Carmelita Estrellita has a dozen songs in the new “First of the Year: 2010”. Here’s a snap-shot of her life and times and five bonus tracks. Puff Peace I arrived in Charlottesville having been homeless for the previous 10 of my 22 years, if you don’t count never feeling at home at home in the … Read more

Clearing My Desk I’m sorry I was sick on the road at the gym on retreat meeting a deadline buying socks freaked out watching baseball painting grieving when you came to town I was too broke tired busy discouraged dirty unhinged ecstatic embarrassed sad desperate to answer yr letter in which you asked me for … Read more

Mother Lion The tawny, long-necked lady talking on a rhinestone studded cell phone who drove her caddy into a cab which knocked into the back of my car where my son slept in his plastic seat, now gestures, graceful as an antelope, apologizing to the taxi’s beefy passenger while we all stand in freezing drizzle … Read more

Yes, we can! This election shifts the exhausted, greedy tone of our time, makes the country stron- ger, able again to change. He looks nice onscreen, far better than that crone, Hillary. Shoots hoops like a Celtic. Blacks and women vote in droves; teens high on hope wear his silkscreened face. Icon already. A profile … Read more

Estrellita still ain’t got no band but her new (virtual) album drops the same month as Leonard Cohen’s who’s one of her heroes. She composed about half the lyrics here in a hot rush last New Year’s eve/day, which calls to mind a story Cohen once told about Bob Dylan: Dylan said to me, “I … Read more

Assimilation People who speak Spanish all have outside jobs, my daughter announces as the Mow ‘n Blow crew descend from a truck to ravish our lawn. I read her a book about dark children dancing, playing drums with wrinkled elders, eating fried plantains. Bored, she grabs Dr. Seuss. I’m not Latin, Mommy, I’m light pink … Read more

aspiring to think like Jesus bought a pack of cigarettes instead speaking of the spaces between us there’s a grade school map in my head look sharp Chicago eyes front New Orleans I’ve got a map of the whole country but I have no idea what it means I failed out of geography physics and … Read more