How one feels about Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange seems to depend on one’s allegiance. I’m reminded of the old joke: Lone Ranger: Tonto, we’re surrounded by Indians! Tonto: What you mean, WE, kemosabe? If you identify, either actively or passively, with corporate capitalism’s global agenda, then Assange is a criminal. If you see […]
While at the Vermont Studio Center in September, working on a nonfiction project, I spent a wonderful afternoon with my former student, the essayist Sarah Stromeyer and her husband, sculptor David Stromeyer, walking the acreage adjacent to their home, viewing David’s stunning work. That field, in Enosburg, is testament to his long and innovative career […]
PROCESSION: AFTER A PHOTOGRAPH BY JOSEF KOUDELKA It only looks as if the boyon the bike, in his angel costume,is pulling the heavy load,drayhorses and all, that we cannot see.Like the faces of the domestic beasts, his face says he is only halfway present.He has learned to steer with one hand. And it only looks […]
From this morning’s BOSTON GLOBE: As the nation prepares to mark the 150th anniversary of the American Civil War in 2011, with commemorations that reinforce the North/South divide, researchers are offering uncomfortable answers to that question, unearthing more and more of the hidden stories of New England slavery — its brutality, its staying power, and […]
THE DEFINITE ARTICLE The people crowded the square.The crowd peopled the square.The troops circled the square.The troops and the people squared off.The name of the people is they.The name of the troops is not us.The name of the square is there.The name of the circle is again.The square peopled the news.The news circled the world.The […]
POOR FREUD, “Freud’s theory of sexuality was the half-truth with which he reconfigured his own traumas and anxiety.” — Louis Breger, FREUD: DARKNESS IN THE MIDST OF VISION walking home,clips a cigar,wants nothing much:an evening’s peace,some coke in the vein,a postulate to chew on;maybe he will finallywrite that letterto his father. Butthey come again:the boys […]
FROM A FRONT WINDOW 1.There is the city of glass and money,over there, but here it comes,closer with every newspaper.Unidentified lying spokesmeninterpret the same old photos:the bloody feet of refugees,the bloody hands of soldiers.Here comes someone, not a neighbor,with a clipboard and a calculator.Where will we grow children and roses?Where will we grow older? 2.Because […]
ABOVE THE FALLS Watch them on the footbridgeabove the fallsthat keeps us from hearing what they say:he leans on the lake side, looking far across,she, above the falls, looks down. We can imagine what he seesis moving with the water to the falls,that the reflections of the trees, the clouds,the docks and houses are a […]
RICHARD HOFFMAN 
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