Lilliput Review #171

Don Wentworth at Lilliput Review has put together another riveting issue in #171 which is filled with poems about the ends of fall and the beginning of spring and the wellsprings of creative impulses of ink and paper. The first dozen poems I quickly claimed as favorites and then decided the whole issue is one of my favorite issues I’ve ever had the pleasure to read. Quite frankly I feel like posting the whole gosh-darned issue right here! However, that would not be practical or fair. So I will provide a small sample here…

4 A.M.

Spring cracks the sky and ink runs out.
An immense rom
rises around us
A wave of birdsong
breaks slowly across the continent.

Jim Ellis of Auburn, NY

Isn’t this a beautiful vision of spring and sunrise? It makes me want to step outside and breathe in deep the fresh air…



The sidewalks have disappeared.
I walk out into blank thought. The hinges
of the mailbox frozen over; the news,
small though it may seem, has traveled
whole lifetimes to reach us.

Greg Watson of St. Paul, MN

This is a nice contrast to the first poem, both make me want to breathe in fresh air. I love the idea of the mailbox being frozen over containing news that has “traveled whole lifetimes” and I am always a romantic about mailboxes and letters.



From the bridge I watch rust-colored barges
pushing pyramids of gravel up the river.
There is no Egypt here, no mystery;
only the earth shifting its weight, sun blazing,
the small indifferent birds who do not
sing. Not even for you.

Greg Watson of St. Paul, MN

I know we’ve already featured Greg Watson but his visuals are so crisp! Pyramids of gravel being pushed up river, how can you not picture it clearly in your mind’s eye? And then the emotions are brought forth by the last lines of birds who do not sing, “not even for you.” Who, exactly, is he naming? I’m dying to know! It’s a great way to create intrigue, don’t you think?



Going nowhere.
Always packed and ready.

Charlie Mehrhoff of Oakland, ME

Such a short poem loaded with any and all ideas you can bring to it. Personally, I wonder if he also means “having nothing” and therefore even more ready to just pick up and go where the winds may take him.


If you enjoyed these poems you can purchase Issue #171 for a whopping $1.00 bill or you can subscribe to six issues for $5 or 15 issues for $10.00 by sending a check made out to “Don Wentworth” and mail it to:
Lilliput Review
Don Wentworth
282 Main Street
Pittsburgh PA 15201

Being a subscriber of Lilliput Review, I can tell you that each envelope that arrives in the mail with the latest issues is always jam packed and colorful with book-mark sized flyers for new chapbooks, and I do use them as bookmarks, each issue arrives on colored paper and the illustrations are just as entertaining as the poems within the pages and on the cover. I always think of it as a present to receive the latest issues in the mail.
You can also learn more about Lilliput Review and its submissions guidelines at:

http://lilliputreview.googlepages.com/home

Thanks always for reading, please click in tomorrow for more Poems Found by Poet Hound…