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Write the Year 2025—Week 25: Pandora Equivocates

It is too hot to brain. This is an incredibly stinky Lakelet. Title: Pandora EquivocatesWC: 102 Incongruous the scent of firsWhen June’s high heat seals sweat to skinThe ghosts of morning linger lateEach breath can hardly bear the weightOf yesterday’s unwelcome fateCalamities within To steal a kiss from burning windAnd box with shadows born in flameThese gestures of the long-since lostThe…

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Review: You Will Get Sick, Steppenwolf Theatre, Chicago https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/regional/chicago/ch812.html

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Write the Year 2025—Week 24: LC 123

Inevitably dark thoughts this week. This is a shadorma about things I can’t stop thinking about, but that both are and are not mine to think aabout. Title: LM 123WC: 104 These storiesare not mine at allbut they creepclose, close, close.Events unfold unbidden,and I remember. I won’t saywho or where or whenbut somethingawful thennow seems dark and expectedand true and untrue. There are…

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Write the Year 2025—Week 23: The Spoils

If it seems like I have nothing to write about except things that I see in the forest preserve while Danger Beagling, it’s only because I have nothing to write about except that. What madwoman decided on a 32-line poem? Oh, that would be me. This is a Gemstone. Title: The SpoilsWC: 167 The awkward arms of summer treeshave trapped two silver starslet loose by imps with grass-stained…

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Review: Iraq, but Funny—Lookingglass Theatre, Chicago https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/regional/chicago/ch810.html

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Write the Year 2025—Week 22: Unbated

Saw Sinners tonight. And I have been menaced by red-winged blackbirds this week (as well as “escorted” by a coyote, who doesn’t really make an appearance here, except subtextually). I dunno. This is an entwined. Title: UnbatedWC: 69 Mistaken for a wrenLet loose a red-wing screechRise up to stake your claimWhen wrath alone can teachYou find your voice again Unrecognized, your flameWill steal…

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Write the Year 2025—Week 21: On High

Exhausted. Annoyed. This is just a Dibi. Title: On HighWC: 52 The artificial starsExpected blueDramatic to the coreEnjoy the viewDon’t writhe so very hardEven though youAre bound to lose this war A sailboat weather vaneEmbraces rustIgnores the changing windAnd still you trustThe filigree refrainof graveyard dustUnwittingly, you’ve sinnedAs serpents must

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Write the Year 2025—Week 20: Hair Ribbons

Well, this is certainly half-assed; I was thinking of taking on the creative nonfiction prompt from Poets & Writers. The first idea that cropped up was writing about a vivid memory of my grandfather, but I realized that I don’t have many concrete memories of him any time other than in summer. And then this turned into something really about my cousin (who was there at the time of the inciting…

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Write the Year 2025—Week 19: Gestural

Several false starts tonight on different forms of poems. I landed on three linked Brahtis (or Brahti-adjacent things). These are unfortunate companions to a song I’m also struggling with this week that also came out of a random jotting down of an image while walking. Title: GesturalWC: 73 Six hummingbirds rattle their tin wingsFly here to there, history insistsAnd true north tugs even…

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Review: Hymn, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre (World Premiere) https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/regional/chicago/ch806.html

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Write the Year 2025—Week 18: Scavengers

A last-minute Flamenca, though the idea has been rolling around in my head for a while. Title: ScavengersWC: 67 Everyone we have beenIs scattered on the lawnAll the Sunday soulsAvert their pious eyesAnd skirt the lines we’ve drawn Six circus-tent tulipsYawn and stretch with curled fistsThey still, stems mid-slantThe story folds, unfoldsThey wonder what they’ve missed Rocking chairs, vacant,…

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Review: Berlin, Court Theatre, Chicago https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/regional/chicago/ch803.html

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Write the Year 2025: Week 17—Elevation

Rushed and not thought out, because I still need to write a review tonight. This is a triple flamenca. Title: ElevationWC: 64 In the branches,a clue that you have leapt—an eager tangle.Know that, devout, I wishfor proof of your success. A paper banner snaps—a lonesome scarlet note—sure as church ladies.And the bottle flies buzz,baritones diving low. I am tipped-over blue.The secrets I could…

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Write the Year 2025—Week 16: Whereabouts

Just an underplanned Dreamsong Title: WhereaboutsWC: 100 Ahead, dangling a lantern, a straw manawaits the sizzling spark from head to toe.Half-lidded eyesanticipate the smoke-curl hooliganwith shoulder-dip sway nonchalance, as thoughthis might be wise. Behind, the face-up queen of spades must planas staggering blue soldiers roil belowthese cloud-stitched skies.Every charred thought since the…

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Write the Year 2025—Week 15: Patina

More bad poetry inspired by my inability to plan. It’s Diminishing Hexaverse born of exhaustion. Title: PatinaWC: 74 A hummingbird of tinAnd punched out metal starsEach grappling with the windAnd showing off their scarsBy light grown paper thinTheir story sad as oursDanger in the sparkComfort in the handBlistering the darkCowards cant withstandThis blistering darkThe fear withoutThe kiss of…

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Thrilling Adventure Hour in Chicago—here's to 20 more years.

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Here. Please have some terrible pictures of my very favorite people on earth. Way long timey ago, I bought tickets to the 20th anniversary of Thrilling Adventure in Chicago, but we made a relatively last-minute decision to go to the WorkJuice improv show tonight, and I am so, so, soooo very glad we did.