As a Tuskegee Airman, the late Leon “Woodie” Spears was one of fewer than 1,000 African-Americans pilots in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II. He was among the last cadets to be trained on the grounds of (and in the air above) the Tuskegee Army Air Field near Tuskegee, Ala. Several thousand other African-Americans were also trained there to be navigators, traffic controllers, mechanics, and bomber crew members. Nothing was easy for the young black men who came to Tuskegee from all around the country in the early 1940s. Woodie was from … Continue reading A Tuskegee Airman by Miles Fowler→
A proposed 21st Century Federal Writers’ Project introduced in the House of Representatives last month is gaining broad support from literary and writers’ organizations hard hit by the Covid pandemic. The bill, introduced by two Texas Democrats, would hire writers to chronicle the changes wrought by the pandemic, much the way the 1930s project explored the devastating impact of the Great Depression and other historical mileposts. That enormously successful program paid emerging writers to collect oral histories and tell the stories of Americans whose lives were forever changed. Some of those hired by the program … Continue reading The 21st Century Federal Writers’ Project By Deborah Kelly→
The old poet who thinks he is young remembers the young poet who used to be wise. Twyford James Though I had my suspicions last fall and tried to hope it along this spring, the venerable holly tree is dead. Most of its leaves lost, yellow paint chips on the ground, the ever and green are missing from “evergreen.” And so the bark sloughs off, the punky white wood is useful to spalting fungi and insect larvae. The woodpeckers follow. A pileated visits Holly’s Diner, chisels like a true craftsman, searches earnestly for … Continue reading Poems Everworthy by Fred Wilbur→
In your final manuscript, every scene should contain a conflict that’s essential to your narrative arc, something that simultaneously captivates the reader and catapults your story forward. Like stories, scenes also have a shape. Some work well, while others fall flat. When you spend a lot of time on something in your story, you’re saying, “Hey reader, this is super important, so pay close attention to these details.” In other words, you’re giving this part of your story some weight or importance. In an effective scene, your main character has a conflict that peaks in … Continue reading Fix Your Scene Shapes by Lisa Ellison→
At thirty-seven inches and thirty-seven pounds, I was the second smallest kid in my first-grade class. The smallest was a kid we called Peanut—a boy so tiny, he’d drown in the shallow end of the pool. Everyone loved to ruffle Peanut’s hair. I loved his “old man” style, complete with plaid bell-bottoms, butterfly-colored shirts, and hair slicked down with Vitalis. Peanut was a sweet, old soul who appeared to like being small. For a long time, I did too. Growing up in a rust-belt town where bad luck seemed like all we had, a small … Continue reading How the Imposter Syndrome Works to Keep You Small by Lisa Ellison→
I get emails and messages from aspiring writers all the time asking me for the one thing they should know, or the one thing they should do, in order to be a successful writer. Well, there’s never just “one thing,” but I’ve taken all my very best writing advice and distilled it down into five things that will help any aspiring writer along on their way to success. Stop Trying to Control Everything This is a big one. Writers are anxious people and we like control. It makes us feel safe and like we can … Continue reading 5 Best Pieces of Advice for Aspiring Writers by Lauren Sapala→
There’s a line in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God that I’ve always loved. After revealing some painful family history, Nanny tells her sixteen-year-old granddaughter, “Put me down easy, Janie, Ah’m a cracked plate.” The image conveys damage, resilience, and fragility all rolled into one. These days, we are all cracked plates. The pandemic dropped everybody on a very hard floor, as did the 2020 U.S. presidential campaign and its unsavory coda on January 6, 2021. Our public reckoning with racism, signified for many by the murder of George Floyd, has been another … Continue reading Getting Unhooked by Hilary Holladay→
I live in a writers’ sanctuary, a nineteenth century three-story house overlooking the James and Tye Rivers. The back stairway off my kitchen leads to my office and bedrooms; a long narrow hall on the second floor separates my quarters from the writers’ section of the house. When the house is empty of visiting writers I like to wander through the rooms and reacquaint myself with the many books. Most of the books are my deceased husband’s or mine collected over the years. Over time, more books appear, publications of past resident writers and donated … Continue reading Return to Sender by Trudy Hale→
On the one-year anniversary of the Covid lockdown, my husband and I decided to visit the recently-reopened Museum of Modern Art (while double-masked and socially-distanced) in midtown Manhattan, and have dinner afterwards in a private outdoor hut in the West Village. When I had my temperature check before entering the MOMA yesterday, the attendant made eye contact with me and said—you have beautiful eyes and I love your glasses. We looked at each other for a few more seconds, and I said thank you and his eyes crinkled above his mask. We really saw each other for … Continue reading Being Seen by Kathleen McKitty Harris→
Yes, champagne, please. It’s a red letter day here at the essay/memoir neighborhood of Streetlight: time to announce (appropriate fanfare) the outcome of our sixth essay/memoir contest. It’s a time of hopefulness, vaccinations and all, even if we are—for the second year in a row—announcing the winners of our contest in the midst of an ongoing pandemic. I feel grateful for all the help I’ve had, especially to Paula Boyland who co-judged and to Emily Littlewood, who kept us ‘blind’ in our reading by keeping track of the entries for us. But, most of all, … Continue reading Bring Out the Champagne! by Susan Shafarzek→
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