Poetry Tips: Memorization

Memorize a new poem. Find a poem you enjoy by a poet that is new to you and memorize it until you can recite it with ease, even if it is a short haiku. This will give you practice in reading poetry aloud as well as practicing rhythm and perhaps even influencing your own writing technique if you are a writer.

Good luck to all who try it, please drop in next week for another featured site…

Lilliput Review's Basho Haiku Challenge

I have copy-and-pasted and linked the guidelines below:

http://lilliputreview.blogspot.com/
Basho Haiku Challenge

“So, here's the deal: for the next four weeks, send along up to
5 haiku to lilliput review at gmail dot com (spelled out
to fend off pesky bots) and the best haiku wins a copy of
Bashō and His Interpreters: Selected Hokku with
Commentary, edited by Makoto Ueda. Minimally, I will
need your name and email to contact you with the
results. In the subject line of your email, please put
"2nd Annual Bashō Haiku Challenge" so I can easily
differentiate it from the scads of other things that come my
way. The final date for submissions will be October 31st and
the winner will be announced in either November 18th or
December 2nd postings. My definition of haiku is about as
liberal as you can get: I follow no one particular method,
school or theory and there is no seasonal requirement.
Your haiku can be 1, 2, or 3 lines (over 5 would be a bit
much, folks, but I will keep an open mind for
experimenters). The one restriction would be that it be
in the spirit of haiku (I've always liked the definition of
English haiku as lasting the length of one breath, in and
out and pause, but that's just me - and, oh yeah, I'm the
judge, but, again, it's the spirit of the thing that counts)
and that the haiku be previously unpublished in either
paper or electronic form (ok, that's two requirements).

In addition, the winning poet will receive a 15 issue
subscription to Lilliput Review (or have their current
subscription extended by 15 issues), plus two copies of
the 2nd Annual chapbook, to be published sometime in
2010. Other poets whose work is selected for inclusion
will receive 2 copies of the chapbook plus a 6 issue
subscription.”

You have until the end of October! Good luck to all who submit and please drop in tomorrow for more Poetry Tips…

Poems Found by Poet Hound

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=175991#
“Just Think!” by Robert Service


http://arseniclobster.magere.com/200101.html
“A Tiger Lurks in the Night Forest” byLouis Daniel Brodsky

Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for more Open Submissions…

Howie Good's Still Life With Firearms

http://www.righthandpointing.com/firearms/

Right Hand Pointing Press has e-chapbooks and I have provided the link above for quick and easy access to Howie Good’s collection of poems in Still Life With Firearms. You are greeted immediately with pictures of soldiers in uniform in training with firearms provided by Dale Wisely, then taken to the table of contents where the titles of the poems are interesting and enticing to the reader while clicking through. The poems themselves are snapshots of tragedy, the absurd, tender moments, and the luck-of-the-draw in life. I will happily share a sample of the poems with you and hope that you will use the link above to read for yourself:


The Doctrine of Insufficient Adulation

I stop looking up
words I don't know.
You stop sympathizing
with the televised apologies
of disgraced celebrities.
The small white dog
we named for John Dewey
sleeps between us.

I like that this poem brings to light the indifference taking over the couple in the poem in regards to their surroundings. Have you also stopped “sympathizing/with the televised apologies/of disgraced celebrities?”


Heartsick

The evening light always
seems to me peculiarly sad.
My heart holds its hands
out toward the fire.
I visit the doctor,
afraid to upset the silence
following upon the collapse
of the great newspapers.
He decides to give me a shot.
He says it’s to numb me.
It doesn’t. Although spring,
I can see the system of roads
built to carry away the days.

You wonder what sort of ailment or wound requires a shot that doesn’t numb the feelings of the poet. You also feel the sad dreariness of life, particularly in the ending lines: “Although spring,/I can see the system of roads/built to carry away the days.,” as though the concrete of the roads annihilates the ability of natural, green growth to show through to prove the season. The whole poem leaves me with the feeling of being weighed down, which gives light to the title, Heartsick.


That Summer
The roof burned continuously.
I passed long hours learning

the names of various shades of blue –
Air Force Blue, cornflower blue,

Persian blue, periwinkle.
Night came early where I lived

with my mother and three brothers
and no one to read me to sleep,

though the herd of clouds grazing
at the end of the street would always

lift their big, shaggy heads to listen.

I love the imagery in this poem. I think of the roof burning blue in the summer heat, and I especially love the idea of clouds grazing at the end of the street in various animal shapes, lifting their heads to listen to a young boy. Very imaginative and whimsical.


This is just a small sample of the poems in the chapbook by Howie Good.
Be sure to visit Right Hand Pointing to learn more about Mr. Good and to read his entire chapbook of poems available on-line at:
http://www.righthandpointing.com/

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

The Gettysburg Review

Find poetry links, current issues, submissions criteria and more at:

http://www.gettysburgreview.com/

Thanks for clicking in, please drop by tomorrow for another featured poet…

Poetry Tips: Decorative Poems

While most people are busy putting up decorations in their houses for upcoming holidays why not add poems into the mix? What spooky poems can you find and disperse among your house for your children or guests to find? You could cut shapes of haunted houses or pumpkins and post the poems on them. How about a poetic menu for the next holiday feast? Or, instead of a jarful of ingredients to make cookies, you could enclose a bundle of poems whether hand-written by you or copied down/printed out neatly from other poets? Robert Frost’s poems would make an excellent bundle tied in ribbon and placed in a jar or vase to give as a present when the winter snows bear down. Gifts can take many forms for poems as well: you could place a tied bundle of poems in a giant mug with some hot cocoa packets and ta-da! Any way you try it, you are bound to have some fun mixing poetry and decorating with plenty of holidays marching in over the next few months. Good luck to all who try the mix!

Thanks always for dropping in, please stop by next Monday for more Poetry Sites….

Rattle Open Submissions

You may send up to five poems including your contact information and a short and interesting biography either by e-mail or mail. E-mail submissions to: submissions AT rattle DOT com or you can mail with an enclosed, stamped return envelope to:

Rattle
12411 Ventura Blvd.
Studio City, CA 91604

For further details check out their guidelines at:
http://www.rattle.com/submissions.htm

Good luck to all who submit, please come by tomorrow for more Poetry Tips…

Poems Found by Poet Hound

http://juked.com/2009/09/self-portraiture.asp
“We Try Self-Portraiture” by Nicole Cartwright Denison


http://poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/19975
“After Apple Picking” by Robert Frost


Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for more Open Submissions…

Fragile Arts Quarterly

http://fragile-arts-quarterly.blogspot.com/

I am beginning with a link because you can download the entire issue for yourself for free and please do so because there is bold art and photography woven among the poems for an enlightening mix. I will happily share a small sample of poems with you:


Sammy
by Wendy Parkin

You don’t care about wearing socks and shoes,
whether the soles of your feet turn black as asphalt.
Grass glued to your sticky fingers doesn’t keep you
from holding up sagging pants falling off your skinny waist.
It doesn’t matter to you
your mom is burning the spaghetti on the stove
because she drank too many Budweiser’s,
the neighbors are sitting on front porches
talking about how dirty you are,
and there isn’t enough money
to buy cigarettes and your first grade class pictures.
It doesn’t matter to you
the school nurse constantly sends you home
because you have head lice, and your clothes stink.
It doesn’t matter to you
adults don’t understand why
you spit on kids at recess for saying you have fleas
and calling you retarded because you don’t talk right.
Right now, happiness to you
is running your little brother over with your bike
in the middle of the street
until you make him scream and cry.
It’s good you’re too young to realize
a little boy should have sheets and pillows on his bed,
a bubble bath every night, and wake to prepared
breakfast every morning; some hot cereal and apple juice.
You don’t realize chocolate ice-cream sandwiches
and flat cans of generic Cola-Bubba for dinner
will rot your teeth until they all go missing.
It’s good you’re too young to realize
what missing is.
It’s good
youth feeds and covers you.


The editors describe Wendy Parkin’s poetry is described as “stark” and that is exactly the term I’d come up with for her poems. She brings to light what is often not spoken of in some neighborhoods but thought about behind closed doors. There is no evidence that anyone will involve themselves in “Sammy’s” life but you can feel the undercurrent of helplessness in watching his life unfold in the poem. Stark, and haunting.



maybe even devils get depressed
by David McLean

maybe even devils get depressed
when screams get quieter
and we seem to be enjoying it,
when anxiety becomes an infinity
of self-congratulation for sensitivity
and self-pity, when people don't really
suffer easily, maybe even devils
get depressed then. after all,
they're only human

I like this one because it’s an unusual take on how devils are portrayed—as human—and as being able to feel sadness/depression. A topsy-turvy turn of events that I find intriguing in that when humanity isn’t suffering so much collectively anymore that devils may become depressed and finally, with a surprise ending of perhaps humans being the devils and angels they create for themselves.


Melinda’s Two Cats
By: Mikki Mous

Melinda's two cats
loiter upon the sidewalk
flipping matchsticks into the street
making catly comments, sleeping in the sun
and generally lending a disreptuable air
to the neighborhood of pristine lawns
and carefully sheared shrubs of no character

I’m including this one because I experienced this sight myself the other day, only at a restaurant crowded with noisy people, the cats were eating anything tossed their way, then sleeping peacefully amidst the noise. I like Mous’s line of “flipping matchsticks into the street” which lends a quirky visual and the words “disreputable air/to the neighborhood of pristine lawns” furthers it along. Among human existence, other worlds continue despite our best efforts, that is what I take away from it.


I hope you enjoyed this small sample and that you’ll check out the journal for yourself, there really are some amazing photos and art alongside the poems, a visual treat in all respects. Please use the link below if you haven’t already done so at the beginning of this post:
http://fragile-arts-quarterly.blogspot.com/

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

The Practicing Writer

Countless resources for all levels of writers at this web-site by Erika Dreifus. You can find e-book resources, newsletters, links to writing programs, If you are interested in improving your writing or embarking on a writing career, check it out at:

http://www.practicing-writer.com/content.php?page=resources&n=5&f=2

Thanks for clicking in, please drop by tomorrow for a featured poetry journal…

Poetry Tips: The Fan Letter

We are all fans of someone or of something, such as sports. Why not try writing a fan letter by way of a poem? You can be as fanatical or as reserved as you like, it can be addressed to anyone or anything. Perhaps you are the world’s biggest fan of Reese’s Cups or perhaps you are a Dallas Cowboys Fan. Are you a die-hard fan of a particular film maker or actor? Dedicate your poem to them and fill it with as many admirations or absurdities as you wish. At worst, you’ll have some fun, at best, you may actually try sending it out and may even receive a response.

Good luck to all who try and please stop by on Monday for a featured poetry site…

580 Split Open Submissions

I have copied-and-pasted the submission guidelines below:
Email submissions are preferred. Please send:
- prose submissions to: 580prose@gmail.com
- poetry submissions to: 580poetry@gmail.com
- art submissions to: five80split@gmail.com
Mail submissions may be sent to:
580 Split
Mills College
P.O. Box 9982
Oakland, CA 94613-0982
These must include a cover letter with your name, submission title(s) and contact information. Mail submissions must also include a SASE. All written submissions must be typed. Simultaneous submissions are permitted, as long as the editors are notified if work is accepted elsewhere
Please see the links below to learn more about 580 Split which is based out of Mills College. You may submit up to 2 prose pieces or 4 poems.

According to Poets and Writers (link below) the dead-line is October 15th, and the journal accepts up to 10 prose pieces and 20 poems.
http://www.pw.org/content/580_split_journal_letters


http://580split.com/call-for-submissions/where-to-submit/

Good luck to all who submit! Please drop in tomorrow for more Poetry Tips…

Poems Found by Poet Hound

http://www.swinkmag.com/tesstaylor.html
“A Song For El Cerrito” by Tess Taylor

http://www.sundress.net/wickedalice/kiefer.html
“Beekeeping” by Molly Sutton Kiefer

Thanks for clicking in, please drop by tomorrow for more Open Submissions…

Braided Creek by Jim Harrison and Ted Kooser

Braided Creek, A Conversation in Poetry contains the correspondence in poems between Ted Kooser and Jim Harrison during Ted Kooser’s diagnosis and treatment of cancer. This book was published by Copper Canyon Press in 2003 and while it does not stipulate who, specifically, wrote the poems, you can find plenty of insightful moments alongside basic every-day moments. You can also use a link provided below to listen to Ted Kooser’s interview with Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air that includes his experiences with cancer, how he sent his poems on postcards to Mr. Harrison, and how he came to be a Poet Laureate. This collection was sent to me by my father-in-law but you can find it at your local library, book-store, and of course, on-line.

There are hundreds of short poems that range in their poignancy and immediacy of the surroundings and lifestyle of the poets. I think one of the first poems you encounter is descriptive of how a man dealing with his mortality might speak to a friend: “Old friend,/perhaps we work too hard/at being remembered.” I think this is true of writers in general but there is an added layer to its meaning when someone is diagnosed with cancer.

What I also find interesting as a reader is that depending on my own mood I am drawn to different poems. Certainly there are other collections of poems that do the same but this collection stands out more so than any others I’ve read. Some poems strike you in their simplicity: “Under the storyteller’s hat/are many heads, all troubled.” Others, for their open-ended ability to let you decide what it’s true meaning may be: “Old white soup bowl/chipped like a tooth,/one of us is always empty.”

Then there are the poems that make you smile or laugh, always wonderful to see mixed in with a collection such as this: “So what if women/no longer smile to see me?/I smile to see them!” or “Strange world indeed:/a poet keeping himself awake/to write about insomnia.”

Finally, there are poems that let your mind wander to your own memories: “At the tip of memory’s/great funnel-cloud/is the nib of a pen.” “Winter knows/when a man’s pockets/are empty.” And finally “An empty boat/will volunteer for anything.”

As I mentioned earlier, there are hundreds of poems and all of them worth pouring over. If you enjoyed this feature you can use the links below to learn more about Ted Kooser in his interview at National Public Radio or you may purchase the book yourself with the link to Amazon:

An Interview with Ted Kooser on NPR’s Fresh Air is linked below:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4574862

To purchase a copy of this book, please go to:
http://www.amazon.com/Braided-Creek-Conversation-Jim-Harrison/dp/155659187X

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

Lit Up Magazine

There is much more than poetry to be found, but excellent poems abound and I urge you to peruse the site at your leisure by using the link below:

http://litupmagazine.wordpress.com/poetry/

Thanks for clicking in, please drop in tomorrow for more featured poets…