brad watson

She thought she heard the distant trill of a bird and looked up as a crash of bubbles shot down from the surface. The bubbles cleared and she saw it was the lifeguard, his dark and curly hair about his face like a nest of water serpents. His eyes were a clear blue revelation, open wide and upon her. She held out her arms. He came forward and held her and pulled her gently upward. Her hands felt the muscles moving powerfully along his back. She thought that he must have wings this angel, and he would take her on some beautiful journey.
- The Last Days of the Dog Men: Agnes of Bob

This may read like the most cliche of romance scenes but it's far from that. Read it again and this time picture Agnes Menken, a one-eyed, eighty-something widow, whose only companion is her dog, under water.

In defense of TMI

A friend and former colleague of mine wrote, an awesomely convincing parody of Gilbert's writing. Commenters called the parody "alarming" and "jaw droppingly brilliant" and "the best thing on the Internet today." And I agreed and still do. The likeness was stunning but also saddening. If someone like Gilbert could be impersonated so easily, what does that mean for the rest of the writers out there. And while the parody stresses the flaws, the run-ons and the deluge of details, characteristic of Gilbert's writing. It forgets what makes Gilbert's writing so refreshing; she can do what writers are so often told to do: "close the door and write." Someone who worried about sounding vain, desperate, weak, or condescending, could never have written Gilbert's first book or her second.

There are only Two or Three Human Stories

"There are only two or three human stories and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before.
There are only two or three human stories and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before.
There are only two or three human stories and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before."
- Willa Cather (1873- 1947) O Pioneers!

This is from the Library Walk between the Lion Library and Grand Central (yes the Lion Library is it's official name, thank you). And thank you Reid Harris Cooper for taking these photos, I hope it was warm out. Thank you Willa. And thank you Robert. I think they ate the same thing for breakfast that day. Or perhaps they sat together in study hall (I know, I know not possible.) Still, I'd like to have been there.

"Someone is reading in a deepening room
Where something happens, something that will come

To happen again. Something that will happen again as many times
As she is reading in as many rooms

What happens outside that calm like water braiding
Over green stones? The ones of little reading

Or who never read for love, are many places
They are in the house of power, and many houses..."

- Robert Pinsky (1940-) "Library Scene"