It is the oldest vernacular language in Europe; it is “unique,” “complex,” and “primal.” Those are some of the words author Manchán Magan uses to describe the Irish language. Throughout the month of March, Trasna is featuring Irish language writers. We begin with Manchán Magan and his recent 2020 publication,…
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A Windy Treatise on the Development of Theogony By Steve O’Connor Well, March certainly came on like a lion. I’m sure you all remember the night of March 1st when the wind, to quote Bob Dylan, “shook our windows and rattled our doors,” and howled around the eves. The wind…
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Susan April grew up in Lowell and Dracut. She is a scientist who lives in Maryland. She offered us this dream-like poem from 1989. End of Track by Susan April I’m running home again. The church off Shattuck Street smells like morning Mass. The granite curb feels cool…
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My Mother, Smoking By David Daniel A recent editorial in the Sun reports how Massachusetts’ ban on menthol cigarettes has cost the state a lot of tax revenue, while, simultaneously, tobacco sales in neighboring states without such a ban have spiked. I know almost nothing about public tax policy and…
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The entry below is being cross posted from Marjorie Arons-Barron’s own blog. Never has our capacity for patience been so frighteningly tested as in the pursuit of vaccines. I have written about finally connecting and getting my first shot. (Fingers crossed for the second shot.) Examples abound of others still…
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Poet, publisher, and bookstore owner Lawrence Ferlinghetti passed away this week at the age of 101. A friend and publisher of Jack Kerouac’s, Ferlinghetti in the late 1980s visited Lowell at least twice as a guest of the Lowell Celebrates Kerouac! group. He began writing the poem below on a…
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I wrote this appreciation of Roger Brunelle at the request of Dave Moore in England, all-around Kerouac wiseman and founder of a Kerouac Group on Facebook with thousands of members worldwide.–PM Au Revoir, Roger Brunelle (1934-2021) By Paul Marion Au revoir, Roger. Let’s hope we do see you again in…
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Moira Linehan has produced four collections of poetry, two of them in 2020: Toward from Slant Books and & Company from Dos Madres Press. Many of the poems the award-winning poet shares with Trasna were begun during her residencies at the Cill Rialaig Project in Co. Kerry and the Tyrone Guthrie Centre in Co. Monaghan. In these…
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Recycling this bulletin from 2010 when I regularly walked around Lowell. My habit was to walk and then write about what I’d seen for the Howe blog. This area is close to where I lived for 24 years, Highland St near the Rogers School. I was acquainted with Peter Danas…
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Tom Sexton is the author of Cummiskey Alley: New and Selected Lowell Poems, which is available at loompress.com. He is a former Poet Laureate of Alaska and a member of the Lowell High School Hall of Fame. Crossing a Frozen Lagoon on a Sunday Morning by Tom Sexton “800…
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