Links to non-fiction pieces
first published elsewhere:
(For more non-fiction, see my blog)
Much of my non-fiction work is available online to read for free. If you would like to support my writing, please buy a book, recommend any of my books to your local library for purchase, and/or leave a tip on ko-fi.
In Relentless Reality, I review Domestic Bodies, Jennifer Ruth Jackson's debut poetry collection published by Querencia Press in February. Whale Road Review includes my review, and my first contrapuntal poem Contemplating Continuing as a Crip, in the Summer 2024 issue.
Accommodation v Inclusion started as an angry email, never sent because the intended recipient changed an in-person-only event to hybrid. Since many other entities won't offer online event options, I turned the email into an essay. It lead the 2023 winter issue of Breath & Shadow, a quarterly journal of disability culture/literature.
There was no good choice for a candidate to chair the Washington County Board of Commissioners. Read about the two women who ran, both identifying as 'progressive', plus take a look at the candidates for District 2, on PDX.Vote. I explained who got my vote for chair, and why, on my blog.
HB 4131, introduced by rural Republicans at the urging of Portland Police, egregiously rolls back the little protection for protesters offered by recently passed legislation. I wrote how Oregon Legislature Proposes Rolling Back Police Restraints for The Big Smoke.
Cozcacuauhtli faced years of incarceration for Danza Azteca and displaying piñatas, candles, balloons, and red dresses in memory of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls outside the ICE building in Southwest Portland. I told her story on The Big Smoke.
Until very recently, I never found appropriate words to describe my own gender identity. My essay about Searching for Identity: Finding Words placed third in the 2021 RCWMS Essay Contest. You can now read it in the Winter issue of South of the Garden.
Each year, the U.S. celebrates its brutal and bloody legacy in November. I explained how inequities and injustice, perpetuated by the white supremacy enshrined in the country's founding documents, continue today in National Day of Mourning, one of the Top 20 most widely read/shared articles on The Big Smoke in 2021.
I discussed why Police ≠ Public Safety and the data, the testimony of hundreds, and the protest of thousands that Portland commissioners ignored on The Big Smoke.
Attempts by people to produce proof of Senator Joe Manchin's perfidy made no difference. He won't change, you can't shame someone who has no shame, and history won't remember if there's no one left with enough resources to record it. Read more in West by God Virginia, written for The Big Smoke.
I called out a publication for its Diversity Lip Service. The response surprised me, but I hope it inspires other writers to do the same. Read my essay about it on The Handy, Uncapped Pen, a blog/community for disabled and neurodivergent creatives.
Despite drought afflicting almost the entire Western United States, elected officials do nothing to prevent the coming conflagration. No one is brave enough to shut down the industry and eliminate the profits. See Coming Conflagration written for The Big Smoke.
I discussed the way elected officials invite voters to attend hearings about how they should spend taxpayers' money, but then never listen to what their constituents say in Voices of the Unheard written for The Big Smoke.
One only negotiates if one cares whether the other party agrees to one's terms. In If I Were Police Commissioner, I outline contract terms most cops won't accept but that could result in police who actually serve and protecte all citizens. Written for The Big Smoke.
I discuss why organizations with roots in capturing and punishing Africans who attempted to escape carceral slavery, whose members ignore the law themselves while using it to capture, incarcerate, and kill those who do not fit in what their limited worldview defines as citizen cannot be reformed in You. Can. Not. Reform. This.
Police reform requires starting over from the ground up. Anything less is just an adhesive bandage on a gaping, hemorrhaging, pus-filled wound. I explain how Legislators Miss the Mark with Police Reform on The Big Smoke.
So-called journalists believe they're empowered to invade other people's lives for their clickbait and sixty seconds of infotainment spotlight and do not care who they destroy to get their stories. I analyze how we got here in Protesters, Press, Police.
Despite four years of numerous analysts explaining in myriad articles, videos, posts, etc. that racism is their primary reason for supporting him, there are still people insisting we need to understand why people vote for white supremacy. Meet the New Boss ... Same As the Old Boss.
Liberals and progressives won't jeopardize their own comfort to fundamentally change a system that privileges them. Why voting blue won't make a difference and how I keep Standing Still While Moving Left.
The political winds have shifted since Portland's May 19th mayoral primary. Now, the top vote getter is the underdog. But, the other name on the ballot could be a spoiler. I examined the dynamics on The Big Smoke.
Oregon elected officials and law enforcement use a failed Proud Boys attempt to stir up trouble as an excuse to remove restrictions on violence against Black Lives Matter protesters, brutally attacking them and, once again, choosing Racism Over Reform.
As Black Lives Matter protests continue in the streets of Portland, the rules for doing so peacefully are constantly shifting and police continue to meet Peaceful Protests against police brutality with police violence. Listed as one of the Top 20 most widely read and shared articles on The Big Smoke in 2021.
Portland Police are guilty of numerous crimes and act as if law doesn't apply to them. I examine their malfeasance in Blue Crime Matters on The Big Smoke.
In Puppies and Pelicans, I review Secure Your Own Mask, Shaindel Beers's third poetry collection. Published in the Winter 2019 issue of the Whale Road Review.
For years I questioned the power that book buyers and sellers abdicated to Amazon. In The Politics of Amazon, I discuss one more example of Amazon's abuse of power (excerpted from the June 2009 issue of The Willamette Writer).
A civil union, marriage establishes hundreds of legal rights/responsibilities when a certificate is filed with a government entity. In May 2009, I read my essay about Separation of Church and State, first featured on OutImpact.com in November 2008, on Shape of a Box.
Sometimes it does pay to just say no. I tell a tale of rejection and acceptance in A Story's Tale, published in the Bylines 2009 Writer's Desk Calendar, November 2008.
A writer can't take rejection personally. I discuss how a story that one editor sent back with words intended to sting became my first sale. Bylines 2007 Writer's Desk Calendar published Rejections in November, 2006.
When I leared that some children entering the SMART program never had an adult read to them, I immediately volunteered. I speak of my experience in hopes of encouraging others to Start Making A Reader Today, published in the organization's newsletter in February 2005.
In Sight after death a rewarding gift that leaves a living legacy I wrote about the experience of delivering eye tissue to the Lions Eye Bank (the first of several deliveries made) for the Corvallis Gazette Times in June 2003.
With just over two hours to catch flights at SFO, a flat tire stranded us on the side of the freeway, in rush hour. Fortunately, A Mensch came to our rescue. Originally published as HeroicStories #259 in December 2001, HeroicStories published it a second time May 25, 2015.