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The Oxen
As stories go, the Christmas birth story as it has been accumulated through the centuries is quite the thing, isn’t it? Let me be honest with you: the overall theological interjections, who Jesus is,...
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Since There Is No Escape: Thanatopsis-Turvy.
Here’s another piece that has been in process for nearly a month. It’s also another that I’ve held back because I feared it would be either disturbing or unattractive. It should be apparent by now that...
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Storm Fear
Of all the English language poets who have achieved a general readership, it’s likely that Robert Frost is the most misunderstood. I don’t say that to shame that broad audience — after all, in my...
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To not be scared of death that doesn’t understand us
I’m going to start off the new year 2024 with something I do less often, presenting a new piece that uses my own words. I give myself permission in part because it was engendered by thoughts of another...
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The Sparrow
Paul Laurence Dunbar is most often introduced as the first successful Afro-American poet, and I guess I’ve just followed form by starting this post that way. That statement is more-or-less true. I’d...
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Wanderers Nightsong II
Despite my inveterate bicycling and my wife’s love of nature walks, I’ve never been much of a hiker, and I’m very much not so in my old age. None-the-less I was charmed this winter when I saw this...
View ArticleHave you tried rebooting? And Melanie, in memoriam
There’s new Parlando stuff coming. Indeed, there would already have been a new piece with words by Emily Dickinson this week if it wasn’t for a couple of issues. Issue #1 was with a new, upgraded...
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If all the griefs…. Emily Dickinson and also music
We’ll get to a remarkable short Emily Dickinson poem today, but first a few words about the music. One of the things I like about this Project is not caring about what style of music I make to combine...
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Waters of Forgetfulness
Here’s the next poem in our series this Black History Month written by early 20th century Chicago poet Fenton Johnson. Like his “Dunbar” poem from earlier this week, “Waters of Forgetfulness” was...
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The Wraithie’s Message
Is there anyone reading this far in these posts today mumbling to themselves “It’s Black History Month — and instead of the eclectic variety I expect from the Parlando Project, Frank is giving us this...
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Mistah Witch: Pioneering Blues Poetry
Enjoy the Valentine’s candy if you have it, but this is a longer post, and we’re going to get into some uncomfortable stuff with this one. Yes racism, but then I’ll deal today with musicology and...
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The Prodigal Son: Another mode of Fenton Johnson’s poetry
Over this February I’ve presented a variety of early poems by the lesser-known Black Chicago poet Fenton Johnson. Johnson self-published two book-length collections of his verse in the years before...
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Two Aunties: Fenton Johnson’s transition to Modernist free verse
There’s a great deal that remains unknown about the poet I’ve been featuring here this month: Fenton Johnson — but then again, there are some things that I’ve been able to learn about him since I first...
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Was Fenton Johnson "one of the first Negro revolutionary poets”
Given that there’s no full biography for Fenton Johnson, and that it would be difficult to produce one with reliable levels of detail at this late date, this post is going to resort to a measure of...
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Wrapping up Fenton Johnson, for now
We’ve come to the end of our Black History Month series on early 20th Century Black Chicago poet Fenton Johnson. Let me try to wrap things up with a few summary points — which as I’ll warn again, are...
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The Last Antelope
Nothing excites me more while doing this project than coming across a little-known poet that I had never heard of. Some of these poets have perhaps a single poem worthy of interest; others, whole...
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The Late Singer, a song for Spring
A short post and a short off-the-cuff audio piece today. I keep trying to fit this Project into my life, and this William Carlos Williams’ Spring poem reminds us that it’s never too late to sing. I had...
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The Drunken Singer
Even though the Parlando Project is about presenting other people’s words,* I sometimes remind myself that I still write poetry and lyrics. Every so often I’ll think of a song, sometimes one I wrote...
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The Wind Didn’t Come from the Orchard Today
Today is World Poetry Day, and if I want to represent the United States poetically to the world, one of my first thoughts for a representative poet would be Emily Dickinson. Dickinson has many...
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Cool Tombs
It’s been too long since I’ve presented a poem by Carl Sandburg here, and awhile since I had the time to make one of my “punk orchestral” pieces accompanying one of the poems. Carl first. Unlike Frost...
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