I recently reread one of my mother’s books—Mr. Blue, by Myles Connolly, which was first published in 1928. It is a tale of a latter day St. Francis, Mr. Blue, who introduces the narrator to the joy of the Divine. Mr. Blue lives on rooftops and flies kites. On this reading, I found him fey,…

“Here where the wind is always north-north-east And children learn to walk on frozen toes…” From “New England,” by Edwin Arlington Robinson Edwin Arlington Robinson grew up in Gardiner, Maine; I live a couple of blocks from his house, which still stands. Nothing much changes here. The brook that ran beside Robinson’s childhood bedroom now…