I am a hoarder, a hoarder of nouns. Lately I've been pilfering nouns from 1970s fantasy novels. Words like zenith and demon, vortex and unicorn would likely never come on my radar otherwise. And they're dynamite words. They lend poems leap and tilt by getting me out of my conscious...

On the eve of a homecoming reading for my first book of poems, I empathized with Chava from Fiddler on the Roof in the moments before her father disowned her. I imagined my mother at the helm of her suburban stationery business, pontificating on calligraphy. Then I thought about...

The other night I felt poet's block so I turned on the TV and watched the very trippy 70s movie, The Wiz, starring Michael Jackson and Diana Ross. In addition to captivating me with its carnivorous subways and poppy girls, The Wiz reminded me of something that a teacher...

If you told me five years ago that I'd have a book in the window at St. Mark's Bookshop, I would have plotzed. I used to go to St. Mark's and sit on the floor in the poetry section eating Jujyfruits, as if it was Grauman's Chinese Theater. From big...