poetry friday

Of Glass Slippers and Hummingbird Wings: Gregory Orr’s Wild Joy

~ jama ~ 14 Comments

“I believe in poetry as a way of surviving the emotional chaos, spiritual confusions, and traumatic events that come with being alive.” ~ Gregory Orr

I’ve always enjoyed reading poems about poetry — how it’s defined, what it means to both poet and audience, how it shapes our thinking and mines emotional depths, the vast potential of its reach.

Virginia-based lyric poet Gregory Orr is a particular favorite, and today I’m happy to share two poems from his twelfth collection, The Last Love Poem I Will Ever Write (W.W. Norton & Co., 2019). I think you will like these ‘poems about poems’, marveling at how Orr celebrates the transformative power of language.

*

“Floating Book Island with Waterfall” by Gert J Rheeders (2020).
CERTAIN POEMS OFFER ME . . . 

Certain poems offer me escape --
They're floating islands
Anchored only
By a cloud-rope of words
I can climb.

                      Some
Are the opposite:
Insisting on
Embodiment --
As if they were tattooed
On the beloved's thigh.

Still others are short
And sharp -- arrows
Aimed at the heart,
As if the purpose
Of beauty
Was to hurt me more alive.

*

Continue reading →

Alarie Tennille: of clocks and clips

~ jama ~ 28 Comments

Tick tick tick . . .

“The Persistence of Memory” by Salvador Dali (1931)
DALI'S CLOCKS
by Alarie Tennille

Scientists have cut time
into tiny, equal ticks,
but we all know it is fluid,

dripping ever so slowly —
an I.V. refusing to kill pain
or worry, 

sweeping us away —
a tidal wave any time we’re 
on the beach of contentment,
reluctant to gather up our things
and head back to our car.

Yet we persist in counting it
as though that’s a skill required
for our final exam —
the one we keep dreaming 
we didn’t prepare for.

~ from Running Counterclockwise (Kelsay Books, 2014)

*

Continue reading →

lefties rule!

~ jama ~ 28 Comments

“I may be left-handed, but I am always right.” ~ Anonymous

Hand Cookies by Ree Drummond/Food Network.

What do Paul McCartney, Julia Roberts and Prince William have in common?

Well, Paul is music royalty,

Julia is Hollywood royalty,

and Prince William is genuine-for-real British royalty (*swoons*):

Aside from that, they’re all lefties. 🙂

Perhaps southpaws are the true blue bloods of the world, the chosen few who comprise about 10% of the population. They are thought to be creative, imaginative, artistic, holistic and musical — traits associated with the right hemisphere of the brain, which is also responsible for left-hand control.

What’s it like being a lefty in a right-handed world? In the following poem, Virginia based poet Gregory Orr describes an early childhood challenge.

*

ODE TO LEFT-HANDEDNESS
by Gregory Orr

I sat at my kindergarten desk,
Surrounded by others,
Either cheerful
Or bored, who were
Cutting
The requisite circles
With ease,
Or slicing down
Straight, penciled lines
As the teacher directed.

I did my dutiful best,
But the scissors
Hurt my fingers
In a minor,
Distracting way,
And I was too young
To realize the handle
Was biased
For a right-hand child,
So all I could do
Was cut in clumsy zigzags
And feel like a fool.

Staring hard at the blades,
I tried to will them
To obey,
Who couldn’t conceive
I was being freed
That day
By those little silver wings
Of a bird
Intent on the erratic,
Authentic pattern
Of its own flight
Through a sky of colored paper.

~ from The Last Love Poem I Will Ever Write (W.W. Norton & Co., 2019).
Continue reading →

[poem and recipe] orange you glad it’s friday?

~ jama ~ 24 Comments

“Orange is the happiest color.” ~ Frank Sinatra

Warm, cheerful and uplifting, the color orange combines the passion of red with the positivity of yellow. Ever vibrant, orange inspires creativity, boosts energy and stimulates the appetite.

California-based poet Lori Levy once said that poets paint in words. I love how she’s embraced her orange palette to create the vivid images in today’s delightful poem.

*

“Monarch Butterfly” by Juan Bosco.
IN THE MOOD FOR ORANGE
by Lori Levy

I want to discover what's orange in the world:
to come upon a leopard lily;
flame lichen clinging to a rock.
A barn swallow's chest, a monarch's wing,
Or just a bird-of-paradise against the sky.

I could slice a mango or suck on a section
of tangerine. Make soup for lunch
with pumpkin, squash, carrots, yams.
Could settle down by a fire, copper and blue,
or by the orange glow of a glass lamp.

What I have in mind is a fat ripe sun
the scarlet of a California poppy --
and me in an ocher-orange dress,
lips painted mandarin, twirling
to the rattle of Mexican maracas

until I drop like the sun
and the world grows dark again.

~ from In the Mood for Orange (Gvanim, 2007)
“California Poppies” by Marcia Baldwin.

*

“Tropical Flirtation” by Carol Collette.

Revel in it!

Continue reading →

poetry friday roundup is here

~ jama ~ 37 Comments
Please help yourself to tea, pumpkin whoopee pies and a shortbread scottie.

Welcome to Poetry Friday at Alphabet Soup!

Some of you may remember when I shared, “What Not to Write on the Back Jacket of Your Debut Collection,” from Scottish poet Helena Nelson’s delightful book, Down with Poetry! (HappenStance, 2016). Well, here are two more ‘unsuitable,’ rabble-rousing, anti-poetry rib ticklers designed to keep any literary snobs in check. Yes, poetry is SERIOUS BUSINESS. But that also makes it the perfect subject for serious satire, and Nelson is so good at it.

See if these don’t give you a good lift. 😀

*

“Gray Bra” by Nathalia Chipilova (2013).
MRS N ENTERS THE LITERARY WORLD

I know it's hard to believe me when I say
(watch my lips)
I once found it hard to get my poems published.
I used to get--Rejection Slips.

In those days the little magazines
--sole recipients of my writing--
clearly needed waking-up--
their editors were uninviting.

As time went by I grew more bold--
no doubt I was inspired by The Muse.
I won elevation by a device
which happily transformed their views.

The purchase of a Wonderbra
which I wore to a poetry slam in Fife
at the cost of £19.99
was the single thrust that changed my life.

I took two poems, short and sweet
and pinned one neatly to each cup
and then I raised my cleavage up,
dangling the poems in mid-air,
suspended like Parnassus where
my readers (those abreast) could stare.

And thus it was a genre started,
my coup de bra, my magnum opus
shared by my sisters (try and stop us.)
The world of Arts Review and Crit
refers to us--we're not part of it--
with quiet reverence as--Lit Tit.

~ Copyright © 2016 Helena Nelson. All rights reserved.

*

Continue reading →