Timothy W. Graveson, Farm Book (detail)

Volume 5

A splendid sampler of exceptional prose, poetry, and art! In this issue, actor, author, and activist Peter Coyote offers a revealing memoir about his father and his father’s father, alongside Tim Foley’s contemplations on San Quentin Prison, an autograph musical manuscript by composer Burt Bacharach, poetry by Linda Pastan and Howard Norman, and compelling art by Randall Gray Fleming and Wendy Schwartz.

Debbie Patrick, Are We There Yet? (detail)

Fathers

Peter Coyote

My father, Morris, was only five feet nine inches—a giant to a child—but his nineteen-inch neck and fifty-four-inch chest made him imposing to adults as well, and men marked his presence. He was handsome, with a virile, charismatic manner; a witty man capable of immense charm and extravagant generosity.

Burt Bacharach, Steven Sater, Living with a Ghost (detail)

Living with a Ghost

Burt Bacharach, Autograph Musical Manuscript
Lyrics by Steven Sater

If the object

is for things to grow

the deadwood must be first to go

then the center

tangled tight

opened wide

to

air and light.

– Gina Cloud, “January”
Clare Elsaesser, Flower Child (detail)

The compulsive surge

of surf against rock, surf

against rock—

white shoulders of water

shattering to fragments,

reassembling

for another run.

– Linda Pastan, “Peace Process” (excerpt)
Mark Ropers, Limantour Scoters (detail)

Jasmine Bravo, Sister’s Keychain

Contributors

Many talented individuals are featured in the West Marin Review. Please click below for this volume’s contributors.

  • Cover
    • Jasmine Bravo   Sister’s Keychain
  • Prose
    • Peter Coyote   Fathers
    • Susan Trott   Plain Jain
    • Judy Brackett   Chicken Crossings
    • Lynn Hoggatt   Madame Alvida Turns a Card
    • Florence Caplow   Elders
    • Frances Lefkowitz   Flash Fiction in Two Parts
    • Tim Foley   Machinery, Waiting
    • Ellen Shehadeh   Shortcake for Breakfast
    • Chris Reding   The Summer Palace Vase
    • Muriel Murch   Morning Rounds
    • Joan Thornton   Maxine
    • Claire Peaslee   The Sand Swimmer
    • Carla Steinberg   Snapshots
    • G. David Miller   Conversations with a Righteous Man
  • Poetry
    • Gina Cloud   January
    • Laura Juliet Wood   Composting
    • Ryan Connolly   Marsh Hawk
    • Olivia Fisher-Smith   My Wings
    • Howard Norman   Novel Made of Haiku
    • Margaret Stawowy   Vagrant
    • Carolyn Losee   First Miwok Poem
    • Meredith Sabini   Fallen from Grace
    • Judith Shaw   Poem
    • Dean Rader   Notes on Inequality
    • Helen Wickes   Day After Easter
    • Linda Pastan   Peace Process
  • ART + ARTIFACT
    • Eileen Puppo   El Patrón
    • Bob Kubik   Point Reyes Station
    • Zea Morvitz   Crossed Trunks and Inverness Drawing #4
    • T. C. Moore   …in a smooth and flowing manner #5 and #4
    • Terry Murphy   Farrier
    • Celt Carr   Self-Reflective Portrait
    • Channon Miles   Self-Reflective Portrait
    • Blaize Adler-Ivanbrook   Self-Reflective Portrait
    • Jennifer Gutierrez   Self-Reflective Portrait
    • Grady Salas Hecht   Invisible World
    • Clare Elsaesser   Flower Child
    • Emmeline Craig   Laundry in the wind with green hills
    • Burt Bacharach, Steven Sater   Living with a Ghost
    • Anna Dal Pino   Investigation of a Raven Investigating Me
    • Kerry Livingston   Blackbirds over the Wetlands and Singing by Firelight
    • Claudia Stevens   Traditional Botanical Paintings
    • Britta Kathmeyer   Gossip
    • Sarah Myers   Polka Dot Pathogen
    • Claudia Chapline   New American Garden Book
    • Barbara Vos   Spring Fed
    • Ryan Dunbar   Simple Complexity
    • Carolyn Krieg   Red Deer
    • Timothy W. Graveson   Farm Book
    • Susan Putnam   Untitled #216
    • Randall Gray Fleming   Winter 1
    • Elizabeth Hansen   Green River
    • Debbie Patrick   Are We There Yet?
    • Rebecca Young Winslow   Butterfly Collage
    • Celeste Woo   Nudibranchs
    • Chelsea Buteux   Breach in the Pacific and Oncorhynchus kisutch (Coho)
    • Mary Siedman   Arroyo Hondo
    • Wendy Schwartz   Conversation
    • Mark Ropers   Limantour Scoters