Author: Janie Braverman

  • Just Off Ghost Town Road

    Just Off Ghost Town Road

    A twenty-one pass erasure poem

    Janie Braverman

    This is a 21-pass erasure poem, which means it took 21 passes through the source material for this poem to fully emerge.

    The source material is a post written by my friend, the poet X. P. Callahan, for her substack Diary Poems. In the comments to her post, she and talked about multi-pass erasures and finding the right material – which, as she noted, can be any material.

    I thought it would be twelve passes, but the material thought otherwise.

    This one is for you, X. P.

    My process notes, cleaned up to be legible, are here. (It’s a glitch in our Drop Box that it shows up as my husband Jody’s work. Always something with the tech.)

  • Death of a resident

    Death of a resident
    Janie Braverman

    $7,500 fine

    1.2 million monarch butterflies

    two million people

  • The Light of Bears

    The Light of Bears

    as they come out of hibernation in the spring

    Janie Braverman

  • Bird poet

    Bird poet
    Janie Braverman

    Feather thought by some to be from the last known Bird Poet

    Source text for Bird poet:

  • Hide the sky

    Hide the sky
    Janie Braverman

    For another look at the source material.

  • Fragility

    Fragility

    is complicated

    Janie Braverman

    Wikipedia: In glass sciences … kinetic fragility … has no direct relationship with the colloquial meaning of the word “fragility”, which more closely relates to the brittleness of a material.

    Source material, with photographs: Vesuvius Turned One Victim’s Brain to Glass

  • Where do stories begin?

    Where do stories begin?

    For Cory Booker

    Janie Braverman

    Original source material.

  • This is why we cannot have nice things

    This is why we cannot have nice things
    Janie Braverman

    This is also why I can’t write a current events post for Under Construction that is … well … current.

    From headline, paragraphs 2-5 and 8 of this source material.

  • Hello to Spring

    Hello to Spring

    The Medicinal and Spiritual Uses of Taraxacum officinale

    Janie Braverman

    With thanks to Jessica Roeder for pointing me to the source material.

    Jessica teaches writing at Lighthouse Writers and dance in Duluth MN.

  • Requiem for a rabbit

    Requiem for a rabbit
    Janie Braverman

    oh how I miss her–a certain energy and way of being in the world, ineffable

    when our friends hurt, we hurt