Wednesday
June 19, 2019
Subscribe
Print or Web publication
Next Line, Please

Next Line, Please

Each Tuesday, our readers contribute a new line of verse—or a completed poem—in collaboration with a renowned poet.

Previous posts

Person walking down stairs, black and white photo

Nine-Line Stanzas

by David Lehman | Tuesday, June 18, 2019
Black and white

Impromptu

by David Lehman | Tuesday, June 11, 2019
A Sonnet Is Ample Space

A Sonnet Is Ample Space

by David Lehman | Tuesday, June 04, 2019
Close-up, macro shot of a bloody knife

“If history can teach us anything …”

by David Lehman | Tuesday, May 28, 2019
Red mailbox

“A Letter is a Joy of Earth”

by David Lehman | Tuesday, May 21, 2019
Old fashioned mailbox that says LETTERS

Read Emily’s Mind

by David Lehman | Tuesday, May 07, 2019
A black and white photograph of a subway car

Poetic Metamorphosis

by David Lehman | Tuesday, April 30, 2019
The Love Poem in an Unromantic Age

The Love Poem in an Unromantic Age

by David Lehman | Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Questions and Echoes

Questions and Echoes

by David Lehman | Tuesday, April 16, 2019
Why Not?

Why Not?

by David Lehman | Tuesday, April 09, 2019
Load more
Smarty Pants Podcast

Newsletter


THIS WEEK’S ARCHIVE PICK

2nd Look

Fathers and Sons

by James McConkey

“Could we have been better parents?” At 87, Cornell emeritus professor James McConkey reflects on the inadvertent ways that parents—especially fathers—shape their children. “Most parents don’t want their children to suffer the kind of grief inflicted on them by their own parents,” he says in this essay from our Spring 2008 issue. “By saving them from that, though, they may inflict upon their children difficulties of another kind.” As the father to three sons, McConkey is acutely aware of how his relationship with his own father informed his relationship with his children. His essay “What Kind of Father Am I?” is a meditation on aging, parenthood, and the bond between fathers and sons.