Sharon A. Harmon, Straw Dog member, freelance writer and poet, writes for The Uniquely Quabbin Magazine and has two poetry chapbooks. She just had a story accepted for Chicken Soup, “Christmas is in the Air.” Sharon teaches workshops on poetry and writing for magazines and is currently working on two children’s picture books. Covid World Read More
Blog
Mourning song by Libby Maxey
Libby Maxey, a Franklin County resident and Straw Dog member, works for Amherst College and Literary Mama. Her poems have appeared in Emrys, Stoneboat and elsewhere, and her first poetry collection, Kairos, won Finishing Line Press’s 2018 New Women’s Voices Chapbook Competition. Her nonliterary activities used to include singing. Mourning song Before, we planned new Read More
APRIL 2020 by Lanette Sweeney
Lanette Sweeney, now a full-time writer and MFA student at Western New England University, thanks to her wife’s support, has survived lifetimes as a mother, reporter, editor, fund-raiser, and teacher of English and Women’s Studies. Her writing has appeared in multiple literary journals and anthologies. APRIL 2020 I miss seeing human faces not split by Read More
First Anniversary by Sharon Tracey
Sharon Tracey’s poems have appeared in The Worcester Review, Mom Egg Review, Tule Review, The Ekphrastic Review, and elsewhere. Her full-length poetry collections include Chroma (forthcoming from Shanti Arts) and What I Remember Most Is Everything (All Caps Publishing, 2017). She is a member of Straw Dog Writers Guild. First Anniversary —April 15, 2020 Not Read More
THE LT. GOVERNOR OF TEXAS SUGGESTS SOME OF US MIGHT HAVE TO DIE IN ORDER TO SAVE OUR ECONOMY by Fred Pelka
Fred Pelka is the author of What We Have Done: An Oral History of the Disability Rights Movement and other books on the history of disability and disability rights. His first book of poetry, A Different Blaze, was published by Hedgerow Books in 2014. He was a 2004 Guggenheim Fellow. THE LT. GOVERNOR OF TEXAS Read More
Forecast by Christine Labich
Christine Labich is a visual artist and poet living in Hampshire County. Her work is the practice of finding spirit-sustaining meaning and magic in ordinary human life and the natural world. She brings a deep appreciation for and desire to illuminate the complexities of being human to all her activities. Forecast How to be on Read More
Waiting by Amy Laprade
A Straw Dog member from Franklin County, Amy Laprade is a writing coach and author of “So Nice To Finally Meet You…,” “Behind the Magic 8 Ball,” and “Silence Is Premeditated: A Collection.” Her poem “Deafening” will be forthcoming in The 64: Best Poets Of The Year, Black Mountain Press. Waiting everything that ever mattered Read More
Kazhuo Ohno Dancing Through my Quarantine by Maddy Leue
Maddy Leue is a poet from Franklin County (Ashfield) and is a member of the Cloud Saddle Writers. She is a single parent, a graduate student of public policy, an artist, a caregiver, a wanderer of woods, a tea-drinker, a tinkerer, a meddler. (Kazhuo Ohno, who is referenced in the title of this poem, was Read More
VIRUS by Eileen Gloster
Eileen Gloster teaches second grade in her hometown of North Adams, Massachusetts. She is a former owner of Papyri Books, where she hosted readings and open mics. Her poetry has been published in local journals. Grateful for this opportunity and incentive, she recently joined Straw Dog Writers Guild. VIRUS 1. Safe, alone, I kneel in Read More
Is This the New Normal? by Peggy Winnett
Peggy Winnett lives in retirement in Leeds, Ma (Hampshire Co.). She has been delighted to find herself in an active writing community, as it stimulates her own late stirrings in that direction. Is This the New Normal? I seem to have disappeared I can’t find myself anywhere I’ve looked in all the usual places But Read More