This week's Poet of the People with Al Black is Lang Owen

This week's Poet of the People is Lang Owen. Before the printing press, balladeers carried poetry and news to the people; Lang Owen writes in that tradition. He is a gifted singer/songwriter who writes poem songs about people and the human condition. Every so often you meet someone who paints stories that sound new every time you hear them sung - I am privileged to know Lang Owen. www.langowen.com/

-Al Black

Lang Owen works straight out of the 1970s singer-songwriter tradition, employing poetic lyrics to express the challenges and possibilities of the current day, often viewed through the perspective of individual's imagined interior lives. Lang’s gift for seeing the world around him and dialoguing with others about their lives informs his songwriting, which often takes the form of conversations between characters in his songs. Lang released his third album, Cosmic Checkout Lane, in April 2024, his second collaboration with musician/producer Todd Mathis. “Cosmic Checkout Lane is about living our wisdom at any moment, including standing in a grocery store checkout line,” Lang says.

In 2022 Lang released She’s My Memory, which the Post & Courier Free Times ranked sixth on its The Best of South Carolina Music 2022 list. Lang’s 2019 debut album Welcome To Yesterday was hailed as “evocative storytelling at its finest” by music writer Kevin Oliver. Lang has played multiple venues in North and South Carolina, and received airplay on radio stations in the United States, Canada, Ireland, and Luxembourg.

Everybody Here 

Everybody here’s my therapist

I need all the help I can get

I look around, I’m losing my ground

I don’t like what I see one bit

I float by like a whisper, you hand me a megaphone

In our own little worlds somehow we’re not alone

We’re not alone

Everybody here

Everybody here’s my archeologist

Digging in the dirt for things I miss

Down on hands and knees beneath the olive trees

Finding my love still exists

We live in memory like statues standing in Rome

In our own little worlds somehow we’re not alone

We’re not alone

Everybody here

I don’t know what I’m dreaming any more

I just know you’re believing

I don’t know whose shoes are on my floor

I just know you’re not fleeing

What I can do is wash your feet

Patch you up when you’re bleeding

I’ll keep your secrets discrete

I’ll say what you’re meaning to me

I float by like a whisper, you hand me a megaphone

In our own little worlds somehow we’re not alone

We’re not alone

Everybody here


Gravity 

I’m not a smart man, but I know gravity

I drop nails from many a roof, it’s physics obviously

Don’t take paper in a frame to see that things fall

I’ve done this job for twenty-eight years, I’m a jack of all trades

I fix everybody’s leaky walls, water moves in strange ways

Don’t take paper in a frame to know a hammer’s what you need

House to house, I drive around, lots of new cars everywhere

From my truck, I see it clear, this town’s in disrepair

I guess that’s why God put me here

My knees are shot, all the ups and downs, I tell my boy get your degree

I’ve done some things of which I’m proud, it never came easily

Don’t take paper in a frame to know what builds you breaks you down

House to house, I drive around, lots of new cars everywhere

From my truck, I see it clear, this town’s in disrepair

I guess that’s why God put me here

I paint all your empty rooms, I like the smell of something fresh

I leave a little bit of me in there, where your baby lays down to rest

Don’t take paper in a frame to know love’s all in your hands

House to house, I drive around, lots of new cars everywhere

From my truck, I see it clear, this town’s in disrepair

I guess that’s why God put me here

Love Sputnik 

Mr. Hardy taught the sciences, the stuff of life

Backrow kids mocked thinning hair and tattered ties

Astronomy was his true love, Mr. Hardy had no wife

Russia launched first satellite shook the world

Beep beep on ham radio, spaceage unfurled

Mr. Hardy daydreamed at his desk of a long-lost girl

Oppenheimer called out God

Galileo searched the stars

Mr. Hardy lectured genius does no tricks

Sir Iassac’s apple fell to ground

Einstein wrote it simply down

Mr. Hardy questioned who on earth invents

Love Sputnik

18,000 miles an hour light across the sky

Mr. Hardy said change rockets into our lives

When she burned up in the atmosphere, Mr. Hardy cried

I recall a film about the sun Hardy showed

Man in glasses explained giant stars someday explode

In the cosmic scheme of things no one is betrothed

Oppenheimer called out God

Galileo searched the stars

Mr. Hardy lectured genius does no tricks

Sir Iassac’s apple fell to ground

Einstein wrote it simply down

Mr. Hardy questioned who on earth invents

Love Sputnik

Mr. Hardy gazed alone at night crescent moon

Mr. Hardy knew she’s inching away too soon

Mr. Hardy retired from everything that very June

Oppenheimer called out God

Galileo searched the stars

Mr. Hardy lectured genius does no tricks

Sir Iassac’s apple fell to ground

Einstein wrote it simply down

Mr. Hardy questioned who on earth invents

Love Sputnik

Man With A Broom

Thirty years I swept floors, F & M Bank

Retired with a big mug, too many last hugs

Cards and thanks

Now I use a red broom, sweep my curbside

Photos, bottles, pennies, cigar butts

You know it’s not right

My sight is still good, careful when the cars pass

My doctor says she’s never seen a man my age 

With such a strong back

I’ve got so little to leave this big world

I never had a son or a precious little girl

I’m just an old man with a broom

On the street in the sun Monday afternoon

Man with a broom

I found a brown shoe on the sidewalk nearby

My whole day puzzling what happened to that foot

Can’t say why

My shadow tells time, I don’t wear a watch now

I can see no point in counting the hours 

As they wind down

Who’ll pick up this broom? Nobody wants to sweep

I’m scared things all go to hell when I fall into

That long sleep

I’ve got so little to leave this big world

I never had a son or a precious little girl

I’m just an old man with a broom

On the street in the sun Monday afternoon

Man with a broom

Neighbor kid walks by with those earphone things

Give me a listen, though it don’t beat Bob Dylan

My heart still sings

Wife calls me inside, says I’ll die from the heat

But this broom’s what I’ve got, and I’ll sweep ‘til I drop

On this clean street

I’ve got so little to leave this big world

I never had a son or a precious little girl

I’m just an old man with a broom

On the street in the sun Monday afternoon

Man with a broom


Used Books

I Sunday browse your shop for hours

We talk about writers when no one’s there

And you proclaim love for Hemingway

For your age that’s pretty rare

You say you can relate

To wine and war and fate

And how this life is so unfair

Your eyes ask me why, you wait for me to try

I scratch my head, I can’t help you there

You wanna be heard, you gotta listen

You wanna be read, you gotta buy somebody’s book

You wanna be found, you gotta know who you’re missing 

You wanna be seen, you gotta really, really look

Oh I swear, my sweet Karina

I once told a girl you never mind my words

“I mind them too much,” she said with a smile

She vanished like a ghost in a cloud of cigarette smoke

I missed that coming by a country mile

I tell this tale to you, I’m no fountain of any truth

Might be the one thing I do today worthwhile

No doubt it’s been said by poets long since dead

There’s nothing in this world we can’t defile

You wanna be heard, you gotta listen

You wanna be read, you gotta buy somebody’s book

You wanna be found, you gotta know who you’re missing

You wanna be seen, you gotta really, really look

Oh I swear, my sweet Karina

Old Man and The Sea, I peruse with iced coffee

I’ll soon forget every page I turn

My days are scribbled down, torn up paper on the ground

Take what I say this once for what it’s worth

You wanna be heard, you gotta listen

You wanna be read, you gotta buy somebody’s book

You wanna be found, you gotta know who you’re missing

You wanna be seen, you gotta really, really look

Oh I swear, my sweet Karina

Poetry of the People with Al Black featuring Tim Conroy

This week's Poet of the People is Tim Conroy. I met Tim Conroy several years ago at a Columbia literary event and cajoled him into doing his first poetry feature. We became fast friends, haunting and terrorizing coffee shops throughout Columbia. Later, we teamed up with singer/songwriter, Lang Owen as the Two Hats & a Ponytail trio. When Tim's wife retired, they fled to Florida; however, he will be back in Columbia to perform Tuesday, 05/07 at Simple Gifts and Wednesday, 05/08 at Mind Gravy with Lang and myself for the Reunion Tour of Two Hats and Ponytail.

Tim Conroy is a military brat who has lived all over the country and eventually ended up in South Carolina. A retired educator and beloved social rabble rouser, he has published two books of poetry, Theologies of Terrain, Muddy Ford Press 2017 and No True Route, Muddy Ford Press 2023. During COVID, he co hosted the YouTube poetry interview series, Chewing Gristle

 

Lousy

My Dad said lousy a lot

to describe his children

a lousy jump shot, a lousy right fielder,

a lousy bedmaker, a lousy dishwasher,

with a lousy attitude.

 

We had lousy eyes, freckles, and postures.

 

But he would never admit,

we were stationed in lousy towns.

We could have become lousy

because he fought in three lousy wars,

where he won a few lousy medals.

 

Every year, we left friends and moved

on lousy cross-country car trips.

He had a lousy temper and backhand.

His world turned lousier when our mom divorced him.

He was lousy in love with her.

He tasted lousy when schizophrenia

came for one of his sons.

 

Afterward, he was never a lousy grandfather

or a lousy money giver.

He remained lousy at saying sorry.

 

When he died, we never felt lousier

and knew a pilot's love didn't land empty,

his caps and his godawful shirts,

his lousy flaws, our hearts.

 

No True Route, Muddy Ford Press, 2023

  

The Flight Jacket

hung in the closet to forget the throttle

and how it zoomed from carriers during

the Korean War, dipped into battle

of the Chosin Reservoir for the troops

to make a break for it through scarred paths

and never told its story, zipped up mute

stayed cold to the touch preferring the dark

every day its arms down not saluting

while its empty pockets refused to hold

onto the sound of bombs and men waving

screaming hello, goodbye, and blood marking

each sleeve forever, but the leather saved

many lives, though not Dad’s, his explosions

and how he didn’t want us to touch him

 

 

The Child We Need

 In front of imperial drones,

swollen under cement blocks

—tongues, old and young

because we doubt what is told

because it takes silence to listen

because we need to learn gestures

to rise reversals from wombs.

War-born babies and hostages

with no chink of light, no angels,

no safe mangers even for donkeys,

only hunger and inconsolable wails

until we embody the dead,

the child we need to live won’t

sing and fly paper kites in Gaza.

  

The Best Part

The truth be known,
gay or straight,

the priest gets paid,
the nun has a shitty deal,
the minister wants his ass kissed.

 Meanwhile I have felt a voice
in the forest of owls and ordinary spaces.
Strangers have rescued me from peril;
like you, love has saved me.


Your neighbor is human.

We don’t listen or tell it right,
we take it literally,

we can’t write it down better,
we make it too complicated.

Who have you loved in this journey?
What is it you have given?

 

From Theologies of Terrain, Muddy Ford Press, 2017

 

A Fitted Game

 The American Legion is full of men and women who battle

video games for printed slips to exchange at the bar for cash.

They don't dare add up the losses, so full of gin and silent friends.

Some say it's a loss of purpose and only passing time.

My Dad would have died playing if he hadn't croaked in bed.

His fingers reached, but I did not know what to tell him.

 

Their sacrifice isn't gone, and the popcorn kernels are still free,

salted, and buttered, sliding down throats that burn like cigarettes.

The flashing screen doesn't care who presses the fortune of the hours,

shouldering memories with sips. No soldier deserts the machine

that programs a fitted game, though many dream of a different outcome.

I have loved those players who won once

Al Black's Poetry of the People Features Janet Kozachek

This week's Poet of the People is Janet Kozachek. Shortly before COVID I hosted an ekphrastic poetry event at the Arts Center in Kershaw County, Camden, SC; Janet has had a lot to do with introducing me to many opportunities to host poetry events in Camden, Orangeburg and Hampton County. She is a dynamic advocate of the creative arts and a talented poet, writer, and visual artist. I look forward to participating in whatever event she creates next.

-Al Black

Janet Kozachek  has led a long and eclectic career as a writer and visual artist,  pursuing work and advanced study in Europe, China, and New York.  She was the  first American to matriculate in the Beijing Central Art Academy (CAFA), where she studied  painting, poetry, and calligraphy.  Ms. Kozachek moved  to the Netherlands with her husband Nathaniel Wallace,  to teach with the University of Maryland overseas division for two years.  Returning to the United States she became a graduate student at Parsons School of Design. 
During graduate work at Parsons in New York, Kozachek studied painting and drawing with Larry Rivers, Paul Resika, Leland Bell, and John Heliker, and poetry with  J.D. McClatchy.  It was this brush with McClatchy, then editor of the Yale Review and author of Painters and Poets, that first inculcated the idea for Kozachek that painting and poetry could emanate from the same creative source in western as well as in  eastern art.


In South Carolina, Kozachek embarked on a long peripatetic career as an artist in residence and sometimes adjunct professor teaching Chinese art and Mosaic making throughout the state under the auspices of the South Carolina State Arts Commission.  Kozachek founded and became the first president of the Society of American Mosaic Artists in 1999.  She wrote for, and co-edited, the society’s quarterly publication, Groutline, and co-authored the catalogue for the first international exhibition of mosaics in the United States.   She also actively wrote for Evening Reader Magazine, publishing essays on art and social issues.  She is the author of four books of poetry. 

Song of the Sinuses

(On the occasion of the discovery that researchers playing ancient ceramic musical instruments would sometimes hear a note that others could not because it was generated from resonance inside their sinuses) 

The archaeologist,

with his vinyl gloves 

and his plastic straw,

played the ancient globular flute,

last touched a millennium ago

by Shaman’s lips.

Six whole notes

climbed up a scale

as the pressure of modern air

yielded sound.

For the record there were six notes.

The archaeologist heard seven.

Investigators played that tape

again and again

– in search of that seventh note.

that they were certain that they heard.

What was that seventh unrecorded final note

that could not be bound 

yet rang persistently in their heads?

It was a singular sinus sensation!

The lonely note was for 

the hearing of the solitary.

It was a spiritual resonance

of an internal sound

echoing in the caverns of their skulls.

Not every note must be noted.

Not every thought must be voiced.

Not every sound need be heard by others.

Not every action must be known,

nor every meaning ascertained.

Not every desire must be met.

There must be quiet in the world

to leave a space for internal music.

Listen.

News Cycle

( After a Drawing by Laurie Lipton)

Another school shooting

the jaded eyes and numbed mind

observe on the rectangular

porthole to the outside world

Another invasion

I watch the troops float onscreen

above my painted toes

Another disaster

A family sleeps on borrowed blankets

outside the rubble

of what was once their home.

I scan them while reclining

in my own bed

in my air-conditioned room.

Another war

feeds my evening news cycle

I watch it through

the hazy steam

that emanates from my

museum shop coffee cup 

decorated with scenes from

Picasso’s Guernica

aesthetically wrapped snugly

around the glazed form.

Purchased for just

$9.99 at the museum shop.

Another famine

plays out across my television

Mothers cradle emaciated infants

My cat cries out

wanting to be fed

I pause to feed her

and switch the channel

I am told

that brain surgery is performed

with just local anesthetics

to get below a scalp’s surface

with sedatives to blunt awareness

of what is inserted or extracted 

from the matter of mind

Brains don’t feel pain

Patient patients

close their eyes then

and don’t panic 

at what they see or hear

Another massacre?

Too many in a day now

to be counted

With the precision of a scalpel

the news cycle enters

through an anaesthetized cloud

of indifference

blunted by frequency

numbed by distance

cushioned with a thick cotton blanket

blocking out the fear

that the news 

some day

will find me

Celestial Beings and Lesser Gods

(Zaparozhia and Melania Perik)

Objects upon a white cloth

lay as offerings to people passing by

in the torpor of late afternoon shadows.

A solitary apple, a tempting trinket,

sit as the trappings of yearning

for a warm bed and respite from hunger.

A mass of woman sits

swaddled in a woven coat

and a thinking hat.

She nods her head downwards,

as hypnogogic hallucinations

fly within and without the hollows of trees.

Celestial beings and lesser gods,

half human and half chicken,

turn right side up and upside down

in their flight between somnolence and wakefulness.

They have been conjured.

They cavort among the boughs,

and then are exorcized 

from haunted limbs. 

Crow

Crow watches you

with eyes you cannot see,

black on black  against the setting sun,

waiting in quiet silhouette upon a branch.

Crow seeks you

in benevolent predation,

to feed upon your sorrows,

and swallow your regrets.

Crow finds you

alone among the living,

lost within memories of departed souls

who call and call your name.

Crow grasps you

in her claws folded

tight around your waist,

her black beak cool against your face.

Crow knows you

when you cross the bridge

into that great void

and come back home again.


Jasper Project Board Member AL BLACK Creates New Poem to Celebrate Announcement of ONE BOOK 2024 Novel - BEAVER GIRL by CASSIE PREMO STEELE

In honor of the announcement of Cassie Premo Steele’s novel, BEAVER GIRL, as the selection for the ONE BOOK 2024 community reading project, we asked Jasper Project board of directors member and local poetry guru, Al Black, to read Beaver Girl and craft a poem in response to the message of the book. Al did not disappoint! Please read Al’s poem, and the signature poem for this project, The Remembering, below, then pick up your own copy of Beaver Girl, and write a poem, paint a picture, or create a piece of music in your response to the book and enter it in the Jasper Project’s THE ART OF ONE BOOK 2024 Arts Contest.

The Remembering

 

Leave your shoes here on the stump.

Go forward on bare feet,

step through into the Remembering.

 

The ground will know you.

The mycelium will announce your approach. 

Next to the beaver pond remove your gown.

 

Sit naked on the bank. Tonight is the Leaving of the Kits. 

The recitation of old stories 

of Livia, Chap and their families

 

Tales of a time when humans and beavers 

spoke the same language 

and learned to live together, again.

 

Tonight, young beavers must leave their parents

make space and time for the next litter.

They may invite you to swim 

 

to the far side of the pond with them.

There they will leave the water 

and begin their journey to new streams.

 

Not all of your sisters or all of the kits will remember, 

but if they listen,

they will feel memories of the Healing Time 

 

that came after the Great Dying Away. 

And maybe - if you are blessed,

you will remember and believe the old stories of a beaver girl

 

and that ancient laws of preservation are based in truth.

The door of enchantment is only open a short time

so do not question me, remove your shoes and enter the Remembering.

 

Al Black, 04/21/2024 

 

Announcing the Jasper Project's THE ART OF ONE BOOK 2024 CONTEST for Literary, Visual, and Musical Arts!

The Art of ONE BOOK 2024 – Cassie Premo Steele’s BEAVER GIRL!

Want to bring your own interpretation of 2024’s ONE BOOK  selection? The Jasper Project has an opportunity for YOU! Read Cassie Premo Steele’s Beaver Girl, then write a poem, paint a picture, or craft a piece of music with or without lyrics.

Entries

A panel of experts in the art of your entry will review submissions and choose winners in the following categories:

·         Poetry

·         Visual Art

·         Original Music

Winners will receive prizes, be featured in the Fall 2024 issue of Jasper Magazine, and be celebrated at the ONE BOOK 2024 Round-Up Party on Sunday, September 22nd at the One Columbia Co-op! DEADLINE JULY 1, 2024!

All submitted work must be original, family friendly, and capable of being performed or displayed in an outdoors setting. Both 2D and 3D work will be considered for the visual art competition.

Submission Instructions

Email your files to submissions@jasperproject.org. In the email please include your name, mailing address and phone number. Submissions are limited to 3 entries in each arts category.

Include the following attachments in your email:

·         Poetry – Word Document or PDF

·         Visual Art – Hi-res photos or scanned image of your work.

·         Music – MP3 or WAV (If files are under 150 mb you can attach them to the email). For larger files please send a Google drive, Dropbox or One Drive link. Youtube, Vimeo and Sound Cloud links are also fine.

Poetry of the People – Ashley Crout

This week's poet of the people is Ashley Crout. I met Ashley a few months ago and since then I have heard her do readings and had lunch with her and another friend. It is like we have known each other for years. 

You can hear her this Wednesday at Mind Gravy. 04/10 - 7 pm Cool Beans.

Bio

Ashley Crout was born in Charleston, SC, and graduated from Bard College and the MFA program at Hunter College. She is the recipient of a poetry grant from The Astraea Foundation, has received awards from The Academy of American Poets and the Poetry Foundation and is a four-time Pushcart Prize nominee. Her work has been published in Michigan Quarterly Review, New Orleans Review, Atticus Review and Dodging the Rain, among others. She lives in Greenville, SC, with her hound, Stella.

CLOSED ADOPTION

All I knew of my birth mother then
was the fierce red color of her hair
that burned away any usual humanness,
her build still slight with youth
and her love of the horses she rode
across the mind of my childhood.
I filled my room with horse figurines
so that we would have something shared
between us when she came one day
to find me. But sometimes what is missing,
does not know how to return. You find
yourself seeking the safety of certain devotion
such as the loyalty of vaguely human horses
like the ones in westerns who know how
to head home if ever they are separated
from their cowboy in the course of the story.
I cannot end this with even a brief singular nod
of acknowledgement. I saw her once
decades too late, the woman who carried my life
until it could be separated from hers.
I recognized her the way I know myself
in the mirror. She moved as I moved. Her face
was trapped in my face. I would not let her out.
I had never resembled anyone. You would think
it would have connected us. I was once
brand new in the world. I needed her then
is what I said during our single intersection.
She had no language for how she heard this,
did not respond. I considered being devastated,
then I decided to take my life back.
I pictured all my horses restless in the barn,
alerting me to a dangerous presence, a coming
storm indifferent to my safety, my survival,
the interdependent structures of my house.
You’ve grown old, I might say. I will outlive you.

SONNET IN A TIME OF CONTAGION

A slant rain deadens the night-dark highway.
There’s something I’m trying to leave behind.
In some yesterday, a new disease came.
You now must hold yourself still in stopped time,
 
stand at a remove from the living world—
seen but unheard, your voice hushed by distance.
Skin on skin touch forbidden, that’s the curse.
You could be coated with it. That’s the dance.
 
You could look like yourself but carry it,
sicken someone, accidental murder.
You could hate it but find you’ve married it.
This has happened before. It grows further.
 
I mean your death could stand right next to you
and you wouldn’t know it. You wouldn’t move.

WOMAN WHO SAID $37 MILLION JACKPOT WIN HAD RUINED HER LIFE FOUND DEAD IN HER HOME

And so it seems you cannot buy your way out of lonely.
 
How many years did she string her
luckiest numbers together looking
to match the winning sequence
before the unlikely day that she did.
 
She had not meant an avalanche of dollars
but the people she believed they would draw
towards her. She had never before been special
to anyone. She had outlived an entire line
of women who aged unwitnessed, unmentioned
by any voice in any room.
 
Some tragedies are about what does not happen.
 
Maybe she sat in her usual house, and the money
overwhelmed her with its possibles, its faces
of former rulers as immovable as the dead become.
Maybe she waited for the townsfolk to begin
to swarm their singular greeding hive mind
at her property’s edge. She dreamed of crowds
that at once would know her, at once would love her
if only they all drew together imitating an embrace.
 
There is no account of the how it had,
as she is said to have said, left her life a ruin.
Maybe it could never have been enough
for the madness of hands sticky with want
that surrounded her mother’s mother’s house
and outstretched their temporary mouths
revealing the entire top rows of their teeth.
 
Maybe all those who beamed at her briefly,
just polite enough to make their faces grateful,
bought garish gleaming boats and sailed away.
Maybe she felt smaller then as if seen
from a distance until she was almost an absence
like the failure of light outside her windows.
Even her body left her alone in her sleep.
 
Authorities found her days too late – unable
to separate what once she was, a physical house
abandoned, from the thin sheet she’d drawn to her
as one does when desperate for the necessity
of touch. Maybe, in her wealth of grief, she submitted
to sleep so fully, its shutdown of conscious
calculated wants, that it kept her body in such
a stillness that it never moved again. Maybe
she lost all knowledge of how to lift herself out
 
again into the gold sun, the sight of its glare
like coins placed on the eyes of the dead.

LAND DWELLLERS

When you are inhabited by a geography, its waters –
the animal scent of the marsh, the brine-soak
of the ocean – rise into your mouth. You swallow.
 
You are never not swallowing. Its land hums under
your feet. You cannot place the song. Its land loosens
into silt. The rust red dust sinks, is sinking, until it settles
 
on the flat of your diaphragm. To breathe, you have to
lift entire cities as if holding an offering up to God, excavate
your body from the roots of the family that named you.
 
You never had their thick drawl in your mouth, how it
stretches every word backwards into a story that glories
the past. Your mother and your mother’s mother could
 
have been someone but they only sat watching the world.
Slatted rocking chairs cast them forward then back
then back. The slowed sound of their language lingers,
 
like the crushed lavender scent at their necks, long
after it means whatever it meant. Your chest is resonant
with human voice. You are both the house and the one
 
locked out, your flushed face cooling against the windows.
One day you will run. One day you will run back
for the same reasons that you left. You are populated
 
both with those whose sins are unforgivable and those
who prophet a God to them. Every one of them, every last
one of them, is yours. Every goddamn one of them is you.

Black Nerd Mafia Presents All My Friends are Dope – An Immersive Interactive Art Experience

“All my friends are dope, you could pull a name out of a hat and whatever name you pulled would be amazing”

This brag about members of Black Nerd Mafia’s artist collective, The Cool Table, from founder and Jasper Project board member, Kwasi Brown, last year was the inspiration for their upcoming event: All My Friends are Dope – An Immersive Interactive Art Experience. Returning for a second year on Saturday, April 6th at the Ernest A. Finney Cultural Arts Center, the experience features a variety of art disciplines. The event starts at 5pm and features a panel conversation, poets, visual artists, and live music. The lineup includes Tam the Vibe, Eezy Olah, Kenya T, Airborne Audio, Cre the Creative, Wannapoundjuu, Niyah Dreams, Moonkat Daddi, Kuma The Ambassador, Yyusri, Dooozy, AC3 Sage, Bugsy Calhoun, Roc Bottom Studios, Dogon Krigga, Jakeem Da Dream, Dr. Napoleon Wells, Deidra Morrison Wells, and TBRH Co-Heaux. There will also be food trucks and vendors as well.

Check out the video below from last year’s event and learn more about Black Nerd Mafia in the Fall 2023 Issue of Jasper Magazine.

Facebook Event

Congratulations to Poetry Out Loud Winner JESSIE LEITZEL!

JESSIE LEITZEL

The Jasper Project congratulates Jessie Leitzel on winning first place in the South Carolina Poetry Out Loud State Finals, held Saturday, March 9th at Richland Library. Leitzel was one of six finalists who competed in the finals for the national recitation competition and will go on to compete in the final competition in Washington DC later this spring.

“Leitzel was composed, confident, and they presented themself as a bright and progressive representative of South Carolina,” says the Jasper Project executive director Cindi Boiter who, along with Jasper Project board of directors member, Al Black, Marilyn Matheus, and Lester Boykin, adjudicated the event. Ray McManus was the host of the event, and Paul Kaufmann was the accuracy judge. Shannon Ivey was the performance coach and Eric Bultman served as recitation coach.

Leitzel is a nonfiction writer and poet studying creative writing at Charleston County School of the Arts in North Charleston. They are the co-founding editor of the literary magazine, Trace Fossils Review, a 2024 Presidential Scholar in the Arts nominee, a gold medalist of the Scholastic Writing Awards, and a YoungArts Award winner with distinction in nonfiction.

Winning second place was Abhirami Nalachandran from Calvary Christina School in Myrtle Beach and Catherine Wooten of Westgate Christian School was awarded the third place prize.

Other finalists included Eve Decker of Spartanburg Day School, Erin Maguire of Socastee High School, and Gemma Williams of Ashley Hall in Charleston.

Congratulations to all the finalists, as well as to the Columbia SC arts community for coming out to support your literary artists!

Al Black Celebrates 1000th Poetry Event March 13th at Cool Beans

At the Jasper Project, we’re excited to share the news of a celebration of one of our own, Al Black, SC’s poetry guru!

Fueled by a labor of love to share and encourage the creation of poetry among his friends and neighbors writ large, for years, Al Black has been staging poetry events ranging from readings to open mic nights to song writers’ circles, and more. Next Wednesday, March 13th will be Al’s 100th poetry event. We’re happy to join the SC Poetry Society in congratulating Al and celebrating this momentous occasion at t pm at Cool Beans coffee in Columbia, SC.

The event is open and free to the public.

Congratulations, Al!

Poetry of the People: Jesus Redondo Menendez

Our first Poet of the People of 2024 is Jesus Rodondo Menendez.

Jesus is a dynamo. He immigrates to this country in his 40s, becomes a successful teacher, works on an advanced degree in school administration, navigates the waters of marriage and writes delightful poetry.

Jesús Redondo Menéndez was born and grew up in Spain, developing a love for books as tools of learning, and as open roads for his imagination. He graduated in Psychology, in his forties decided to move to the United States and started a career as an educator in South Carolina. Now, almost ten years later, he is finishing the process to become a school administrator. He deeply thanks America for this transformational change. Now and then he enjoys writing poetry and short fiction, and experiencing new places in the loving company of his wife and their four legged child, Chomsky   

____

A belonging recipe: a bit of matter, time and self 

I've sat on 

the wooden bench 

in front of the river... 

Couldn't help but crying 

and gasping, 

overwhelmed by 

the daunting sense 

of belonging 

to just the 

intersection

of that moment, 

that place, 

and my most 

intimate 

and inner 

self... 

____

Bay of Dreams 

There is a picture 

I often like to revisit, 

and truly enjoy to see, 

one with my little dog 

watching us 

at the beach, 

his defenseless back 

pointing to the sea. 

I called it Bay of Dreams, 

because we always 

pictured our hopes 

somewhere overseas, 

in a sort of secret place 

where you could find them 

guarded by him, 

bathed and soothed 

by the lullaby 

of ocean beings. 

But as it happens in every dream, 

there are moments when 

the bay turns into a tree, 

and we, and our hopes, 

are together, 

embraced by its leaves. 

There’s an uneasy sense 

of uncertainty coloring the scene. 

And we can see the cloud 

that announces the storm, 

and we can feel the strong 

and chilly wind 

as it starts shaking the tree. 

And we see our hopes 

falling to the ground, 

as the cloud darkens, 

as the wind blows, 

as the leaves fly, 

as our fear grows… 

And we hold to each other 

and to myself I keep 

how much 

I would like to believe 

there is some purpose 

above us 

that is shaking 

the tree. 

_____

You make it easy (to Lola) 

There are some days, 

I have to say it, 

I don’t want to leave 

my bed, 

‘cause there lays 

everything that makes 

me feel safe: 

the woman that leads 

my boat, 

the pet that watches

my footsteps. 

Life can be wonderful 

you often can hear me say, 

sometimes a little bitchy, 

that I keep to myself, 

but every morning 

I walk to the mirror 

tying my tie, 

reminding to myself 

who I am. 

A person that may 

stumble and fall, 

but always stands up; 

that may need to 

try a thousand times, 

but never gives up: 

those and many more 

are the things 

that make me who I am. 

And there’s no day 

I don’t wonder where 

you get your strength from, 

how can you have 

such a clear mind 

to target all our goals, 

I don’t mind confessing 

something that I truly enjoy: 

I’m still figuring you out, 

because from all that breathes 

in this world 

you amaze me the most. 

And I think to myself 

that I don’t care whatever it takes, 

I don’t need to know what it is, 

it doesn’t matter the pain, 

because you make it easy. 

____

My people 

My people dared me 

to play kickball 

so I told my people 

I didn’t know the game. 

My people raised eyebrows, 

because, you know, 

it seems that 

my people know. 

My people don’t know 

that my people still 

blame me for what 

my people did 

500 years ago, 

while my people 

celebrate 

old fashioned speeches and parades. 

My people know 

my name when 

I ask to close the check, 

while my people 

keep reminding me 

that I am 

just another guy 

from 10 miles away. 

My people invite me 

to parties, 

bridal and baby showers, 

after work meetings 

poetry readings,

 and jazz, 

while I know 

about my people’s lives 

on Facebook or Instagram. 

My people ask me 

if I want to stay, 

and my contract 

waits to be signed 

on my desk, 

while my people 

keep asking me 

when I’ll go back home, 

how long I’m gonna 

be away. 

My people, one year ago, 

a 30 degrees morning, 

and short sleeved people 

had to show 

their best behavior 

to come to Español, 

but my people yesterday, 

last class of the week, 

didn’t care that much at all. 

And today my people 

are here in West Columbia 

listening to my words. 

Thank you for your patience, 

my people. 

____

Squeezing a verse (to Evelyn) 

And there she goes, 

a dynamic explosion 

of creative bangs, 

a swag of jeans, 

and bright lemons, 

squeezing verses 

like demons 

sliding down 

the darkness 

of his shirt, 

feeding our hearts 

with something mellow 

bringing light 

in the yellow shape 

of delicious fruits 

with citric flavor.  

Congratulations to the Accepted Contributors to Fall Lines - a literary convergence, volume X

On behalf of the Jasper Project, we’re delighted to announce that the following literary art was selected for inclusion in Fall Lines Volume X, releasing in spring 2024. These contributions were selected from several hundred poetry and prose submissions, and we couldn’t be happier to include them in this milestone tenth volume of Fall Lines – a literary convergence.

In early 2024 we will announce via the same website where and when we will hold our annual Fall Lines reading and awards ceremony, as well as the winners of the Saluda River Prize for Poetry, the Broad River Prize for Prose, and the Combahee River Prize in Poetry and Prose for a South Carolina Writer of Color.

Until then, congratulations and thank you for sharing your talents with the Jasper Project and allowing us to share them with the world.

Paul Toliver Brown – Digging to China

Allen Stevenson -- Shep’s Story

Bryan Gentry – Some People Never Change

Ruth Nicholson – The Red and Blue Box

Suzanne Kamata – Community Building

Evelyn Berry – Home Party

Randy Spencer – Next Day Now

Liz Newell – Red Hill Fans

Debra Daniel – Eve Purchases an Apple Watch

Shannon Ivey – As I Went Down to the River to Pray

Eric Morris – Straight Down Shadows

Lonetta Thompson – The Differences

Napoleon Wells – The Court of Thieves

Tshaka Campbell – Pews

Ann-Chadwell Humphries – Urban Eagle

Jacquelyn Markham – The persistence of limited memory  & Storage

Brian Slusher – *Improv 101 & What else for you darlin?  

Worthy Evans – *Blue Song for Bringing the Body Home & Blues Song for Never Having What I am Relative to Everybody Else

Rhy Robidoux –*Whereas

Nadine Ellsworth-Moran – *Nasturtium grows lush

Susan Craig – Migration & Treating our mother's last living friend

Heather Emerson – Divorce & Ceilings  

Joshua Dunn – Clearing House

Candice Kelsey – Chainsaws  & Renewable Energy

Terri McCord – Following a Blast

Randy Spencer – *Reading Ann’s Poem & In Passing

Debra Daniel – *Studies in Reproduction

Loli Munoz – Liminal

Frances Pearce – Strawberries

Ann Herlong-Bodman – One More

Jo Angela Edwins – A Neighbor Calls a Cool June Evening a Miracle

Kristine Hartvigsen – What I’ll pack for the apocalypse  & Inagaddadavida

Al Black –*Meditations on the Lawh-i-Aqdas & Midnight Call to Prayer

Tim Conroy – Journeys

Jessica Hylton – Space

Amanda Warren – Divination Road

Danielle Ann Verwers—How was your day

Libby Bernardin – Ode to the Santee Delta & Ramble of thought as I read an article in the New York Times

Ellen Blickman --The Mystery of Pomegranates

Allison Cooke – Whippoorwill Elegy

Julie Ann Cook --  Into blue

Bryan Gentry – Hail, Fuse

Kelley Lannigan – Aubade

Gilbert Allen -- T**** IS PRESIDENT

Jane Zenger – Choices

Anna Ialacci – Ruined

Nicholas Drake – The Space Beside Her  

Graham Duncan --  Exceptionalism

(* indicates finalists for the Saluda River Prize for Poetry)

Fall Lines - a literary convergence is made possible through a partnership between the Jasper Project, One Columbia for Arts and Culture, Richland Library, and the Friends of Richland Library.

Poetry of the People: Amy Alley

This week's Poet of the People is Amy Alley.

Amy Alley is a poet, writer, educator, and artist who I originally met through Cassie Premo Steele. She hosts poetry and art events from Greenwood to Newberry. She is a quiet, nurturing, and generous connector of people and talents and is the keeper of the poetry torch in her corner of South Carolina  . 

Amy is a talented freelance writer, poet, author,  artist, educator, and solo mother of one son who somehow managed to make it to University (hooray!) Because that isn't enough, she is currently training to become a certified yoga teacher. A so-called ‘curator of sophisticated chaos,' she knows what it is like to strive for balance in the throes of a busy, hectic life - but she has learned to breath deep and embrace the flow. She has a passion for service and enjoys helping others express the story they wish to tell through writing and/or art as well as discover new tools for creative expression to promote wellness and wellbeing. She also loves fashion and style, like, a lot.

If You Reached Out  

If you reached out 

While children clamor at our feet 

And on our laps 

And people chatter all around us 

In a language I fall in and out of understanding 

I would take your hand 

 

If you reached out 

I would follow you into your world 

I would let you lead me 

All the way 

Because I’m so tired 

Of being at the wheel 

 

If you reached out 

I would let you teach me 

The language of your ancestors 

So that I could speak to you 

With the same words that 

You dream in. 

 

If you reached out 

I would let you into my world 

Where the solitude you’ve never known 

Bears fruit 

In color that swirls on the canvases 

That you admire so much 

 

If you reached out 

I would take you to a place 

Where you can hear the owls 

Call to one another 

Their ancient language one 

With the sound of night settling 

 

If you reached out 

Across this table 

And these children 

And these worlds 

And languages 

And all that seems to lie between us 

 

I would fall into a space 

That seems to be as vast 

As the night sky  

We both dream beneath 

Counting the stars 

In different languages  

Living in worlds 

We both fall in and out of 

Understanding. 

 

 

Shoe Fetish 

I’ve kicked off more shoes than you could imagine 

Wasted, wanton shoes 

confining 

shoes that fit only for an instant 

and never 

never ever 

let me dance. 

 

I’ve kicked off more shoes that you could imagine 

and ran barefoot instead 

through meadows of clover and freedom 

where nothing is too tight 

and I can dance as much as l like 

 to the tune 

of me. 

 

MYCELIAL 

I wanted to write about me,
but I am possessive
so it comes out as my
and my mind goes to mycelium
and mycelium is another name
for God, I have been told.
And God was possessive, right?
The source of what connects us all
and it runs deep underneath,
connecting everything to itself.
The fungi know this. There’s
communication down in the deep,
dark spaces where the gods really live.
There’s magic in my and mine and
maybe not so much shame
in wanting to possess something
completely. Mycelial networks
are so intrinsic, a worldwide
web of their own. We don’t see it,
just like we don’t see the internet,
but it’s there all the same, sparking
magical mystical connections.
And there’s magic in me and mine
and he and his and we can’t own
each other but we can think about it.
We can go down deep into
all the dark places below where
the mycelial hyphae of our minds 

run like strands of Ariadne’s thread, 

under all the layers of us,

and earth is this space where
we finally touch one another,
touch the magic, and watch the light
of it spread to all of our parts.

 

Black and White Dream

Spring came too early,

again. It seeped in 

everywhere, overnight. Dew

glistening on green like 

sweat on skin after

making love. Sunny and 

74, too early. March 3

is not Spring. A long

afternoon walk leaves me

like dew on green - 

anew - as though everything 

wasn't breaking down,

as though I'd spent 

idle hours with 

Wang Ming's Humble Hermit

of Clouds and Woods,

having stumbled upon him

in a black and white

dream, making love between

cups of tea in his

thatched cottage, hidden

by ink branches and 

boughs of pine. And 

why not, when everything

is breaking, broken.  At least 

once before, this scene, in a 

dream, waking up

like dew on green

leaves - anew - but not

enough. I have spent days

in woods, in clouds, in

meditation, trying to find

my feet back on that

jagged path. Hermits like

to make us think that they

are wise, but I take 

my gurus with a grain of salt 

these days. Fragile as me

they are, and just

as broken. Spring has come

too early, again. And everything

is breaking,  broken, except

the black ink branches and 

pine boughs that hide 

a thatched cottage where

lives the man who

prefers silence and solitude 

to the chaos of Spring. Who

prefers his loneliness

to my black and white

dream. Who doesn't see 

everything breaking, broken, 

who doesn't see me

blinded is he 

by a warm Spring sun.

Too early.

Last Night I Dreamt of Pow Wows  

Last night I dreamt of friends long past 

Divorced from one another 

And otherwise scattered 

Lost to the winds of time 

Lost to the miles between us 

Lost to themselves  

And lost to me. 

 

But for a moment 

Together again. 

Some long ago powwow 

Where we laughed and sang together 

And danced under starshine 

To a drum as familiar 

As the beating of my own heart. 

 

I wake up  

Wanting to reach out 

Find everyone 

And bring us all together again. 

 

But my heart says no 

It is a time long past 

They are lost to the winds of time 

Lost to the miles between us 

Lost to themselves 

And lost to me. 

 

I begin my day nostalgic 

With the memory of moccasins on soft earth 

Keeping time with a drum  

That fell silent long ago. 

 

Making War 

The way of the peaceful warrior 

is not my way. I fight. 

Against the grain, against 

myself. Against the oppression 

of cultural expectations and 

societal norms. What is normal 

anyway, the collected insanity 

of the masses? Peace 

is not achieved without a fight. 

Inner, outer, it doesn’t matter. 

You have to slay the demons, and 

they fight back, scratching and biting 

and you bleed and your blood flows 

to all the inner and outer places. And 

They don’t go down easily, no. Begging  

and pleading and willing them away 

won’t work. You have to fight back. That’s 

why it’s important that you know how.  

 

You, sitting on your velvet cushion with your hands 

folded, thinking “Namaste,” you better know 

how to throw – and take – a punch. Because 

the way of the peaceful warrior is not 

achieved through the bliss 

of meditation, no. It takes the screaming of war 

to get to that place, inner or outer, 

where peace resides. It takes 

making war on yourself 

to stop making war 

on the rest of the world. It takes 

fighting back. Hard.  

And you get stronger, scrappier. And 

wounded. But the bleeding 

stops. And scarred, you put away your sword, 

for now. You can only be 

a peaceful warrior if you put 

it down completely.  

And you might. 

 

But I fought too long 

and too hard for the right 

to hold mine 

to just let it go. I’ll 

put it away, though. And I’ll sit 

on a velvet cushion, with 

my hands folded and think “Namaste” 

all day. I will 

be peaceful.  

I will. 

 

You should know, though… 

in a moment’s notice 

I can be armed  

and ready for war 

in the event 

that you choose 

to wage it. 

 

 

Poetry of the People: Jerred Metz

This week's Poet of the People is Jerred Metz. Jerred found and befriended me a decade or so ago and is my irregular lunch partner at Arabasque. We talk of poetry and prose, family and friends. He challenges me to become a better writer without losing my voice or becoming derivative of what I read; he is a gift to the poetry community of South Carolina.

Jerred Metz has had seven books of poetry, three non-fiction, and two novels published, and over one hundred poems and stories in literary journals. He taught creative writing at the University of Minnesota, Webster University, and Coker College. For fifteen years he was poetry editor for the Webster International Poetry Review. He has degrees from the University of Rhode Island (B.A., M.A., English) and the University of Minnesota (Ph.D., English and Philosophy.)


        Honey, My Muse


Her wild shadow wakes, rises, and

comes toward me. I love her,

frightening as she is, her eyes

the color of water,

her wings

battering the air.

When she flies the world unfurls

like a backdrop

behind and beneath her.

 

Benevolent bees

fill her hollow body

with hive and honey.

 

She tells me,

never minding the calendar,

 

“In 1929 I had to leave school to marry the banker who holds the mortgage on my poor mother’s homestead since we could no longer meet the payments. Believe me, life was no picnic, me only twelve and missing all my friends and my teachers and what if the townspeople learned that the banker had a twelve-year-old wife? I learned to cook, keep house, and please my husband in bed. Believe me, that was no easy task, me only twelve and him well into his fifties, his hair and moustache still shining black. There were no sex manuals then. Those few who had them considered themselves lucky to have books of etiquette. And this banker had been around and was particular about his sex. Oh, where could I turn? Who could I ask for help?”

 

           She brings me visions. 

In return, I show her

a new place to press

or kiss,

a new position,

a fresh phrase to

utter.

 

Muse, 

whose sacred body—

hive for queen and drone,

worker and larvae,

and honeycomb

rich with sweetness,

 

comes toward me

holding another poem. 

____


I created these “overheard” snatches and snippets of a private detective in Newark, New Jersey in the 1890s. Accounts of incidents in his career, each hinting at a “before” and an “after.” They are from Sad Tales and Sordid Stories: Interruptions. There are about 30 of them.

 

What was Not Her Astonishment 

Harland was a friend of Hattie's

of whom The night before Hattie had written to

 Charlotte of Harland, who was a friend—

"a very fine, spirited man

whom Charlotte would like,"

 

she thought and believed.

 

What was not Charlotte’s astonishment

when she found he was nothing

like the man Hattie described.

 

The Air was Unusually Mild 

Harland strolled out

with Charlotte before

going to the office.

 

The air was unusually mild

for this time of year,

such days being part of

the recent past

or far in the future.

 

Strange to say,

he was empty-handed.

The manuscript—

its worn wrapping

exposing some

of the contents

to public view,

which I expected

him to be carrying—

was nowhere to be seen.

 

I felt safe now;

I knew the lady’s name—

“Hattie the hat”—

an old schemer—

and proceeded to her boarding-place,

had her summoned,

introduced myself, mumbling

a name that sounded like that of a con

from Newark who she had heard of,

and began talking to her

about literary matters,

favoring the popular writers

over the serious ones.


Harland’s Henchmen in the Restaurant

 

Had they hunted her

or were they acquaintances of Harland's

who found her there by accident and

simply followed her down?

 

I wanted to speak with the proprietor,

but they might be customers

who always spent as much as tonight,

and clearly Charlotte was charmed by them.

I was a stranger here— 

why should the owner listen

to my meagre dribble of coin

against the music of

their smiling wallets?

 

 

  

“She is an Angel,” or,

"Her Eyelashes are Harpstrings Angels Thrum" 

 

In spite of all the assurances

I offered her Charlotte

would not single out

any of the men as her attacker.

She claimed not even to be sure

that any of them had been on

the trolley that morning.

 

But when I saw their shy glances

in Charlotte’s direction

I was certain she had made

An impression

upon their minds,

and now they wished

they were not thieves and murderers,

but pleasant young men

who might sit beside her and say,

"Your eyelashes are harpstrings

angels thrum.

Come with me to tented Elberon

and stroll the boardwalk,

sipping lemon ices,

sit in the breeze

at the edge of

the sea."

____

I call these epigramatics, by definition concise, clever, and amusing

1
             Homo Sapiens

       An
               Invasive
                               Species.
2

Technology
Every day
     I learn something
          I wish
               I didn’t
                    Need to know.
3
Our Quietest Meals
Are when we
eat fish.
Not that fish
makes us
more serious,
just more
careful.

4
A Simile on Free Writing
Like looking
For something
In an empty attic.

5
Catastrophe
—the Great Fuck-Up—
is Mother
and Father—
the Hermaphrodite—
of Invention.

____

Positano

Positano bites deep. It is a dream place that isn’t quite real when you are there and becomes beckoningly real after you have gone. 

                                                     John Steinbeck Harper's Bazaar, May, 1953 

I

In Ancient Days

 

Vesuvius’ razed Pompeii and Herculaneum

A rain of burning ash buried Positano.

Before then, on westward treks Greeks and Phoenicians

traded at Positano, so history says.

Named for the Sea God,

Poseidon in quiet and wrath—

the old cosmology still alive.

Or is this what happened?

Pirates stole  a thirteenth-century  

Black Madonna icon from Byzantium. 

When they reached the bay,

in anger at the theft, Poseidon

tore the waters in storm.

The thieves heard a shout, "Posa! Posa!”

“Put down! Put down!”

The storm-struck ship crashed,

a wreck on the shore.

Still alive, the pirates hauled

the Madonna up the steep cliff

to the village, delivered Her to

Santa Maria Assunta’s priest.

The storm stopped, the sea quieted, the sun smiled.

Good citizens of Positano ever after—the reformed pirates.

Posa. Posa. Positano

 

II

 

The Plate of Clay

Whole, then broken, buried,

unearthed, repaired with reverence.

The beauty of the broken,

The marvel of the restored,

marking its own perfection.

The border—geometry, repetition, variety,

the shapes of flowers—holds all the universe. 

The border beyond, before Chaos, its own beauty.

 

III

Praise Invention, Praise Conception

The artificer,

whose brush followed hand,

whose hand obeyed mind,

whose mind embodied the muse.

How much beauty can a wall contain

before bursting forth in song?

IV

Seven Sisters

The single band of cloth twirling, and breeze

 lifts to its own dance, tying sister to sister.

What song do they chant?

“Who are we?

Seven sisters, Pleiades

dance, dive,

divide and gather.

How are we called?

 Maia,

        Electra,

       Alcyone,

                            Taygete,

                           Asterope,

                Celaeno

Merope.

Seven daughters of father Titan Atlas, who holds up the sky,

and mother Ocean, Pleione, Mother to Sailors,

whose Fate she governs.

Zeus, Poseidon, and Ares fathered children

upon us, made us a small dipper

of stars in Taurus.

See us twinkle and nod,

sharing our songs in code.”

“Who are we? Half-sisters to the

seven Pleiades and the Hesperides.

We, the seven Hyades,

sisterhood of nymphs,

the rain-makers,

who fall as rain,

our weeping, rain.

When a wild beast killed the hunter Hyas we wept,

became a star cluster in Taurus’ head,

a dipper to hold our tears.

 

V

Perched Positano

 

Thanks to its location, Positano’s climate is mild—

winters warm, the summers long and sunny,

refreshed by sea breezes, and

by the landscape’s beauty.

Long, steep stair link the village high above

with the valley beneath, the sea beyond.

A hard walk down, a hard climb up.

Below, the happy throng at Positano, blissful,

bless the sea suspended in ecstasy,

bless the patient town,

the happy villas above which become

beckoningly real after you have gone.

 

Poetry of the People: Ed Madden

This week's Poet of the People is Ed Madden, Ed Madden is a gifted poet and a generous mentor and nurturer across a wide range of our community of poets. He consistently models how to be relevant and present in both the town and gown communities and we are richer for it.

Ed will be reading Sunday at Poetry Church and Tuesday at Historic Columbia 

From Ark (Sibling Rivalry, 2016)

Ark
Christmas 1966

The small box is filled with little beasts—
a barn that’s a barge, a boat—the ark’s

ridged sides like boards, a plastic plank,
a deck that drops in fitted slots, but lifted

reveals that zoo of twos—heaped beasts
to be released beneath a glittering tree,

its dove-clipped limbs. Dad’s asleep
in his reclining seat, and crumpled waves

of paper recede as Mom circles the room.
The humming wheel throws light across the walls.

How to lift him

Don’t pick him up by the pits,
which seems easiest. You risk

broken bones, bruised skin.
Instead, once he’s eased up, sits,

shoulders hunched, fee slung
over the edge, lean down for the hug, 

your arms under his and around,
hands flat against his back, his arms around

you. This is what you do. Then lift him,
his feet between yours, this timid

dance around, this turn. Tell him
to bend his knees as you ease him

down to the chair, its wheels locked,
set him in slow. Kneel in front

as if to receive his blessing.

Lift each foot to its rest. Wrap
a blanket around him—you’re going out.

Stop at the old flat-front desk,
last hiding place for his cigarettes— 

why he wanted up, after all. Stop
at the edge of the porch and lock

the wheels. Make sure he’s in the sun.
Stand silent by, he won’t talk much,

though the lonely cat will,
rubbing its back against the wheels.

Thirst

The nurse said, your father really looks at you
when you walk into the room—

he stares at you,
she said, he must have something to tell you.

But he never tells you.

Later, another hospice worker listened to this story.
She said, no, you know,

sometimes, as we’re leaving this world,
our world contracts to the small space of the room,

to the few things we love.

Your father wasn’t looking at you because he had
something to tell you, no,

he was looking at you because he loved you, she said.
It was near the end, she said,

he was drinking you in.

Poems from A Pooka in Arkansas (Word Works, 2023)

[untitled]

What has been omitted
from the history we learned?
The stubble was plowed under,
sometimes burned.

[untitled]

Sometimes when it’s cold out,
I pull on my dad’s old denim
shirt, warm, worn, the past
a thin jacket, what I have left.

Psalm
after Psalm 23

Tim is my therapist;
I’m learning to trust him.
He motions me to the green sofa;
there’s always bottled water on the table.
He leads me to talk about things
I don’t want to talk about.
If I make my way to the top
of the dark stairs,
he makes a space for talking
and for not talking.
Sometimes the room gets crowded—
my dead father, my distant mother,
all those messages from my brother
I can pull up right there on my phone.
In their presence, he asks,
“What would happen
if you stopped doing your family’s work
of shaming you?”
That question follows me the rest of the day.

From A Story of the City: Poems Occasional and Otherwise (Muddy Ford, 2023)

Postcard: First Baptist Church, Columbia, S.C.
Justitia Virtutum Regina, motto of the City of Columbia

This is where they decided
to divide US, where they said
all men are not equal, where
they pledged allegiance to
the divided states of America
and to the secession for
which they stood, a nation
broken, divisible, with liberty
and justice for some.

Something to declare
July 11, 2018, after William Stafford

The president is overseas this week, that’s the news,
and we’re reading William Stafford in a chilly classroom
and trying to write about where we live now, and how.

Important people are gathered around a big table,
but we sit at our little desks. Sachi talks about what it means
to declare something when you cross a border.

Back home, I know my cat is dying. She’ll amble
stiffly to the door when I return, her blind eyes
wide and bright with what she cannot see.

They say that history is going on somewhere.
Zoe describes her story as a scrap of paper swept
by the wind, litter snagged in a tree.

This is only a little report from a summer arts camp,
where Makenna and Maya and Eva and Micah are writing
about their small, rich lives. We’re here. You can find us here.

A new year

Bert’s outside taking down the strings
of lights, this winter sun bright enough
for a new day, new year. Colleen sent
a thick heart made of seeds—we’ll hang it
in a tree today for birds, for the winter
that persists despite the sun. Last night’s
firewords were gorgeous, though Barry ran back
and forth with his torch to relight them—
the way, sometimes, we have to do for
our little resolutions, for our glorious
dreams, for our tired hearts, when it’s
dark, when it’s still so cold.

UNPUBLISHED POEMS

Epithalamium, backyard wedding
for Mahayla, 20 June 2020

Bert mowed the yard and we spent
some time tidying up, though I know
after next week’s storms there will be
more to do, before the weekend, before
your wedding, before the small service
you asked to have in our backyard.
The mockingbird who takes up a post
every day on the utility pole will sing
for you I’m sure, and I’m certain too
he’ll work in his latest riff, his perfect
soft mimicry of a car alarm going off
in the distance. I will get the words
ready. I’m sorry there’s a big hole
in the yard where we hope to put in
a pond later this summer. But maybe
that’s okay. We’re always trying to make
things better and sometimes that means
a big muddy hole in the middle of it all,
sometimes that means a simple service
in your uncles’ back yard, everyone
standing apart, except for the bride
and groom, maybe your mom and stepdad.
Nathan got the day off, despite the police
being on call right now. I hope he stays
safe this week, his dark skin, his uniform
and gun. I hope I get the words right.
I know you’d hoped for something lovelier,
that wedding in the mountains in October,
but maybe this is best, we don’t know
what things will be like then. May it be
clear and sunny on the day, may the
magnolia still be wearing its perfume, may
the yard be good enough, may this be good
enough. I will ask him to take your hand.
I will ask if you have a ring. I will ask
you to repeat after me. You said no
prayer because Nathan is not Christian,
but I may offer up a prayer anyway.
Maybe this is that prayer.

 

Poetry of the People: Catherine Zickgraf

This week's Poet of the People is Catherine Zickgraf. Catherine, aka Catherine the Great is a mother hen of poets of all ages, educational backgrounds and genres and is a force in South Carolina and Georgia that reverberates throughout the spoken word and written poetry community. If you don't know her you have resided too long in your little office listening to your own voice or parrots who sound a lot like you.. I am honored to call her friend.


Two lifetimes ago, Catherine Zickgraf performed her poetry in Madrid. Now her main jobs are to write and hang out with her family. Her work has appeared in Pank, Deep Water Literary Journal, and The Grief Diaries. Her chapbook, Soul Full of Eye, is published through Kelsay Books.

 Find her on twitter @czickgraf. Watch/read more at www.caththegreat.blogspot.com


Poem to Lost Poems

 

At the riverbank, she writes

while her letters stretch wings,

slip wind, skim away.

 

So she shelters her words,

nails wood without hinges to the floor, 

singes the threshold and corners.

 

Groundwater carves the chalk rock.

She’s learning to find the darkness

in the humid chill of earth’s stone web,

in moss-floored pools that shadow-shift

with a breath of candlelight.

 

Still the arch outside connects the riversides,

brides of the rapids flow home to sea

with the surfaced words of she who

sees now with mind, not eyes. 

 

Where rivers scoop lakes at their estuaries,

a marble she holds encases the oceans. 

Seeking the self inside,

she polishes the sky’s eye.

Pulling rope up the riverside,

she swings into the long line of horizon.

 

 Yasou! A Celebration of Life, July 2020

 

  

In the Dilation of Eye

 

We chilled for three days.

But when you started staring

out my back windows into the woods,

I knew I had to return you to the wild.

 

You have eyes that can mirror earth or sky,

that hide in your environment.

You are oak leaf and grass, aqua and azure.

 

Take me with you.

Let me swim in your iris

and the well of your pupil

toward horizons and the trees.

 

 Vita Brevis, August 2020

 

Saving a winged animal 

that gets lured in by the porch light

requires at least three human hands:

mine to catch/seal creature from escape

and my helper’s to kill lights/open door

so I can release it into the night. 

 

It’s always been my job to rescue

beings that don’t belong inside

(unless its slithery, bitey, or stingy).

The cats help by gently delivering

me tiny, living lime-green lizards— 

so mostly all these complex little

things get returned to roam the earth. 

 

 Savannah Dusk

  

Now is the hour

when cypress trees dim into shadows.

 

The river is lingering along the bank

in puddles caught among braided roots.

Ageless sky deepens, wavelets go still,

the water seems to slow and fall silent.

 

This is the ceremony of sinking dusk—

when our reflections turn dark and

dim blues fade in the calmness of night. 


 Goodnight

 

Kira and I decided one evening before I had to go in

and get a bath that after bedtime we would call

 

out our windows to each other from across the alley.

First grade, I was still crazy awake when they’d

 

tuck me in, the sky so full of daylight. But having her

to talk to at night would be like double-dutching the

 

telephone lines that crossed the canyon between

our streets—I’d never be bored again. Yet from my

 

row of homes in my treehouse bedroom two and

a half stories up, the only word I heard was goodnight.

 

 Neuro Logical, January 2021

 

Somnambulant                                                                     

When they sleep down deep at night,

she tunnels out the powder room window     

into drizzle and mist, hops fence.  

 

She kicks through currents along the curb,                            

crosses street, descends the bank

toward the creek’s down-streaming sounds. 

 

Twelve and barefoot all summer,

she’s unafraid of treading the pebble beds,

leaps cold rocks to boulders,

splashing the stars of the water.

 

Breeze moves through the woods,

the moon-lattice shifts around her.

 

Though curtained with night and still invisible,

she slips back in through the bathroom window—

almost ready come pain of day

when they’ve opened wide their eyes.    

 

                                                                                                                                                                                             

Overnight

Into my window fall stars long as dreams, I slip through the screen.

Night grows a poem stretching prima toes to cross street then creek

stepping soft on the forest floor. Over shivering beds of dark stones,

the sparkle-moon follows me home.

 

Even through moon and drizzle, the train plumes billowing into the

clouds navigate my backyard valley. They vibrate my candle flame

until its last breath sifts out the window, when whistles trail off and

tracks flow into the starlight horizon.      

 

The pines don’t drip with shadows behind our house, out of reach

of the streetlight. Past the creek line bordering our woods, the oak

leaves close their eyes. The creatures of the low sky hush us calm, 

I’m returning my mind to its dream.

 

 Origami Poems Project, April 2020

 

Minimal

 

In the fullness of summer, mowers decapitate green necks

            of dandelions and red clover,

            slicing their flowers between matted blades. 

 

We stop gashing our lawn as it’s shocked with October frost.

            When the winter wind spreads arms down the valley,

            my garden zinnias turn to death and skeletalize. 

 

On the back porch tonight, I reach through the atmosphere,  

            lengthening glowing arms into space. I ease the moon

            from its netted cradle, an egg nested in my palm.

 

I am minimal, though, under the sky’s dark quilt.

            I’m a speck in the weeds of my acre yard

            on a tiny rock rounding its ancient orbit.  

 

 

Visitant, October 2017

 

Poetry of the People with Kimberly Simms Gibbs

This week's Poet of the People is Kimberly Simms Gibbs. She is South Carolina upcountry poetry. She sees with an eye of southern cornbread sopped in pork drippings gravy. If you want to feel the Carolina hills and mountains read Kimberly Simms Gibbs.

Kimberly's literary voice is rooted in the Southern tradition of storytelling. Her passion for poetry from both the page to the stage has led Kimberly to garner titles such as former Carl Sandburg NHS Writer-in-residence, National Poetry Slam ‘Legend of the South’, TedX speaker, co-founder of CarolinaPoets, former Southern Fried Poetry Slam Champion, and award-winning teaching artist. In her first full-length collection from Finishing Line Press, Lindy Lee: Songs on Mill Hill, Kimberly chronicles the lives of textile workers in the Carolinas with historical accuracy and imaginative insight. Ron Rash, the award-winning author of Serena, says about Kimberly: "she writes with eloquence and empathy about an important part of Southern history - too often neglected."


                                  Trespassing after the Hysterectomy 

The Lily-of-the-Valley 

           pearly bells tremble 

            the way a child’s mouth brims 

                                   with laughter. 

Daffodils 

          headless green arms gesture 

          split-hearts subterranean 

                                leaves blackened. 

Mole, 

          how sweet is your tongue 

           after your feast of bitter 

                                 tulip daughters? 

Dark earth, 

           how do you embrace the emptiness 

            of your bloomless womb 

                                  your crumbling tubers? 

Lady Slipper, 

           my gloved hands long to plant 

            while your tendrils more exotic 

            unfurl sharp leaves, pregnant blossom 

                                   beneath the last living hemlock.  

                                                  Homestead 

                                 But nothing is solid and permanent. 

                       Our lives are raised on the shakiest foundations. 

                                   – Ron Rash, One Foot in Eden 

A bolt of barbed wire, black with age,

hints the way, jutting from the undergrowth 

like a wizened digit— the post long since decayed 

and lost to the crumbling host of litter. 

This sunken corner is a garbled message 

till we catch a tree pierced with another barb. 

A stone pile murmurs, entangled with the metal. 

This forest expands in every direction. 

Our eyes can see no horizon beyond it. 

Mountains surge as we weave 

up and down valleys, creeks, and ravines. 

Eighty years: a forest has fallen and regrown. 

Homestead cleared, tilled, planted, harvested 

then reclaimed by this hummocked beast. 

We follow the ancient line back to a single 

hearthstone and the outline of a foundation. 

A toppled stone wall, a brown bottle. 

All around us: a forgotten fence, an outpost of the past.

Wild Green Soup

          Newberry Cotton Mill Village

           South Carolina 1924  


Fingers of frost stretch across the windows.

Seasoned wood crackles in the wood stove

while I stir the last salty pork knuckle

with a handful of beans, wild greens

into a stock pot just off the boil.

Fall's harvest now a collection of empty jars;

the cupboards breath -- dust, dead moths.

Each stir is more a wish as the day considers

getting warm, sweet herbs summon cravings.

Morning casts its pink sap over frost-risen clay

as I shepherd this thinly-feathered brood

towards the cotton-strewn spinning room.

Today we will piece broken strings, weave

cotton scraps to make them something whole.

Liddy Lee Songs on Mill Hill (Finishing Line Press, 2017)

       Machine Tool Salesman

Bill run that grinder fo ten years

Machine bigger than a brown bear

in Manny's stretched machine shop

in the flats of South Carolina.

The metallic cold milled slack snow

big sloppy flakes. The guys put on

their coats and stuck out their tongues

for the rare southern crystals.

Scraping together snowball heaps,

they watched the yard go dark and drank

black coffee. They stomped their feet

and left their coats on cause the shop

was so cold. That year so metallic.

That's how it happened, the coat.

Bill knew better, but ten years

you get so easy. The machine caught

him-- metal grinding machine --instant.

I sold them that grindernew.

Just horrible, he had two little babies too.

Took a week to get him out of the wheel

but it still ran. Can't keep a machine

something like that happens. I sold

it down the coast. Just horrible, two little

babies too and that year so metallic cold.

                                                     Summer Swagger

Late August, we are still free summer children.

We run over the rocky banks laughing in some

chase game; muscles flex, tense, stretch, climb

the steep --- dig fingers into cracks, wrench ourselves up.

Mountain expanse of water calls to us. My skin

tingles with nervousness as I look down thirty feet.

"Take my hand," you tender, "We'll jump together."

Wind races around my feet! We send out seagull wails,

steal breath for the plunge. My body is a scream!

Down, down forever in bubbles, then buoyant, silent,

We are carp pulling ourselves up through the water.

We burst back into heat, hollowing out triumphant bellows.

Poetry of the People with Loli Molina Munoz

This week's Poet of the People is Loli Molina Munoz. Loli openly shares her otherliness and in the sharing becomes one of us.  Diaspora of a Spanish Tortilla (Recipe and Poem); is exquisitely simple in telling complex emotions.

IT’S THANKSGIVING AND I AM NOT AMERICAN

It’s Thanksgiving and I’m not American.

I have cooked turkey, mashed potatoes, 
collard greens, cranberry sauce, and stuffing. 

My husband has dressed up the house
with fall colors and he is not American. 

A friend has come to share this rainy
day and he is not American.

The dog is staring at us hoping to
get some table food and he is not American.

We have toasted and remembered some
old friends who are not American. 

We are thankful for having each other 
and we are not American. 

I HAVE AN ACCENT

I have an accent

When I go to the grocery store
and they ask me if I found everything I needed 
I answer “yes”
they say: you have an accent!

This accent is my grandmother’s sewing for the rich 
and waiting from my grandfather to return from Venezuela.

When I order a tall decaf coffee with milk 
and I spell my name
they say: you have an accent!

This accent is my mother’s cleaning houses
so I could fly abroad and improve my English.

When I read a poem 
and your faces change trying to understand 
what I say and 
you think: she has an accent!

This accent is their braided hands delivering the fruit
that I will place in your still empty basket. 

THE GOOD DISHES

“But they are grounded
in their God and their families 
they are grounded in their hearts and minds.”
-Nikki Giovanni

my mother keeps the
good dishes in an old
cabinet after fifty 

years hoping I have 
them someday, she also 
holds onto a coffee 

set and a quilt she
made before she got 
married, your dowry

she says while she shows 
one of her few smiles 
buried in a deep wide


hole digged by my father
covered with her dreams
and my nightmares

long lasting nightmares
my mother possesses 
the first and the last 

of my days, the 
first and the last of
my nights, the fist 

and the last of 
my 
thoughts. 

ON ALL SAINTS DAY

Don’t leave me.

Those were your last
words. 

And we left you.

We closed the door
and we went home. 

Your eyes were begging for more 
time with us, more time alive.

But we left you
abuela Lola.

And the morning after
you were gone.

And the memories became 
a attempt to order the chaos.

My chaos. 

Diaspora of a Spanish Tortilla

(Recipe and poem)

I
Ingredients for 4 people
2 cups of Spanish extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons of Spanish extra-virgin olive oil
1 pound of potatoes
6 eggs
Salt

II
My mothers tells me it’s time to go to bed before the Three Wise Men come with the presents. I have to cook the tortilla for them, she says, and I think it’s not fair I don’t get to taste the mixture before being cooked. I close my eyes and I think about the smell of the potatoes and the eggs before jumping into the pan. 

III
Heat 2 cups of olive oil in a medium pan, slowly fry the potatoes until beautiful golden brown. Drain the potatoes on a paper towel. 

IV
It’s 1997 and I am an exchange student in Coventry, England. The first week someone organizes a party at our house. I don’t remember who. It wasn’t me. Everyone brings something for their countries. I cooked tortilla the same way my mother taught me. We eat, we drink, and we sing songs that we all know. 

V
Beat the eggs in a bowl with 1 teaspoon of salt. Add the cooked potatoes to the beaten eggs and let stir for 1 minute. 

VI
Last night I went early to bed as my mother told me and this morning Melchior came home with a present for me. It was the doll I wanted. Her tortilla must have been really good this year. 

VII
Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a 6-inch pan over high heat. Once the oil is hot, pour the egg-potato mixture and reduce the heat to low. 

VIII
Last week I cooked a tortilla for lunch and he smiled when he saw it. This is so good, he said. You are even better, I thought. 

IX
Once it begins to set and the edges turn golden brown, place a plate over the pan and flip the pan and the plate so the tortilla ends up on the plate, uncooked side down. 

X
Wisconsin was cold, too cold for a Southern Spaniard used to the sun and the scent of the Mediterranean. Someone asked me to make a tortilla but this time it didn’t flip right. I had to go back to Spain. 

XI
Once the tortilla set, flip the tortilla again and transfer to a platter. Season with salt and cut into wedges to serve.

XII
In 2006 my mother confessed that she never cooked tortilla for the Three Wise Men. I was so disappointed that I cried. I was 32. I was 32 and I cried. And I never stopped making tortillas. 

 Bio

Loli Molina Muñoz is a Spanish teacher in Lexington, SC, with a Phd in Modern Languages. Her poetry has appeared in different Spanish and American publications and anthologies like VoZes, Label Me Latin and Jasper Fall Lines. In 2019, she published an essay on gender and sex identity in feminist science fiction as part of an anthology called Infiltradas. This anthology was awarded as Best Essays Anthology by the Spanish Science Fiction Society Awards in 2020.

Poetry of the People with Cassie Premo Steele

This week's Poet of the People is the indomitable Cassie Premo Steele. Cassie is an Earth mother to many poets and writers. Her poetry invites you to take a walk with her in a forest to her safe place for an intimate poetry salon with the denizens of nature. A Daughter of Light, she leads you back to the city refreshed and remade.

~~~~

Cassie Premo Steele is a lesbian ecofeminist poet and novelist and the author of 18 books. She will be reading from Swimming in Gilead, her seventh book of poetry, at Simple Gifts on November 7, and the launch party for her third novel, Beaver Girl, will be at All Good Books on November 16. Her poetry has won numerous awards, including the Archibald Rutledge Prize named after the first Poet Laureate of South Carolina, where she lives with her wife. She is currently running a Kickstarter project to fund the Beaver Girl Book Tour:

Poems from Swimming in Gilead, Yellow Arrow Publishing, 2023

~~~~~

Let Us Begin Again

 

Be very quiet. Make it dawn.

Rise from bed. Walk on the lawn.

Wait for it. The sun is coming.

It’s a new one. It’s beginning.

You don’t believe me, you say

this happens every day, there’s

nothing new under the sun and

certainly not the sun itself.

Put your doubts on a shelf,

I say to you. Hush now.

Listen to the birds singing.

Watch the blue ones feeding

their babies. See the heron

heading south for fishing.

Look at the egrets catching

pink light in their white wings.

Faith is made of things like

these, everyday movements,

sights and sounds that you

usually ignore, and today,

since you’ve told me you’re

tired of life and wanting something

more, I’ve shown you how to do it,

and now that you know,

come, let us begin again.


The Woman Speaks of Bicycles 

I’ve known bicycles:

I’ve known bicycles new as my skin and older than my dried blood

from my womb.

 

I’ve known bicycles:

Reliable rubber and metal bicycles.

My body has grown strong like bicycles.

 

I rode along the Minnesota roads when constant motion was my freedom.

I got off my bike and walked the sugar bluffs, puffing with each step.

I looked upon the Mississippi and had a vision of finally flowing away.

I heard the wheels of my bike whizzing downhill at the end of the day.

 

I’ve known bicycles:

Reliable rubber and metal bicycles.

My body has grown strong like bicycles.

 

I rode in Carolina when children waited for me back home.

I got off my bike and walked the hilly edge of Covenant Road.

I looked upon the Congaree River and knew I would always stay.

I heard the music of my own voice saying I could live a different way.

 

My body has grown strong like bicycles.

  

This Is How We 

I once knew a Native woman,

Eastern Cherokee, who taught me

that in order to fix a rip in a basket,

you can’t just go in after it.

You have to unwind the fibers until

it’s pinestraw and sweetgrass again.

This is how we begin again.

 

I once injured my left knee

and the physical therapist,

a Latina from Texas, showed

me how a lack of stability

in my right hip had caused it.

The body crosses like this,

she said. It’s all connected.

This is how we heal again.

 

I once lay on my bed for hours

on end, as a child in Minnesota,

reading book after book while

my body disappeared, and so

did the pain and fear, until

I was just a mind in a story.

It took me years to invite

my body back into the party.

This is how we move again.

 

I once stayed in endless motion

of serving and cleaning, cooking

and feeding, wiping and washing,

drying and folding, until my mind,

always so strong, broke hard

and long, and for the first time,

I told the truth in therapy.

This is how we feel again.

 

I once heard a song that felt

like it was singing all that had

gone wrong, and I thought

it had been written just for

me, and then a pandemic broke

the globe and I realized everybody

knows the melody of tragedy.

This is how we begin to be together for the first time really.

 

Sun Loving 

Just before the day ends, I look up

and the sun is in drag, orange lipstick

and purple fingernails, red hair,

peach high heels, and I say, Hey, girl,

Where you headed? And she says,

Off to bed. Alone? I ask. You know

better than that, she laughs, and

as she sashays away, I see the moon

and stars take her by the hand

and lead her downstairs to a ballroom

for a final dance before kisses and

all the love she has ever deserved.

 

Under a Full Moon 

What must be done is a gathering

of women under a full moon,

each one holding in her hands

a leaf or bud or flower, blade

of grass, and together we say

the names of these plants,

and the list transforms into

a poem, a prayer, a spell, an

incantation, a chant and belief

in peace, peace, peace, peace.

 

And when our throats go sore

and voices tire, we take our

empty hands and make a chain

to keep the violence from crashing

into bodies any longer, and

dream that war will cease.

  

Seeds 

I spent years diving and digging

and bringing coral and diamonds

up into the light with my palms,

but the sun had dimmed so much

that my gifts were invisible, and I

mourned the bodies and voices

of women and girls I’d wanted

to crown with orange and bright

jewels who had all gone down

underground in a collective action

of mutual survival, and so I let

what I wanted to give away

drop to the ground and walked

so long up a mountain that I could

look back and see the seeds had

buried themselves back into the

earth to be trees. Tall were their

trunks and the leaves sang green

songs to bring the girls and woman

back to me and back into the castles

and courts we ruled over again in

this land where we’d always belonged.

  

Tuesday Afternoon 

I walk with my fingers on the page and

I dance with my hips on the stage I have

made in my room where bluebirds take

turns with me playing the parts of star

and audience and I hear the silence filled

with breath and electric hum and a neighbor’s

rake and I touch my dog’s fur and think

about origins and species and know that

nothing the mind does brings as much joy

as an animal can and I laugh while

remembering my grandson’s voice after he

knocked my chin with a stick in the garden

and asked me, Are you okay, Gaga?

and I wonder what would have happened

if God had been more like this boy in Eden

and instead of rules and banishment, we’d

been met in our mistakes and our pain

with a question and compassion.

 

Poetry of the People with Amy Drennan

This week's Poet of the People is Amy Drennan. To meet Amy is to walk into bright sunshine. She is Charleston's house mother of lost poets. She is a gifted writer and poet who feeds and houses poets who need a safe place to land and sacrifices her opportunity to shine to promote others. She is a gift and a treasure and my friend.

Amy Drennan was born and raised in Los Angeles CA. As a reluctant military spouse, she’s lived all over the states, and now calls Charleston SC, her permanent home. She is an advertising executive, an above-average wife, and mom to several exceptional humans, a scraggly dog, and anyone who finds themselves in need of some love. She enjoys writing, as her Irish heritage has rendered her impervious to traditional forms of therapy.

If You’d Tried 

It’s ok.

I’m a bit much.

Not everyone likes a woman

with a gap in her teeth

who cries

a lot.

 

Some can’t handle a bunch of words,

being fed all the time.

Some prefer hungry.

 

I’d just tell you

you’re beautiful every day.

You wouldn’t want to hear it,

couldn’t bear it,

already know and don’t need it.

Maybe you don’t have needs.

 

You may not like your name

when I say it.

I’ve whispered your name

into a few mouths.

Some don’t care for whispering.

Some don’t like their mouths.

 

There’s peach fuzz

at the base of my back.

It’s ok to dislike peaches

and my back.

The way I’d curl it into you.

The way I’d arch it in your honor.

Some prefer the front,

like to see what they’re dealing with.

 

I’d love you so softly,

so loudly,

you’d be sick of it by now.

 

Maybe heat isn’t your thing.

You’ve been burned,

had your fingertips singed off.

You don’t touch anything warm now,

you promised.

 

I have freckles on my freckles.

Maybe you don’t like freckles.

Maybe you’d learn to love them.

I’d have shaved my legs for you,

if you’d told me you were coming.

 

Do you like women in bathtubs?

What if they stay there

till sunrise,

writing and not sleeping,

writing about not sleeping?

Would you like to not sleep with me?

 

You wrote your number for me

on a notepad, a matchbook,

the back of my hand.

I didn’t keep it, it kept me.

 

I’m calling you from up North,

down South,

out East.

Somewhere you’ve never been,

have always wanted to go.

 

You might think I’m a firefly, a star,

Christmas lights in June.

From this distance there’s no telling.

 

We could be night sky.

Two blinks to navigate by.

Point A and point me.

The shortest distance between us,

a wish.

We could’ve found each other

if you’d tried.

 

 Kissing a man without lips

 

Last night I dreamt a tiny tooth

broken on your boyhood gums

sunk into the flesh

of my cellulite thigh,

my stretch marked hip,

my salt lick neck,

my all I have is yours,

if you’d like it.

 

The first time you planted in me

up came everything hardy,

hungry,

difficult to kill.

 

It’s peach season in the south.

You can travel there

without leaving the West.

You can wipe sticky sweet

from your chin,

eat till your belly hurts,

till Summer is an abomination.

 

I am a fire you set.

A sun plucked from its sky,

made brighter for shining

in dark places.

 

My memory is thick and unforgiving,

but yesterday you is forgotten.

I can’t recall you before you now.

Punch drink me,

and you a punch pourer.

 

A lover of your own reflection.

I make an awfully good mirror.

 

 What I will tell your daughter

who is old enough to ask

 

Your dad was maddening

and he was loved

 

He held his ear

to a glass

held the glass

to my chest

he listened

he listened harder than anyone

 

He heard pins drop

secrets spill

belly aches and butterflies

 

He heard pieces break

the push-pull

of stitching back together

 

He washed my hair once

I didn’t ask

but he heard me

always listening

 

He had the softest spots

the brokenest bits

he thought himself ugly

but he cried like music

when he cried

he was the bluest

most beautiful boy

 

 Not sorry

 

You are sorry not sorry

‘bout the fire you’ve become.

 

By the time you read this,

I’ll have flown the coop.

By the time you see this,

I’ll be blue eye disappeared.

 

I loved more

than either wing,

gave up flight for you,

stopped singing.

 

Each leaf I know

has turned color

and dropped.

Every leave I know

has left.

 

I’ve gone gone before.

Old news,

fresh ink,

ablaze in the end.

 

I wove you a bed

you’d never need,

stepped lightly over,

apologized never.

 

Don’t deliver the news of our deaths

 

Repeat after me.

We are ok.

It’s all ok.

 

We can breathe

don’t need to breathe

to be here. 

 

We don’t die,

we make room.

 

We are enough light

to fill a teacup,

a sky,

a memory full of here

and gone again.

 

Bushels of babies are born

while grievers grieve.

 

If we hold our ears

to them,

lay hands,

we can hear the whole ocean,

feel what made way.

 

We wish us

Hallelujah

each time we walk

through a door.

 

We wish us

a soft touch

a gentle goodbye

when it’s time.