Poem: Vacant Lot Pope
Walk the goofy walk of the Galilee clown, laughing at denarii or spilling the coins in anger amid the pigeons and lambs, music of the heavens, lyrics by sacred hoboes […]
Chicago Is Lit: Independent Bookstore Day and More Spring Events
For regular readers of this column, Saturday’s Independent Bookstore Day is likely as highly anticipated as the Super Bowl (if not more so). If you haven’t made your game day […]
Book Smarts: Secret World Books of Highland Park—Third Space for the North Shore
Capitalism abhors a creative gathering place—otherwise auto dealerships would put on poetry slams and hardware stores would host book clubs, wouldn’t they? While coffeehouses and restaurants often step up to […]
Review: Scream of Protest, Cry from the Heart, For Gaza’s Children: Black, Brown and Jewish Writers and Poets Speak Out, edited by Marc Lamont Hill, Haki Madhubuti, and Keith Gilyard
For Gaza’s Children is a scream of protest against the oppression of Palestinians by those who have suffered oppression themselves. It is a cry from the heart against the destruction, […]
Review: Learning to Love the Feel of Words in The Braille Encyclopedia
“I grew up in a nest feathered with words, texts, and books,” Naomi Cohn writes in the first essay of her lyrical debut memoir, The Braille Encyclopedia: Brief Essays on […]
Glögg and Carols at Simon’s Tavern
They come every year around this time, gathering at the long bar or huddling around the worn wooden tables. Many stand in the middle of the floor shoulder to shoulder […]
Interview: Ruben Quesada on His New Collection, Brutal Companion
Ruben Quesada is a poet and editor of the award-winning anthology Latinx Poetics: Essays on the Art of Poetry. His poetry and criticism have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Best American Poetry, The Believer, Harvard […]
Interview: Daniel Borzutzky and The Murmuring Grief of the Americas
Conducted by Binx Perino I learned of Daniel Borzutzky’s work after reading Lake Michigan (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019). I had just moved to Chicago and was interested in the […]
Chicago Is Lit: Printers Row Lit Fest and More September Events
Avid book lovers can be a solitary bunch—after all, it’s hard to lug our stacks (and stacks) of books around a party. But that is exactly what’s about to go […]
Chicago Is Lit: August Live Literature Events and Readings
This month’s column explores another reason Chicago’s literary scene is “lit”: the wide variety of live literature events held in neighborhoods across the city. From conversations with award-winning authors to […]
Interview: S. Fey, Author of Decompose
Interview by Binx Perino. In preparation for the Association of Writers and Writing Programs 2024 Annual Conference, I organized a poetry reading to benefit Kansas City based mutual aid groups […]
Review: The Terror of Love and Grief—Elsewhere: An Elegy, by Faisal Mohyuddin
In his poem “The Hourglass. The Pebble. The Throne of God,” Faisal Mohyuddin ponders “the lightless language of elegy.” His father is dead, and he is grieving. And he wonders if he […]