Monthly Archives: March 2022

Poem (?) for the Day

By Robin Bates | Published: March 31, 2022

A poem for April Fools’ Day

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Authors as Nationalist Symbols

By Robin Bates | Published: March 30, 2022

Perhaps Russia has a sentimental attachment to Ukraine because many of its authors have loved its cities, especially Odessa.

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Addressing a Long and Sad History

By Robin Bates | Published: March 29, 2022

The long overdue anti-lynching bill signed into law by Biden yesterday brings to mind powerful lynching poems, including this one by Hughes.

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Lucille Clifton on Turning Red

By Robin Bates | Published: March 28, 2022

Pixar’s “Turning Red” brings to mind a series of Lucille Clifton poems where she too looks at the red dimensions of womanhood–and how to handle them.

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The Very Model of a Modern Russian General

By Robin Bates | Published: March 27, 2022

Tweeters have been busy finding literary allusions to capture the incompetence of Russia’s armed forces in Ukraine.

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Mary’s Courage In Saying Yes

By Robin Bates | Published: March 26, 2022

Levertov’s “The Annunciation” sees Mary as making a momentous choice and not as a passive receptacle.

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A Hughes Poem in a SCOTUS Hearing

By Robin Bates | Published: March 24, 2022

By citing Hughes’s “Let America Be America Again,” Sen. Booker honored the occasion of the first African American woman being nominated for the Supreme Court.

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Could “Dover Beach” Prevent a Rape?

By Robin Bates | Published: March 23, 2022

McEwan’s novel “Saturday” shows Arnold’s “Dover Beach” forestalling a rape.

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No Crystal Stair for Judge Jackson

By Robin Bates | Published: March 22, 2022

The prospect of a Black woman being nominated to the highest court in the land bring to mind Langston Hughes’s “Mother to Son.” In other words, it’s been a long climb.

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