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Everybody Goes Home in October By David Daniel In Jack Kerouac’s classic novel, On the Road, his protagonist, setting off on yet another road journey, heading back to the East Coast this time, tells us, “The bus roared on. I was going home in October. Everybody goes home in October.”…
Read More »Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, known better to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. This week we feature a blog piece by writer Orla…
Read More »Spurred by our Texas friend Frank Wagner’s essay about meeting Patti Smith in the late 1970s, an encounter with a cranky, thirty-something, tightly wound artist, we’re reprising this review-essay about Patti Smith’s most recent book, Year of the Monkey, just out in paperback. Note that former Lowell Sun journalists Nancye…
Read More »Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, known better to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. This week we feature award-winning poet, photographer, and filmmaker, Mark…
Read More »On a Rhine River trip with his wife Rosemary in 2019, Paul Marion was transported back to 1969 by a dubbed-into-German classic American film. Here’s a poem he wrote about the experience. Also, coincidentally, this Friday, Oct. 9, would have been the 80th birthday of John Lennon, who is mentioned…
Read More »Siggy and Tina By Steve O’Connor More from Germany. Here’s a Steve O’Connor essay from Lowell Sunrise, 2008 Tina is from Bavaria. A few years ago, she was sent from Germany to work as an intern at the Puma branch in Westford where my wife worked. Puma is a German…
Read More »Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, known better to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. This week we feature Peter Sirr, a well-known poet, and…
Read More »Joe Blair of Iowa posted this lyrical prose on Facebook today. He allowed us to reprint it here. He’s got roots in Greater Lowell and is a past contributor to the Howe blog. Joe is the author of By the Iowa Sea: A Memoir (2012), which O, The Oprah Magazine…
Read More »Charles Bukowski (1920-1994) was a German-American poet and writer who was a contemporary of Jack Kerouac but never a part of the Beat Generation writer scene. Still, Bukowski, who was known as the “Poet of Skid Row” and was called by Time magazine “the laureate of American lowlife” had a…
Read More »Susan April sent us a new essay about a time when she was growing up in Lowell in the Highlands neighborhood. I don’t want to give away the turn in the narrative, so I’ll leave it here. Susan is a past contributor to this publication. Her work has appeared in…
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