What I hope to accomplish in this book is to give writing prompts that will help you to get past all the outside influences that keep you from believing in yourself and in your ability to write. In order to write, you need to get rid of notions about language, poetic form, and esoteric subject matter ? all the things that the poetry police have told you are essential if you are to write. I wanted to start from a different place, a place controlled by instinct rather than by intelligence. Revision, the shaping and honing of the poem, should come later, and, in revising, care always needs to be taken to retain the vitality and electricity of the poem. Anyone can learn to craft a capable poem, but it is the poems that retain that initial vitality that we remember; these are the poems that teach us how to be human.

Mari Mazziotti Gillan's new book, When the Stars were Still Visible, asks us to 'remember.' In her example, memories start 'on the back steps of the six-family tenement / on 5th Avenue in Paterson' in 1944, her father dressed 'as a devil for a costume party / at the SocietA Cilentana'; this opens 'so many memories' which 'swirl / like bits of color in a kaleidoscope': of Mrs Gianelli 'who always fainted when she got upset' and of 'Zio Guillermo's garden / with tomatoes and zucchini and corn' which is 'years later / covered with asphalt and garages.' The poet tells us that 'children of immigrants pick up bits and pieces / over the years to create a picture' ('The Children of Immigrants'), that 'On the street where I grew up / everyone knew everyone else. / We knew each other's secrets' ('Carrying Their Hometowns to Paterson'), and, invoking Eliot, that they wore faces that they presented to the world. She writes about her people, her community, and the comfort of soothing things 'beckoning me home' ('Even After All These Years'), the way, perhaps, that all poetry should.

Poetry. In THE SILENCE OF AN EMPTY HOUSE, Maria Mazziotti Gillan comes to the limit of human experience, stares death in the face, and struggles to keep moving. These moments she faces and speaks of so clearly are unavoidable, and the long illness and death of her husband, Dennis, is her personal version of the fundamental struggle we all face. THE SILENCE OF AN EMPTY HOUSE speaks of forgiveness, guilt and grace. With courage and a stubborn refusal to look away from the terrors that surround her on so many levels, Gillan documents the parallels between our own struggles with mortality and the struggles being played out on the world stage today. From wars to climate change to the death of whole species to her own struggles with the deaths of her husband, family and friends, she makes each of these battles the reader's own, and gives order and meaning to those fundamental things that otherwise threaten to capsize us.

Poetry. Italian American Studies. Maria Mazziotti Gillan's Ancestors' Song takes the reader on a journey, one in which she recognizes deep within herself "the voices of the women who came before," their words blending together, forming, as she tells the reader, "the beat I move to." This beat is very much a part of the narrative she weaves in her characteristically honest, intimate, and humorous voice. This beat is true, hard working, strong; a beat that began in the villages on the mountaintops in San Mauro, Italy, and continues to the present day, illuminating the path for those that will follow. These poems will move you to laughter, to tears, and a mixture of both, and are proof that Gillan is at the peak of her career. She is truly one of America's most beloved poets.

Poetry. The place that Maria Mazziotti Gillan calls home is a universal haven built of enduring memories and peopled by loving family. In Gillan's newest book of poetry, THE PLACE I CALL HOME, we share her complex emotions of an immigrant childhood in Paterson, New Jersey, in the 1950s, her long marriage, her husband's devastating illness, and her subsequent widowhood. Yet, we also share the sheltering family in which she grew up, the deep love binding her and her husband, the unfolding of her life as a mother and grandmother, and, most of all, her resilient spirit. She reminds us that even when the bud of youthful na vet flowers into the reality of an uncaring universe, we are home again when we recall the protection we felt within the warm sanctuary of family. These poems are beautiful crystalline narratives, sometimes exuberant and sometimes poignant, but always unflinchingly true."THE PLACE I CALL HOME by Maria Mazziotti Gillan contains some of the most honest poems about marriage and family a reader is likely ever to come across. The craft is there, the well chosen word or phrase, but the power of these poems comes also from the truth in them that is moving and rare."--Marge Piercy"

This anthology gathers fiction, poetry, memoirs, oral histories, and journalistic pieces by some of the best Italian American writers to chronicle the Italian American experience in the Garden State. The collection features male and female writers whose work focuses on Italian American life and the distinctive culture of New Jersey, which long has been home to a large and vital Italian American community. Filled with passion, humor, and grace, these writings depict a variety of experiences, including poignant but failed attempts at conformity and the alienation often felt by ethnic Americans. The authors also speak of the strength gained through the preservation of their communities and the realization that it is often the difference from the norm that helps them succeed. Although it deals with only one ethnic group, the volume addresses in microcosm the complexities of American identity, depicting situations and conveying emotions that will resonate with people of all immigrant ancestries. Italian American Writers on New Jersey features writers who have a national following, such as Gay Talese, Tom Perrotta, Louise DeSalvo, and Maria Laurino, as well as lesser-known authors. The volume moves beyond stereotypes, providing a fresh perspective on the diversity, complexity, and richness of Italian American experiences. Publication of this book is made possible in part by a grant from the Institute of Italian and Italian American Heritage Studies, State of New Jersey.

In stories and poems that explore how our society shapes us, Identity Lessons features a wide array of ethnic perspectives on growing up in America. Leading the reader into the living-rooms, boardrooms, classrooms, and movie houses of America, distinguished writers from all points of the American ethnic landscape shed light on the space between conformity and difference, and examine the struggle between the need to belong and the pull of one's cultural roots. With insight, wit, and poignancy, the contributors to this anthology recall their attempts to reconcile family from the old country with the powerful messages about race, gender and class confronting them in their new surroundings. A collection of superb and moving writing, Identity Lessons deconstructs conceptions of personal and national identity, and forms an indispensable primer for understanding our cultural selves.

A multicultural array of poets explore what it is means to be American
This powerful and moving collection of poems stretches across the boundaries of skin color, language, ethnicity, and religion to give voice to the lives and experiences of ethnic Americans. With extraordinary honesty, dignity, and insight, these poems address common themes of assimilation, communication, and self-perception. In recording everyday life in our many American cultures, they displace the myths and stereotypes that pervade our culture.
"Unsettling America" includes work by:
Amiri Baraka
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Rita Dove
Louise Erdich
Jessica Hagedorn
Joy Harjo
Garrett Hongo
Li-Young Lee
Pat Mora
Naomi Shihab Nye
Marye Percy
Ishmael Reed
Alberto Rios
Ntozake Shange
Gary Soto
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Nellie Wong
David Hernandez
Mary TallMountain
...and many more.