“I just want you to understand discovering your mother in a rehabilitation hospital packing her things only these are not her things, these are trash things, used diapers, plastic wrap, wads of Kleenex,…

“The windy forests of the high foothills and Front Ranges are the birthplace of rivers: rivers like the Oldman, beside whom I sit most evenings on what I’ve come to know as the…

“There are very few places anymore, in these times, where we can recreate the carefree security of the past, or even the illusion of it. Today, our children can’t even feel safe at…

“The man at the table across from mine/is eating a painting with a knife and fork./It looks to be a lesser Pollock, or perhaps/a Clyfford Still, regardless, abstract/expressionism, surprisingly modern/for a restaurant with…

“With so much turmoil in our world, I was at a loss as to what I would write this month, but then I heard a children’s choir sing Benjamin Britten’s ‘A Ceremony of Carols,’ and…

“Thirteen years ago this week, the day before Thanksgiving, on a whim, I drove from West Virginia to rural Kingston, Georgia to a no-kill dog rescue. As I pulled up to the gate holding…

“In the spring of 2003, The Royal Shakespeare Company helped to bring a theatrical production of Rushdie’s allegorical novel Midnight’s Children to the stage of the Apollo Theater. At the time, and still…

“I am a merry-go-round mannikin yanked by the pole at the top of my head and tossed off the wheel. My pole goes into the soft ground. I see the whirling stars beneath…

“I saw stretching out before me endless days of dealing with those demands, of setting aside my life for a person who terrorized me as a child. Something within me demanded that I…

“I’ve never considered myself the equal of George du Maurier’s Svengali, able instantly to capture the heart and soul of any woman, nor are my good looks on the same terrace as Cary…