It's That Time Of Year

May your winter solstice be as congenial as this Wham! music video.

Raise Up

This beautiful interview with the eleven year old boys who will be playing the prince in New York City Ballet's Nutcracker this winter made me wonder about raising a boy to be tender and true in our culture. As if in response to my meandering thoughts on the matter, this piece touched on the transformative terrain of male adolescence from a mom's perspective. 

Postpartum Depression

I so appreciated this candid narration of postpartum depression. I don't think I've had a full blown case, but I absolutely feel that potential in me and reel from the occasional upwelling of despair. In other words, I can relate even if I wouldn't claim the experience as my own. 

And Then There Was Pittsburgh...

My nephew Leo features in this response to the latest eruption of fear-based violence.

What a counter point to the message of peace I received from my dad in the Jewish new year:

A Sympathy Of Poems

Bearing Witness

Under the dual heat 
of love and alcohol
you melt. 

Solid to liquid.

Then reconstitute 
in the morning.

A little wonky
for wear (and tear).

But yourself,
whole 
and alive.


No Problem Not Possible

Careening between small mercies
Bruised in all the right places
You travel head up and wings out.

Oh, My Heart

This obituary, a family's ode to their loved one claimed by addiction, brought me to tears.

Bleak

How far must we travel as a nation into grimness, this horror show, before we stop our stumbling and regain footing in our own innate goodness? We are so deep in the dregs, so mired in the muck.