LITERATURE
The Soul and the Sound of the Man with the Dancing Hands
By Jim Dunn
Republished by permission of the author.
From Bass Rocks to
the slippery cliffs of Rafe’s chasm
I hear the resounding
ringing of your Afro Cuban rhythm
It’s the beat
way down to your shoes
It's the beat to keep.
It’s the beattitudes
It's the beat in the heart.
It's being beat and down in the world
It’s the rhythm
The rhythm of your rockin’
and the roll of your soul …
Huldufólk
By JoeAnn Hart
“Huldufólk” is part of the prize-winning fiction collection Highwire Act & Other Tales of Survival by JoeAnn Hart, published by Black Lawrence Press in September 2023.
Astrid, their Icelandic tour guide, was so white her head seemed disembodied from her black Gore-Texed torso. Nary a suggestion of yellow in her hair, no pink to her skin, but it could have been the lighting, or more accurately, its lack. The entire busload of tourists knew one another only by flashlight. It had been dark when they boarded in Reykjavik, it was darker still an hour away from the artificial glow of the city, the better to view the aurora borealis streaking white and green in the sky. Released from the bus, they had arranged themselves on rocks in the field, silhouettes bundled against the cold, and when the first Day-Glo glimmer appeared on the celestial canvas, …
Reversing the Rivers: A Memoir of History, Hope, and Human Rights
By William F. Schulz
Reviewed by Gregg Kvistad
June 28, 2023
William F. Schulz, now a resident of Cape Ann, has just published an extraordinary book, Reversing the Rivers: A Memoir of History, Hope, and Human Rights, with University of Pennsylvania Press. It is a memoir that focuses mainly on his 12-year tenure as the Executive Director of Amnesty International USA. …
Mooney’s Manifesto
By Greg Gibson
Review © Bing McGilvray
May 17, 2023
Mooney’s Manifesto is Greg Gibson’s new book, a roman-a-clef, fictionalized version of Greg’s haunting life experiences. And yes, the best damned novel I’ve read in a long time. Like few characters of fiction ever could, Mooney got to me. Now I cannot get him out of my head.
TSE and Father on Pickford's Boat (cited as 1895) Photograph by Henry Ware Eliot, Jr. Courtesy of the T.S. Eliot Estate.
Dear Papa …
Young Tom Eliot’s Letter from Gloucester (1895)
By Chris Munkholm
October 26, 2022
In September, the Dry Salvages Festival celebrated T. S. Eliot's early years summering in Gloucester, and their influence on his body of poetry. Included in the program was a collection of artifacts, many borrowed from Harvard's Houghton Library and displayed in the Cape Ann Museum Library. Among the documents was the poet’s first preserved correspondence, a letter to his father written in 1895. COSMOS has secured permission from the T. S. Eliot Estate to publish a transcription of the composition, originally written in the formal cursive style of the time.
COSMOS Features: Literature
