“Whom Must We Hire?” The Top 5 Questions Every College or University Should be Asking Itself (Part 3 of a 5 Part Series)

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You have just finished making love to your beautiful third wife, who happens to be a 20-year old Sports Illustrated swimsuit model when you feel it. The unmistakable stutter thump of heart palpitations. You break out in a cold sweat, and a bracing pain in your lower left jaw strips you of the abi...

The FEMININE PRONOUN series # 16: Keep Your Eyes on the Prize

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This episode finds me moving from my various roles of artist, daughter, and mother. What’s cool is I get to inhabit all of them at the same time! From a multi media poetry reading with my father for the nine network, to Cinco de Mayo on Cherokee Street, to a wonderful Mother’s Day breakfast with ...

Who Are We, Really? The Five Questions Every College or University Should Ask Itself (PART TWO OF A FIVE PART SERIES)

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Support and love are interchangeable words. And like love, support is an action word. Love without action is empty. It’s just fondness. Or maybe the absence of intentional harm. To this end, many organizations think support means to have good thoughts about, or good feelings toward, or not to b...

Are We Racist? The Five Questions Every College or University Should Ask Itself (A FIVE PART SERIES)

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I have taught at colleges and universities for 15 years — art schools, community colleges, universities, even college age students in a prison — and what I’ve come to realize is that the U.S. system of colleges and universities or “The Academy,” as we like to call it, operates as a citizen in...

The FEMININE PRONOUN Series #14: #blackpoetsspeakout

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The #blackpoetsspeakout movement was started by Jericho Brown, Mahogany Brown, and Amanda Johnston in the wake of Michael Brown’s death in Ferguson, Missouri. This episode finds me traveling to participate in a #blackpoetsspeakout reading in Columbia, Missouri. The reading featured poets from the...

Top 5 Reasons Why I Prefer an Anti-racist ACCOMPLICE to an “Ally.”

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In this podcast I breakdown why anti-racist ACCOMPLICE is preferable to “ally.”  I would love to hear your feedback!   _________________________________________________________________________ Paulo Friere wrote, “Washing one’s hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless mea...

The FEMININE PRONOUN Series #13: The Kids Are Alright!

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In this episode I prove that poetry works with seasoned adults, college aged readers and writers, and high school “novices.” I travel from Illinois’s capitol, where I read for the state legislators, and the Illinois Humanities administration, to McKendree University,  and I end with the brillian...

Is there Such a Thing as a Poor White Progressive?

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“We po’.” Almost everyday, my grandmother would say this simple sentence. The missing verb served to make it more immediate, like a simple equation. “We po’.” We equaled poor. Sometimes she said it in response to the evening news when groups of white men argued in Washington, DC about...