Opera in Bianco/Contemporary Poetry

Frederico Federici clued me in to some wonderful English translations on his blog of poems that you should all check out at:
http://leserpent.wordpress.com/category/english/

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Lisa M. Cole's tinder//heart

Lisa M. Cole’s chapbook, tinder//heart, published by Dancing Girl Press in 2012, is beautiful and riveting. There is pain, tenderness, beauty and scars among the pages, all exquisitely revealed by Lisa M. Cole’s mastery of prose poetry. Her words appear as free flowing thought corralled into order. It is difficult to share only a few poems so I urge you to pick up a copy for yourself after reading these samples:

that you didn’t love me//knocked flat//love greater than fear//no walls/tear down & conquer do it//not enough love//thinking//quell love//quell it//drawing the eye//clover eyes, pig eyes, frog eyes, zombie eyes//brick house dreams//digging with a short-handed hoe//remember when we talked of wedding dresses & white cake//my mother cradling my face//don’t quit soldier//don’t quit//biding time//driving, driving/she is a white zombie//no voice box//no chords//ships need anchors

This poem reminds me of free-flow thinking and writing your thoughts as they naturally occur before breaking them up into the fragments that they appeared in. I imagine the poet thinking about a recent lover and trying to stifle the overwhelming tide of emotion, hence the italicized words to emphasize the intensity of the emotions throughout the poem. I love the imagery, the different kinds of eyes she names, perhaps the way her eyes look during the ups and downs of the emotions, and the “brick house dreams” where so many of us picture that perfect house to live in with that perfect someone. Her mother “cradling my face” is endearing and heart breaking all at once and then followed by “don’t quit soldier” and you hope the Mom is encouraging the poet through this heartache to come out whole on the other side of the grief. It’s a beautiful poem. I’ve read it over and over again and just find more and more that I love about it.


touching his skin soft like a pear//memory opens like so many tattered maps//empty perfume bottles shattered//teeth marks on all the books//drinking bloody marys till dawn and scheming like chemists//butter cookies in the backseat of the car after sleeping with the horses in the grass//spill ink on your arm//remember the palm trees & the balmy nights//the letters to too many lovers written in long-hand//all the theatres in your mind fall down & then you see it//what you breathe against//a heart full of tinders

I love the images of each line framed by the //. I envision the poet thinking of a man who she loved dearly but has gone on with his own life and she sees the small moments in freeze frames. I love “teeth marks on all the books” and wonder whose teeth made those marks and how does someone end up putting book in their teeth? What sort of pair sleeps in the grass with horses and then either eats or finds butter cookies in the backseat of the car? I love the idea of “the theatres in your mind fall down & then you see it” all the dramatic spins that reminiscing can impose of true memory and then to strip the memory back down to its true nature. Everything about it makes me long to learn more about this pair in the poem, to dig down further into their history.


when grace asks, give her rusted pennies//the lament of the lungs//that we can never breathe enough//give enough//live enough//when grace allows//love an Irishman with a red beard//bruise your Achilles’ heel dancing drunk in your stockings smoking Camel cigarettes//call the horse & chariot that holds your desire//& runrunrun

I love the idea of “when grace asks…” That state of grace which can be so difficult to achieve, and in the poem is the sense that we are never good enough to achieve grace. So when grace allows it, why not allow yourself to love, to dance, to drink, to smoke, to run? That’s what I imagine the poem’s message to be. I’d love to know how this poem came to Lisa M Cole’s mind and what her intentions are for its meaning.

If you enjoyed this review and these wonderful samples, you may purchase a copy of tinder//heart by Lisa Cole for $7.00 from Dancing Girl Press at:
http://dulcetshop.ecrater.com/p/14991457/tinder-heart-lisa-m-cole

Thanks always for reading, please drop in again next week...

Poems Found by Poet Hound

http://juked.com/2013/01/meg-thompson-new-companions-coming-soon.asp
“New Companions Coming Soon” by Meg Thompson

http://www.poolpoetry.com/poetthree.html
“o! hello araby, again” by Kristin Hatch

Thanks again, please drop in again next week…

Aleathia Drehmer's Site

I’m a fan of Aleathia Drehmer’s work and editorial skills. Now she has her website devoted to showcasing all her skills and dreams and things-in-the-works so check it out at:
http://aleathiadrehmer.wordpress.com/

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Read A Good Book: Hank & Jules by Jason Fisk

Jason Fisk’s collection of short stories, Hank & Jules, is published by killthemiddlemanpress.com. It is a haunting collection of stories about the couple described above and how they fell in love, endured hardships, and are slated to part through sickness rather than health. I found myself feeling uplifted and redeemed in “Chemical Reaction” where Henry’s father learns that love is not just a “chemical reaction” and I found myself cringing in anticipation in the story “Harmonious.” “Harmonious” is the story of Henry’s car accident and the secret that could be exposed about his true intentions for being found at the zoo at the time of the car accident with his wife worried and anxious at his side. Many of the stories leave you wondering what the end really is and leaves the reader to anticipate the ultimate conclusion for each short story. However, the ultimate concluding story will break your heart even as it leaves you with questions. It is a page-turning read and is the perfect book for a rainy day spent indoors.

If you enjoyed this review of Hank & Jules by Jason Fisk you may purchase a copy for $5.50 by going to:
http://www.amazon.com/Hank-Jules-Jason-Fisk/dp/0615722490

To learn more about Jason Fisk, who writes poetry and fiction, please visit his blog at:
http://jasonfisk.blogspot.com/


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The Lit Garden Open Submissions

Seeking poetry (among other types of writing) with a limit of 500 words for upcoming issues: The Resurrection issue (deadline Feb. 28) and The Plunder Issue (deadline March 30th). You may submit via e-mail to: joanne@thelitgarden.com

Be sure to check out their website for further details, etc. at:
http://www.thelitgarden.com/p/calls-for-submissions.html

Good luck to all who submit, please drop in tomorrow for Read A Good Book…

Poems Found by Poet Hound

https://sites.google.com/site/rhpissue60/angele-ellis
“Waning” by Angele Ellis

https://sites.google.com/site/rhpissue60/worthy-evans
“Southern” by Worthy Evans

http://www.unf.edu/mudlark/flashes/darling_guess.html
Katrina Marie Darling’s and Carol Guess’s collaborative poems/prose, all of them

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The Navigation of Loss by Jane Rosenberg LaForge

Jane Rosenberg LaForge has been featured on Poet Hound before and I am pleased to feature her today with her chapbook The Navigation of Loss published by Red Ochre Press in 2012. While the title lets us know that the contents are about loss the poems themselves are composed of real and imagined scenes with emotions ranging from nostalgia to heartbreak. At the end of the collection is an interview between the editor Mimi Ferebee and the poet about her work which is enlightening and wonderful. I wish all poetry collections had this feature, even just a few short questions and the responses from the writer would be a grand thing for all readers. All of us are curious to a writer’s inspirations and motivations and the interview at the end provides us that crucial information. The collection is whimsical and stark all at the same time. Below I am happy to share a couple of poems:

Sanctuary

If I could live in that place
that photographs not in sepia
but in burnt umber, so there
is enough of a reminder of blood,
of what was not carried out,
and left with wounds to open;
where trees do not endure,
but merely assemble, as if
they have been called for
that one final round, to collect
their retirement and meaningless
medals; there my feet would
not upbraid the dirt, and my eyes
would not tear at the cold;
my breath could be as thick
as the clay below and the warmth
of it would not matter. I might
wear a garment of earth, restore
the autumn to my hair, and I
would belong. I would be invisible,
I would be both bark and hollow.
I am so old now that I can only
be disappointed in my humanness,
my vanity and jealousness, and
I am left with only the option
Of waiting, neither for sunset nor
Twilight but for the stain to breach
Clean of all taste, and all of color.

This poem feels earthy and sensual in a way I did not expect. The poet speaks of older photographs where most, but not all, the color is drained out and how she wants to inhabit that space where everything is arranged just so and that nothing in the scene would or could be disturbed. I think we all feel that way at times, the desperate need for order in our lives, to inhabit some perfect scene that we find in magazines and TV shows and films instead of the imperfect and chaotic space of our real lives. She describes her reality at the end and so many of can relate to feeling “disappointed in my humanness.” There is no perfection, only humanity, it is a beautiful poem.


The Navigation of Loss

In the apartment I bought
with my inheritance, I can
sit at one end and feel as though
my grandmother’s grand bathroom
is just down the long hall; with the
sunken tub beside the clouded window
that smeared the landscape outside of it.
This is supposed to be about loss, how
it is quantified and navigated in cardinal
directions according to our infernal
compasses. It does not matter if ironweed
and cattails grew too high outside the
bathroom for the fire department, only
that my grandmother’s rooms had to be
sequestered far and away from everyone
else; she was so ill and delicate. In the
kitchen, there was an intercom, and my
uncle typed up a legend for its buttons,
on the old typewriter that left tears in the
consonants, and shadows in the vowels.
For the last button, he had typed “Mother’s
Room,” and when I was old enough to read
it I realized just who this man was, living
with my grandparents. My uncle hung his
antique maps throughout the rest of the house,
instruments devised before satellites and
contemporary battles. Continents distended,
oceans shrunk; there were fewer borders than
I remembered, and there were no rivers or
mountains. Just after my uncle died, his wife
tried to give me those maps, but I said it was too
soon for that. She told me he had confided he had
always been afraid of women because his mother
was always on the verge of death. That’s why he
became a doctor, though he would have rather been
anything else.

The poem’s ending catches my heart strings. The poet looks back on her family’s life as she was growing up and learns that her uncle chose his profession out of a fear of the unknown. So many of us pursue life either avoiding our fears or trying to learn more about them in order to overcome. What we don’t know is whether her uncle ever found the answers he was looking for and so there is another layer of loss for the reader to contemplate on. The antique maps are a visual cue and reminder of the poets’ uncle and his ways and I wonder if she ever decides to receive the maps and hang them in her own home?


If you enjoyed this review you may read more sample poems and purchase a copy of The Navigation of Loss by Jane Rosenberg LaForge for $11.00 at:
http://www.redochrelit.com/janerosenberglaforge.html

To learn more about Jane Rosenberg LaForge and find more of her poetry and writing, visit her website at:
http://jane-rosenberg-laforge.com/

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

Syntax is a Second Skin Blog

Writer, poet, and professor, check out her blog filled with fabulous writerly things, links, and more at:
http://www.carolguess.blogspot.com/

Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for Jane Rosenberg LaForge’s collection…

Poems Found by Poet Hound

https://sites.google.com/site/bradroserhpchapbook/honey-gets-her-wish
“Honey Gets Her Wish” by Brad Rose

https://sites.google.com/site/bradroserhpchapbook/no-tip
“No Tip” by Brad Rose

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David S. Pointer's Sundrenched Nanosilver

Mr. Pointer has been featured on Poet Hound before. His latest collection, Sundrenched Nanosilver, is published in Canada by Brian Wrixon Books. Mr. Pointer is no-holds-barred when it comes to his poems about politics, the armed forces, world relations and his own private life. Below I am happy to share a sample:

The Scrapper

He used to fight under antler chandeliers
sharp in his trotting razors, the attack

rooster now roams through discarded
nail kegs, egg crates, and cream cans,

unadorned claws, rescued and retired fire
atop a wood pile big as an Amish wagon.

This poem has an illustration of a rooster standing tall and reflects the stature of the former prize fighting rooster. I can picture the rooster fighting under the antler chandeliers and making out well enough against his opponent that somebody takes him to a safe place and retires him to what looks like a junkyard. Once a rooster that stood tall for battle it now roams in what I picture to be a spare and desolate landscape. The ending stanza leads me to imagine he is being thrown into a built-up fire to put an end to his misery of all the injuries of fighting in the ring. The poem is as stark and unadorned as its creature.



First Will and Word Testament

As curator for the
preservation of poetry
in my own home, I
hereby leave my little
girls everything—the
inner spirit’s porcelain
spy glass for special
investigations into any
hard or loving heart,
the inlaid dowry chest
for their choicest poems,
the rock crystal candle-
sticks for display on
the cedar tilt-top
tea table, the mahogany
bow-backed armchair
for after-hours reading.
and tonight, I leave
them with my wishful
words to help thread
their dreams with pink
party lanterns and
frosted glass fairy
lights for illuminating
blue river pebbles
floating through razor
rock rapids of REM
sleep where white
slipper shells slide
towards new aquamarine
avenues just one soft
wake up away.

I love this sweet poem about the poet and his daughters. I can picture the poet quietly peeking into his daughters’ room to look at their sleeping forms and thinking up this poem. It speaks for itself and I enjoy it very much.



Envy?

The rich grab up all the money
like a Mexican land grant, and
the bottom end poor are left
pondering early burial by
bottle,
crack pipe, or tiny paycheck,

Mitt Romney’s cross-border
bank roll
safe, secure, and insured as
his corporate raider retreats

This poem makes me smile because I, too, feel the squeeze of finances and I’m tired of seeing wealthy people in power make more money while the rest of us continue to be squeezed. Thanks for the righteousness, Mr. Pointer!


If you enjoyed this review, you may purchase a copy of David S. Pointer’s Sundrenched Nanosilver for $10.00 at:
http://www.blurb.com/b/3728190-sundrenched-nanosilver

Thanks always for reading, please drop in again tomorrow…

Strange Girl Press

Andrea Kiss has created this press and has alerted me that she will soon be posting for Open Submissions o in the meantime please check it out at:
http://www.strangegirlpress.com/

Thanks for dropping in, please stop by tomorrow for another featured poet…

Never Ending Story Open Submissions

If you enjoy writing and/or reading haiku and tanka poems, this is the place to go. This is a bilingual Chinese-English blog, so please check out the website to see what kinds of poems are published:
http://neverendingstoryhaikutanka.blogspot.com/


The guidelines are as follows:

Send your best, preferably published tanka (please provide publication credits) or new work and a bio sketch (75 words max.) with the subject heading "Published or Unpublished Tanka, Your Name, Submitted Date" to Chen-ou Liu, Blog Editor and Translator via email at neverendingstory_tanka@yahoo.ca

No more than 20 tanka per submission and no simultaneous submissions. And Please wait for at least four months for another new submission.

Please note that only those whose tanka are selected for publication will be notified within two months, and that no other notification will be sent out, so your works are automatically freed up after two months to submit elsewhere.

The accepted tanka will be translated into Chinese and posted on NeverEnding Story and Twitter (You are welcome to follow me on NeverEnding Story or on Twitter at @storyhaikutanka). Of them, the best 66 tanka will be included in the anthology, which is scheduled to be published in April of 2014, and the best of the best tanka of 2013 will be rewarded $CAD 50 and the poet will be given a 3-page space to feature the best tanka of his/her choice. For those whose tanka are included in the anthology, each will receive a copy of its e-book edition.

A tanka is snowflakes drifting through the ink dark moon. -- Chen-ou Liu


Good luck to all who submit, please drop by again next week…

Poems Found by Poet Hound

http://www.corpse.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=757&Itemid=32
“March Hares” by Nanos Valaoritis

http://www.poolpoetry.com/poettwelve.html
“Trip Advisor” by Nicholas Wong

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Bill Friday's Blog

Find some poetry and some hilarious self-deprecation by clicking here:
http://billfriday.com/

Thanks for clicking in, please drop in again on Wednesday…