Since the astonishing Coleman Barks died Feb. 23rd, I've been trying to write about this premier translator of Rumi, the ever-relevant 13th century Sufi mystic poet Coleman brought us. I especially want to tell the story of how I met Coleman when he was helping, in extraordinary fashion, my friend John Willison. But I stopped myself from writing this celebration of poets and poetry because of all the stuff happening in our world lately. ICE showed up in my town to disappear s

With Coleman and John (and a very bright lamp) Last night was one of the shining evenings of my life. Surrounded by lightning and thunder...

When it was mentioned in a newspaper article that the poet laureate read a poem at a rally, someone remarked sarcastically, “Yeah,...