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Archive 4
October, 2013


We Welcome Poet Bernadette Geyer To VerseWrights

PictureBernadette Geyer





Heat Lightning


The nights it happened, we’d set up chairs
in the back yard, watch the skies instead of

the black & white TV handed down
from our grandfather when he upgraded

to a console. We bugged our eyes as wide
as we could, tried hard not to blink

for fear we’d miss one of the flashes
outlining the clouds that separated us

from the stars, the clouds that acted as a screen
against which we could watch this display

of nature’s fireworks. Foolish as pups, we tried
to predict where the light would flare next

looked there instead of where the flash last
occurred, because we’d been told that lightning

never strikes the same place twice.
Even now, I find it just as hard

to witness radiance as it happens,
just as hard to stop myself from trying.

Bernadette Geyer’s first full-length collection, The Scabbard of Her Throat, was selected by Cornelius Eady as the 2013 Hilary Tham Capital Collection title, published by The Word Works in early 2013. She received a 2010 Strauss Fellowship from the Arts Council of Fairfax County and regularly serves as an instructor at The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, Maryland. Geyer’s poems have appeared widely in journals including Oxford American, Poet Lore, The Midwest Quarterly, North American Review, American Journal of Nursing, and on Verse Daily. Her poems have also been featured on public transit buses through the Moving Words Program in Arlington County, Virginia. In July 2013, Geyer relocated to Berlin, Germany, where she works as a freelance writer and editor. Read.


E. Michael Desilets' newest: "Time with
Peggy"

PictureE. Michael Desilets





Time with Peggy


Mommy smokes Chesterfields
while she breastfeeds
our baby brother Larry.
Later I’ll make you and Stevie
a grilled cheese
she lets me know.
 
Mom says it’s always
easy to change Jerry
because of the brace
that links his ankles.
Once she broke Tommy’s glasses
with her boar bristle hairbrush.
 
Ma trades stares
with Kenny and Lenny. 
They are the last
the ones who let her know
we just can’t last
forever.


Read the poetry of E. Michael Desilets
Read a profile of E. Michael Desilets



Ben Miller Joins The Poets On VerseWrights

PictureBen Miller





Moon and Muse


Lightless sun negative bleaching
A barren window horizon
These are ghost towns in the attics
Dark windows onto winter beaches
Migratory flights from skeletal fears
Dancing on waters that turn from warming icecaps
Stygian breakaways too worn welcome paths

Where is the moon and where is the muse
Moon stabbing all silver light away
In lack of light deserts are screaming
For want of words which carried meaning
Across all bridges of desire

Lightless sun negative bleaching 
A barren window horizon
Self-emptying into pools too shallow
Without the moon to feed it and to be fed
Moon and muse in reflective dance
Surface always going deeper


Ben Miller is a poet, writer, and computer programmer who lives in the US Northern Plains. His poetry is ritualistic in nature and has previously appeared on his now retired blog; he has had fiction published in the second Third Eye Blind anthology. He began writing poetry as a teenager, on the suggestion of an English teacher and hasn't stopped since.  As a form of expression, his poetry is a mixture of music, logic and storytelling, yet exists somewhere in the spaces between those entities. He is influenced by diverse poets such as Shakespeare, Blake, Yeats, Baudelaire, and Ferlinghetti. More words are in the works. Read.

VerseWrights Welcomes Poet Michael Lee Johnson

PictureMichael Lee Johnson





Apparently, David  ☊

There are categories of hell here.
Apparently
David died of
chronic liver disease
February 28, 2012.

David’s drinking became his sin.
Sin is the crack of the Devil's butt.
It tossed a good man into hell.
Dandelions faded with him when
the burning began.

His widow was a chronic bitch.
Locals called her "Nightmare Boogie."

His wife of 14 years
celebrated his passing;
she pissed on his pictures.

She was simple, mindless.
Her life was understated, full of fragments.

She got drunk on the night David died.
She thought it was butterscotch wine.
Confused, Cherry Lee, kept it simple;
she recognized the mix up,
it was butterscotch schnapps.

Either way, Cherry Lee helped
evaporate David's heart.

There were no memorial services.

David's ashes are still in a fruit box;
mounted on the top of her toilet bowl.

No urn, present or past tense.
No obituary, too late.

Only a label, a tag on the cinerarium stating:
"this is David's discount Funeral Home."

Fact, I am a newspaper reporter.
I am a chronic drunk.

There are no survivors here.


Here this poem read by the poet


Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era.  Today he is a poet, freelance writer, photographer, and small business owner in Itasca, Illinois.  He started writing at 17, during the old typewriter, mail only days, lost interest for a few years, and then with the advent of the Internet has has been publishing online since 2007. Michael has been heavily influenced by poets Carl Sandburg, Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, and Charles Bukowski, among others. He is the author of The Lost American: From Exile to Freedom, several chapbooks of poetry, including From Which Place the Morning Rises, Challenge of Night and Day, and Chicago Poems. He invites readers to visit his website, which has his poetry and a list of poetry sites which he edits. Read.


Paul Sands' "good morning, good morning"

PicturePaul Sands


good morning, good morning

this house is awakening
It yawns and stretches
aged bones, as last night’s ghosts scurry
home with the copper blood running
warm through worm pricked floors

I lie, like you, while you lie,
as we, under the nights warm stink
and the claw and the purr
of the cat’s half lidded lazy gaze
as the foundations shake with each
passing race of 18 wheel freight

the breakfast chorus is missing,
presumed drowned,
so this morning demands a virtuoso performance
“how do you want your eggs my dearest,
square or round?” too early for her
to answer a question quite so profound

“still inside a bird please” whispers the cat


Read the poetry of Paul Sands
Read a profile of Paul Sands



A New Poem From jacob erin-cilberto

Picturejacob erin-cilberto





from a separated stanza of the world

dark eyes squeeze out a tear
and the cheek beseeches you to come back
i found love in a moon drop
and the unwanted sunrise scattered it
into frothy lake

a large impending body
of wishes
of take-backs
of words absorbed back into the tongue
to be held back by pursed lips

pretend i never said it
reopen your moon to me
i was the man in it

and now without your sky

i have no place to stay.


Read the poetry of jacob erin-cilberto
Read a profile of jacob erin-cilberto
Read about his latest book here



"A Dry-Stone Wall Near Coleraine (for Seamus Haney)"

by Leslie Philibert

as if the pale stones
share the warmth
between two sides;
sea and field cut,
early light and full morning;
the path weathered and slow.


VerseWrights Welcomes Poet Kim Talon

PictureKim Talon





Plumed


The borrowed wings
don't fit quite right
feathers trail on the ground
as you twirl in front of the looking glass
nearly tripping when the wings wrap round your legs

gingerly you test the wings
like a heartbeat
...in and out...
...in and out...
your eyes wide-wonder
when the wings obey
your commands

up you go
a clumsy flight
scraping toes across rooftops
feathers snagging on branches of towering trees
breaking free of the wings to journey alone

gaining altitude
you soar through the blue
to places more outlandish than imagination
overwhelmed by the magic
the temptation to stay overpowers
but reluctantly you leave
there is no place like home
no matter the sting of reality
 
the borrowed wings
are returned to their owner
who tucks them back inside the closet...
neither of you speak of your journey

in the quiescent closet
the wings rustle
resettle
wait


Kim Talon is a professional photographer, writer, and poet residing in Southern Ontario, Canada. Always a lover of words, she wrote her first poem at the age of seven. The magic of poetry has never left her since. Her poems have been featured in many publications including The River Walk Journal, The Prairie Journal , and 9train Press. She has been honored with a Cambridge Recognition of Arts and Cultural Achievement for her award winning poetry. You can find her on Twitter @This_is_Talon, and on her blog, talon, where she posts her poetry. Read.


We Welcome Mikels Skele to VerseWrights

PictureMikels Skele

Along About Now

Along about now,

A particular group of photons,

Some 200 million light years away,

Is heading in our direction.

They’re out there.

At the same time,

A delegation is leaving my face,

Bound for cosmic intersection.

After all the debates have passed,

Long after the poor old Earth

Has been wrung free of its

Infection of life

Two photons,

Their memories wiped clean

Will pass in the distant night

As unaware of our anguish

As we are of their fate

Mikels Skele was born following World War II in Germany, and came to the United States where he grew up in Indiana. He presently lives in Illinois. He is a former teacher, and has worked as an archaeologist in the United States, Greece, Italy, and Latvia. He has been writing poetry and fiction all of his life, minoring in creative writing in college. His publications have been primarily archaeological, a fact he intends to remedy now that he has retired from that profession. His two blogs are www.omniop.net and www.exileschild.org; the former features prose, and the latter poetry. Read.



"Hidden from View," From Poet Christopher Sanderson

PictureChristopher Sanderson





Hidden from View

I will take the time to find you


If only in my mind
It is a kindness I might remind you
If only I had the time

Sweet scent of rhododendrons
Bitter taste of bitter fruits
Loops for to go meandering
How else to follow xenophobia

I will take the time to find you
If only in my mind

Blue-grey skies of tomorrow
Picked out sounds of lullabies lutes
Troops of wishful wandering
How else to lose xenophobia

I will take the time to find you
If only in my mind
There, with hindsight to remind you
To this cause I am resigned


Read the poetry of Christopher Sanderson
Read a profile of Christopher Sanderson



Mark MacDonald's Poem For His Son

PictureMark MacDonald





I, and Not You—To My Son


Not even to these was I always constant--
What escaped my attention. What small hands
of sunlight; what frail and infant breeze, hid

trembling among the trees—and all those so
freely given, those tender, those aching,
gifts I turned from each day. As much as I

loved, I un-loved. I know without counting.
For each and every evening I walked
alone in the twilight; for each time I

paused to consider the moon; or the sun
as it traveled with yellow and pink, to
the distance the color of bruises; there

were softer, more subtle—even sometimes
more glaring, prisms I chose to ignore.
And so it was also with You, my Son--

Argonaut, Tall Lion, Philosopher
King—Prince along the bookshelves, happy and
excited, hunter of knowledge, and friend

to all lost sailors washed onto the shores.
Too often I chose indifference. As
often as duty chose me, I failed what

duties I chose for myself—at least,
if not more. So now in your grandeur--
husband and father; bold Captain—know it

was I—not You— I, who failed to row
to those flares from the waves; I—and not You
—I, and not You—steered away from the call.


Read the poetry of Mark MacDonald
Read a profile of Mark MacDonald



Cheryl Snell has a "Message from Home"

PictureCheryl Snell





Message from Home


All that August the house seesawed
between heat and wet. Bedraggled
relations in souvenir shirts wondered
if they’d brought enough clean underwear.



We exchanged gifts


earmarked for the junk drawer.


The front door swelled shut



and I cased the window like a thief.






They split into cliques, filling blackout hours


with clannish grievance.
I wondered why until my head ached.



When mornings cooled and we recognized
the coffee steam for what it was, we divided
snapshots, reminiscing already, energized
by the idea of parting.
 
In the wake of kissed air and reconfigured goodbye,
I stood at the door waving, long past the hour
that would have them turning back, frantic
with apology; and rushing into the house,
convinced they had left something precious there,
something they would recognize if they ever saw it
    again.


Read the poetry of Cheryl Snell
Read a profile of Cheryl Snell



William Fraker's "Moving Later This Year"

PictureWilliam Fraker





Moving Later This Year

The house’s first owner suffered from allergies,
            grew roses without aroma.
I trim wild strawberries, clinging to the porch’s first step.
They do not get to flower or bear berries,
unlike irises thriving beside the house.
The flowing creek behind the house attracts small
    rodents,
barred owls, deer, raccoon, and opossum.

Sun streams through sky lights in the living room.
Upstairs balconies, where a couple of adult children
            smoked years ago, hang over a forest.
The family laughed, slept, and ate in this house.
We lighted fires in winter, kept company,
celebrated holidays and birthdays.

Walls hold tears and laughter.
Stairs know the footfalls of each of us.
Bathrooms reflect individual images.
Family pictures in the hallway,
            like furniture, wait for re-location.
How will three cats and our dog adapt?
What parts of us will get broken,
no longer carried with us?


Read the poetry of William Fraker
Read a profile of William Fraker



"Strong," A New Poem From Michele Shaw

PictureMichele Shaw







Strong

he stands in shredded forests
the flap of wings merging into grit-filled winds
black funnel clouds, gathering useless against iron love
beaks barb and jab, live arrows, yet not piercing

invincible, is he, or invisible

shrouded by a promise
hurts stealth as sand seek to invade

grains tailgating unseen, burrowing

rubbing midst the hope of unwatched cracks and                 forgotten fissures
common pests romping at will, delight at open         veins

only to travel false paths

unable to breach steel
of father, protector, champion


Read the poetry of Michele Shaw
Read a profile of Michele Shaw



Poet Kathleen Everett Is Now On VerseWrights

PictureKathleen Everett





The Moon Makes Me Laugh


The moon makes me laugh.
Her face pink-gold with exertion
Pushing past the horizon,
Filling the constellations,
To rise in her nights journey.
As she climbs, she prays
in the voice of my mother,
“I see the moon, the moon sees me.
God bless the moon and God bless me.”

The moon makes me laugh.
Her bright face silver with light,
Gracefully easing into space,
Moving in celestial dance.
As she rises, she sings
In the voice of my father,
“Don’t the moon look lonesome,
shining through the trees.
Don’t the moon look lonesome,
when your baby packs up to leave.”
The moon makes me laugh.

From the dark bedroom
My sleepy voiced husband calls,
What are ya’ll doing? Come to bed.
We can’t, I answer.
We have moon sickness.
As the dogs and I moon-bathe,
Naked on the back porch.


Kathleen Gresham Everett is a writer and poet living in the Missouri Ozarks with her husband, a landscape designer. Having attended universities in Texas and Missouri and having lived in many areas of the United States from New Jersey to Colorado, her love for her adopted region speaks through much of her work. Her first book of poetry, The Course of Our Seasons, was published in 2010. Several of her poems were included in The dVerse Anthology, Voices of Contemporary World Poetry, edited by Frank Watson and published by Plum White Press, 2013. Everett writes on her blog, the course of our seasons and can be found on Twitter @everettpoetry. She is currently editing her memoir, The Last Really Good Shack, and is working on a second book of poetry. Read.


Two Short Poems From Danielle Favorite

PictureDanielle Favorite





New Moon


This night is deciduous
and I am lost in Ursa Minor
with a dead flower, alive with fire.

I want to tease my name
from the lips of every star
that pulses within your heart--

        you, with the blue bandana, you know who you are.

Let me be the voice


Susie's pool

You stole the stars from my breath
so I sank to the bottom of the pool
and listened for rain.

The moon is naked with pewter;
it drips into my heartbeat,
slows it down until you pull
me to the surface,
like a star to the earth.


Read the poems of Danielle Favorite
Read a profile of Danielle Favorite
Read about Danielle's latest book



A New Poem From Roseville Nidea

PictureRoseville Nidea





Brishma's Bed of Arrows


It seems you practiced asceticism:
       stood in one toe in the snow
       for seven and ten years
       to learn the secret of my death.

Then there, one day, you struck me
With your hundred thousand arrows
In such full accuracy,
No space in my body
Thicker than two inches
Was not pierced;
I fell from where I stood,
Lying fully supported by
The sharp-edged shafts, with
No part of my body touching the earth--
 
And, I remain lying,
Alive but dead.


Read the poetry of Roseville Nidea
Read a profile of Roseville Nidea



"The Watchers," New From Louise Hastings

PictureLouise Hastings




The Watchers


As darkness falls
the sky is shot with red
and here is where the wood
thins out, opens into a field of souls,
and all that’s good and gentle
bleeds off through the night.

There is no hope in this
and they come to burn the dead
hidden by a sweep of cloud
and a fading moon. We watch
to witness whatever truth there is,
and wait for morning to weep
across the trees, raw as ripped out roots.


Read the poetry of Louise Hastings
Read a profile of Louise Hastings



"Stranded," A New Poem From Rhonda L. Brockmeyer

PictureRhonda L. Brockmeyer







Stranded

In every quiet moment
You are there,
Twirled in my heart…
A single thread of music
Through all the chaos,
All the noise and pounding
A single strand of notes
Barely audible
Barely a breath…
But there you are…

Fingers of strength
Holding me tight..
My serenity
My sacred light

Stranded within
Wandering throughout all I am
Every moment feels
Like the tenderness of a kiss
A brush of lips to skin
Heart to soul
Eyes–quieting to be held by yours
Every moment
Has a gentle reserve
Washing through it
Passion sitting on the edge
Slowly eroded into us
Twirled away quick as it fell

Stranded within us
Faint musical interludes
Of love, of light


Read the poetry of Rhonda L. Brockmeyer
Read a profile of Rhonda L. Brockmeyer



Poet Liam Porter Is Now On VerseWrights

PictureLiam Porter





The Ploughed Field


Today you were cut deep,

sliced open from end to end,

and everything was suddenly

turned upside down.

Torn asunder, you bled

fresh brown into yourself

until you glinted again

in the September sun.

Overhead, on the wires,

the black music score of birds

silently played out the evening,

and the light of the tractor

flashed amber and warned

of the winter days yet to come.


Liam Porter is an Irish writer from Co. Donegal who, after years of working in local newspapers as a reporter and editor has recently rediscovered the joy of creative writing. He has had poems published in several anthologies, newspapers and other publications, including The Rake (University College Dublin), Poetry Now, Fire in the Heart (International Library of Poetry), and The Derry Journal. He has set himself the challenge of posting a poem a day on his blog during this present year. Read.

We Welcome Poet Gary Metras To Our Pages

PictureGary Metras





Destinations


“Sometimes the most real things you can’t see.”
—Chief Oren Lyons of the Onondaga


Engine noise in the sky above the fields where
I loaf, reading, then a helicopter on a straight path
to somewhere grows larger and louder and leaves
a wake of angry air wasting minutes. Afterward
the white and gray clouds resume their play
while in front of me a dragonfly, as large
as a hummingbird, hovers before darting
around this field where it zigs to random patterns
of mosquitoes hatching and rising to their deaths.

A hawk’s faint cry splits the meadow’s new calm.
I put the book down and search for the brown streak
circling against the dark mountain. Another cry.
Another. The neighbor’s telephone rings.
They are in New Jersey all this week. Ring and cry.
Then silence. I pick up the book. August continues.


Gary Metras is the author of Two Bloods: Fly Fishing Poems, winner of the Split Oak Press Chapbook Award 2010, Francis D'Asissi 2008, Finishing Line Press 2008, selected as Recommended by the Massachusetts Center of the Book 2009, along with thirteen other chapbooks and three books of poems. His poems, essays and reviews have appeared in such journals as Blueline, Boston Review of Books, Connecticut Poetry Review, Istanbul Literary Review, Poetry, Poetry East, Salzburg Poetry Review, Santa Fe Literary Review, and Small Press Review. His newest book, Captive in the Here, is due this fall from Cervena Barva Press. He is a retired educator having taught English and writing on the high school and college levels. He is the printer and editor of Adastra Press, which specializes in hand crafted limited edition chapbooks. Read.


A New Poem From Poet Samantha Reynolds

PictureSamantha Reynolds




You are more than a sweaty turnip

I take offence on your behalf
to what they focus on
as you press your way
week by week
into my skin

like this week
one website compared you
to a turnip
and made note
of your sweat glands

and why the term rump
like you are a cut of steak

am I the only one
who wonders if you dream yet

and what about your amygdala
a word so beautiful it could be your name
that almond-shaped slice of your mind
where your memories nest

will I feel it when it grows
collecting your slippery thoughts

when you dream inside of me
do I get to watch.


Read the poetry of Samantha Reynolds
Rea a profile of Samantha Reynolds



Poet Eusebeia Philos Now on VerseWrights

PictureEusebeia Philos





Neighbor


Better change your ways,
I hear the Teacher say,
when we question who
our neighbor is,
not just the dude in the pew
who sings like you,
off key and all,
or professors and their
obedient sheep tuned to
the classroom sermon,
all those in faithful repetition,
appear alike, sound the same,
uniform in the outrageous
dress of the same tribe as you,
no that won't do, get up and
cross the road that splits
your comfort from your disgust,
and do for others
what you do for yours,
clean up their bloody mess,
stash a few bucks in their pocket,
and promise to check back
till they're on their feet
and ready to be
your neighbor, too.


Eusebeia Philos was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. Poetry and its ability to create an emotional experience from words and ideas has always fascinated him. Many of his long form poems can be found on his Website. You can also find him sharing micropoetry on Twitter @Eusebeia_Philos. Eusebeia received his B.A. in Philosophy (with a certificate in Bioethics) from Cleveland State University. He resides in the rolling farmlands of Northeastern Ohio. Read.


Lupe Eyde-Tucker's Poem "First"

PictureLupe Eyde-Tucker






First
☊


It was in a dream

in a low-light room

in a box of matches

from a pocket

It was a rapid friction

a flare of passion

reflected in dark eyes

It was in a dream

I sometimes tell myself

where nothing I touched

could touch me back

It was in my skin

in the evidence of

the scars, the burns,

the scratches

In a crying moment

in a chosen fashion

that a game of arms

struck like matches

in the beating heart

of a dream

pleasure & pain

are the same muscle.


Hear this poem read by Lupe Eyde-Tucker
Read the poetry of Lupe Eyde-Tucker
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From Shan Ellis: "Hold your position"

PictureShan Ellis





Hold your position


Open mouthed, salivating,
unforgiven words.
Passed
in silence.
 
Room spin, raw throat
spottled spittle depravity.
 
Clenched jaw, head high
undermined.
 
Formidably uncrossing pale legs
juncture and crevice
yearns.
 
Broken glass
sickly remnants of whiskey
dribbles half-heartedly.
 
Listless kiss regrets,
double-jeopardy jumped.
 
Unfurling luscious betrayal wafts
ruffling, tempting.
 
Open mouthed, salivating;
discarded.

Thirty-four.


Read the poetry of Shan Ellis
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Poet Robert King's "At Fifteen"

PictureRobert King





At Fifteen
☊


At the first hard shock, a first love
overturned in the instant of a letter,
I was burned by the hurt, if not

in the heart, that tight affectionate knot,

then in the chest, an ache swelling up.

That night I lay in bed watching the rain

burst over our small troubled trees

and cried, mostly from pain but partly,

that young, in tune with the storm’s torrent,

until I stopped. But then, wanting back

that bitter pang, I counted up

every lost thing until I broke out again,

glorying in my new sadness,

delighted to feel it, to feel, my small life
as large as the worldly rain.


Hear this poem read by Robert King
Read the poetry of Robert King
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Poet Rowan Taw's "The wrong vehicle..."

PictureRowan Taw





The wrong vehicle for this town
☊

It was summer in a new town,
in a new house, in a new life.
A township full of conservative
community sentiments.
Real men have chainsaws,
and women bake and love their..
horses.

I had my hundred year old roof
replaced by a local man.
With weeks of work and
weeks of tea drinking
out on my shaded verandah,
he was an easy going mate,
we would chat about..
nothing in particular,
my intellect relaxed,
I felt grounded in his
company.

If I drove the right vehicle,
he’d have invited me to
join the lads for a beer,
and a game of cards.
But it’s a small town,
old social rules still apply -
I drive the wrong vehicle,
with my smackable rear bumper,
and my front airbags
permanently inflated.

I hid inside the house
the day his wife called on him.
I feared my own
non-existent threat of
being an apparently single,
liberal lady, of
independent means.
I hid..because..all I wanted
was a friendly smile, and for him to
fix my gutter five years from then.


See this poem read aloud (by Paul Mortimer)
Read the poetry of Rowan Taw
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Maryann Maglangit Joins The Poets On VerseWrights

PictureMaryann Maglangit





San Antonio


A white moth rustles
beneath the old wooden
bench at 5 a.m.
where you used to have
morning coffee with me,
while overhead is a
signboard that reads
'Welcome to San Antonio!'
It swings back and forth
like a childhood sweetheart
waving outside my window.
How many sunrises
until the paint peels?
How many sunsets
until the letters fade?
For now
I guess
my only choice is to wait
with my cup of coffee
on a chipped wooden seat.
Just like any other morning,
only colder now.


Maryann Maglangit lives and works in the Philippine’s Queen City of the South, the country’s oldest city since the Spanish regime. She attended the University of San Jose-Recolletos receiving a Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering and later studied at Southwestern University. She has been writing from the age of three, a passion which continued into her adult life. After college she put aside her interest in writing to climb the corporate ladder as a marketing analyst for an American architectural company. She later became a community service representative for a US based global eCommerce company. The new position gave her plenty of time to write and in 2011 she renewed her passion for writing. Her current project is a lesbian themed novel entitled Poison Ivy. Read.



We Welcome Wasentha Young to VerseWrights

PictureWasentha Young





Landscapes of the Mind


We imitate the Masters
based on a poem,
Capturing the feeling of what is underneath

Auspicious pines
Immortal peaches
sitting among
rustling bamboo and banana leaves

The strength is the
brushstroke of the mind and image
     coming together like two waterfalls,
     becoming the feeling.

The changing shapes whisper
     like clouds cradling mountaintops.

Empty space filled with chi,
Imaginary journey for the soul
forgetting worldly desire,
     We nourish our spirits.

Wasentha Young has been involved in the “arts” since her early teens. A native New Yorker, city life has offered her many opportunities for creative expression. She has written about, painted, and studied Eastern health arts. More recently she has become a writer of short stories, children books, and poetry; she is a mosaic artist; and a master of Tai Chi and Qigong (Energy Work). Most of her writing has been published in national and local magazines and newsletters such as Qi Journal, Tai Chi Journal, Natural Awakenings and Crazy Wisdom Journal. She has also won the University of Michigan "Excellence in Patient Education" (2006) for a series of children’s books focused on cultural diversity in different models of physical activity, entitled Move Your Body. Her poetry and short stories have been publically read and performed in bookstores in Albuquerque and Santa Fe, NM as well as The Ark in Ann Arbor, MI. She maintains a website at www.wasentha.com, and invites your visit. Read.



"A Vocabulary," from Julie Brooks Barbour

PictureJulie Brooks Barbour





A Vocabulary

My grandmother recited recipes from memory.
She wrote nothing down. Even when I offered
 
pen and paper, she insisted on speaking.
Ingredients and measurements might settle
 
into my memory if she repeated them often enough,
like a spell. I refused that vocabulary.
 
It was like science, and I only liked science
when it pertained to animals and their habitats.
 
I adopted the language of stories, took the pen and                 paper
I’d offered my grandmother and wrote my way                     
out of the kitchen, away from boiling water
and baking temperatures. Outside, I dug old bottles
 
from the dirt in the chicken house, dusted the soil off
their curved bodies and traced the raised letters;
 
I plucked stamen and stigma from passion flowers
until they became dancers I twirled between my fingers.
 
The sun’s heat could bear down on me
but not the heat of the kitchen or its rules.
 
My grandmother never stopped trying to lure me in,
offering banana pudding or cherry cobbler at the end
 
of a school day, waiting to tell me when I finished
of cups measured or how much fruit to slice
 
but I slipped out the screen door after
cleaning my bowl, my only work in that room.

Read the poetry of Julie Brooks Barbour
Read a profile of Julie Brooks Barbour



Lupe Eyde-Tucker Joins the Poets on VerseWrights

PictureLupe Eyde-Tucker





August

This night is
a fuzzy, fleshy peach
which I aim to take a bite of
just knowing that
it won’t be long
before I am covered
in sticky, sweet juice
dripping from my fingers
running down my arms.

This night is
a sultry dream
a far-away jazz tune
brought by a wayward breeze
laid at my feet
an offering, a promise
I intend to keep.
This night
is ripe.


Lupe Eyde-Tucker was born on the shores of the Navesink River in Red Bank, NJ. She is a wife and the mother of five. In her early twenties she began writing as a stringer for the Asbury Park Press, and went on to become a freelance writer. After receiving her B.A. in Business Economics, she found her life’s passion in education, having taught literature, language arts, and economics at the middle school, high school, and community college levels. Currently, with her husband, she publishes several online e-magazines, including SailMiami.com and HomeschoolingFlorida.com. Poetry has been a source of great joy and inspiration throughout her life. She shares her poems on her poetry blog, Not Enough Poetry and other writing on her website entitled TheNewJerseyGirl “I just want to inspire, and be inspired,” she says. “Teach a little, and learn a lot.” Read.


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