Some Thoughts on a Sunless Spring

 

Here's a scribble from my journal:

Who knows when the sun will shine again so

we can sit once more beneath the dogwood tree.

 

Right now its branches are in full bloom,

 

with petals not white or yellow or milk or cream –

they’re simply themselves

 

in spite of our steadfast rain

and the sudden April snow

 

that made the silken heads

of the proud red tulips bow.

I shared this freewrite with my adult students a few weeks ago, and they kindly shared their writing, too. Our congenial exchange brightened the sky inside my mind.

A Hastily Written Tribute to a Master

At the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, circa 1979

Happy Birthday, William!

Or may I call you Will after

all this time? I've never

cared if you were squat or tall,

a glovemaker or an errant spouse ever

since I joined, at age 10,

the giddy band of fans who

for centuries have frolicked in the woods

where your fairies, queens and shepherds

plot and toil and kiss. Again and again we slip 

our feet into the shoes of your thwarted 

lovers and velvet-lined villains. We revel 

in the snap and sting of Beatrice's wit

and the fire and ice of Hamlet's

loneliness. And on our tongues, your 

phrases perpetually dance --

In my heart of hearts

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow --

as familiar as lawn, as jay, as 

sun, with the beat of each line moving us 

forward, calling us to create, whether

in ink or on this earth (this precious stone

set on the silver sea) our own version of

a brave new world.

Far from the Tree

 

What an honor to be among the winners of the Oregon Poetry Association's Fall 2021 contest. My sestina, "Far From the Tree," was second place in the Traditional Category. 

I'm especially happy to have this honor because the requirements of a sestina helped take my mind off of other things...like the pandemic, for instance. If you need a creative challenge, you might want to write a sestina of your own. Here are the rules of the form. If you're anything like me, it might tie your brain in knots at first, but keep going and you'll get there!

Thank you to OPA and to Marilyn Johnston, who judged this category and called my poem "a provocative women's history course." I can live with that!

To read "Far From the Tree," as well as the winning poems by Brad Maxfield and Amelia Díaz Ettinger, click here.

Try, Try Again

An early draft of "Some Women"

What an honor to be included in this group of Pushcart Prize nominees. Thank you to the editors of OyeDrum Magazine!

Lion in the Living Room – Monica Raymond

Et Tu – Liz Ramirez

Kayla Schwab – Great Expectations

Yu Müller – equidistant

Linda Ferguson – Some Women

The First Fib – Piper Courtenay

Happy New Year, Happy Reading!

Looking for ways to stretch your mind and imagination in the new year? These two wildly creative collections will get you there!

The Catalog of Small Contentments by Carolyn Martin

The Poetry Box, 2021

Carolyn Martin has done it again. 

In her sixth poetry collection, her words prance, dream and and sing. Through conversations with the sky, musings about Monet, and appreciation for an antic ant that offers critiques of Martin's writing, we enter a world that's both imaginative and also entirely relatable. The collection includes heartrending poems such as "Music to Disappear By," in which her dying father asks her "to record/his melody before it disappears," as well as the bouncy, life-affirming "Dear Type-A Friend," where Martin asserts she's "newly funemployed" and plans "to gadabout" a universe full of infinite possibility. 

To purchase a copy, you can click here.

Callie Comes of Age by Dale Champlin

Cirque Press, 2021

Think you don't like poetry? Think again. This pageturning coming-of-age and character-driven thriller redefines the meaning of what poetry can be. With a gutsy heroine and a rugged landscape that's so vivid you can smell the sage and feel the "dry heaves of hills," Callie Comes of Age took my breath away. Dale Champlin, who has always struck me as being a magician as much as a writer, fills her book with a dark secret, a sense of danger and delirious pleasure.

You can purchase this novel/poetry collection here.

The Poetry Box LIVE

 I'm looking forward to joining these amazing writers for a reading on January 8!

Holiday Romance

 

Santa Meets the Tooth Fairy*

 

They meet at a party

and the attraction is instant,

surprising them as much as anyone—

what, with his wide-belted girth and crinkled eyes

and her spun-sugar hair and silver-veined wings.

Within moments of being introduced, she takes his hand

and leads him to a moonlit room, empty except for a bed

covered by a single snowy blanket. Softly,

he shuts the door, and the floor tilts

under her dainty feet.



They share a sense of humor about their situation.

When he promises not to take her on his lap

and ask her what she wants,

she trills, then touches his cheek,

sending small licks of flame through his frost-bitten skin,

even before her fingertips travel

under miles of plush red velvet

to feel his heart beat.


Afterward, he says he'll drive her home,

but she straightens an iridescent strap on her slender shoulder

and reminds him she still has work to do.

One last kiss, and she’s gone,

so quickly he feels like a boy

who’s just learned his toy train came from the mall,

not the North Pole.



Later, as she’s lifting the pillow of a sleeping child,

she catches the scent of soot and scotch and pine trees on her skin,

and she, who always works in silence,

hears a sigh

escape from her own ribs.

At the same moment, he’s riding across the sky

with a pair of soft leather reins in his hands

when he’s suddenly engulfed

by the fragrance of an orchid that blooms

just one night a year.

"Santa Meets the Tooth Fairy" was originally published in Fiction at Work