Posts

Showing posts from 2011

Soul in the South

Image
I’ve been forced to address my soul in these tree-covered hills, this region of NASCAR and Civil War ghosts…guitars, banjos, and fiddles saddled to the wind...mockingbird mornings...moonshine sunsets. Do I miss Chicago, with all its steel beams and fragmented forest? Car horn mornings? Cell phone sunsets? Where I was constantly jabbed in the sides by strip malls and cars breathing down car’s necks? The patchwork wildness seemed okay at the time because it was all I’d known. But now I live where it spreads out like a big whoosh against the horizon. So what’s more to say? The soul’s no longer jabbed. It can breathe.

"...and there was a connection to the earth..."

  . . . and there was a connection to the earth, the night sky, all the stars. There was space beneath trees, under falling leaves, to dream. A day held a river, picnics on the bank. Romance was a thrush, with odes in its breast . . . (From the book Wilderness & Love )

Poem Nominated for Best of the Net 2011

The editors at Thick With Conviction have nominated my poem " The Props at My Funeral " for Best of the Net 2011 .  Thank you to Arielle Lancaster-LaBrea, Kayla Middlebrook, and Kristina Blanton for the nomination.

Poetry Exhibit in Lisle

Image
The Illinois State Poetry Society has a spring-themed poetry exhibit at the Lisle Public Library. " Spring " has been included in this exhibit. Other poets include Wilda Morris, William Marr, Barbara Eaton, Alan Harris, Marilyn Huntman Giese, Donna Pucciani, John J. Gordon, Caroline Johnson, Michael Galati, Ruan Wright, and Tom Roby.

"You found me, rebuilt me..." (poetic fragment)

You found me, rebuilt me, When I was in pieces, my shapes abstract When the hole in me Was the whole of me

"All the right words..."

All the right words have gathered on my tongue to form a parade but my teeth are the walls and my fractured ego is the rain. (From the book Wilderness & Love .) (It was featured on NPR's All Things Considered on April 14, 2019 .)

Beauty Effect (old unpublished poem)

Her soft, careful soul shines through translucent green eyes, her brunette curls long to be kissed. When she cries, her heart aches— and all around the flowers bloom.

I grieve for the storytellers...

I grieve for the storytellers of yesterday, and morn the loss of their magic.

I Know a Girl (old unpublished poem)

I know a girl Who frames us In her mind I know a girl Who thinks love Is a waste of time I know a girl Who brings musicians To their knees I know a girl Who stays busy To avoid things I know a girl Who should be singing As a fulltime job I know a girl Who knows glory Only through God I know a girl Who turns her cheek When kissed I know a girl Who has a boy That’s fatherless I know a girl Who can’t live Far from the sea I know a girl Who is better off Without me I know a girl… So many it seems But the one I really need Remains faceless In my dreams