Moms on Poetry has reprinted a poem from my first collection Doll God.
Thrilled to be in good company. One of the other poems is by Karen Paul Holmes from her book No Such Thing as Distance. I reviewed that book for Pleiades. You can find more about it here.
Here is the poem up at Moms on Poetry:
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Chewy.com called my girl Kana “furdorable” on Twitter the other day!
Are they right?
Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Doll God, Inspiration, Poetry, Publishing
Sorry not sorry for blowing up your readers and/or email with my posts in the past week or so. I’ve never had so many poems published online in such a short space of time. It was just a fluke.
Today I’ll say Happy Memorial Day, but give you a sad Memorial Day poem. It’s by James Tate (1943-20150) whose father was a pilot in WWII. His father was shot down and killed in combat on 11 April 1944. Tate was only a few months old, so he never knew his father. Thus are the sacrifices magnified through families and other loved ones.
The asterisks between stanzas are mine. I placed them there because WordPress wouldn’t keep the spaces between stanzas otherwise. Sigh.
for my father, 1922-1944
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Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, History, Poetry
The Ekphrastic Review has reprinted another poem from my first collection Doll God. As I mentioned last week, the journal is a very unique literary magazine. The emphasis is on publishing writing that responds to visual art. Thus the name of the journal. Check out this article for explanation: Ekphrasis
Thank you to editor Lorette C. Luzajic for choosing my poem “Debris.” There is a strong connection between the poem and my mother-in-law’s art.
Here is the poem up at The Ekphrastic Review:
The photo above is the cover of the book that is a story of The Birdland jazz club illustrated by my mother-in-law’s Birdland murals. That is where my photos on the journal site originate from–not the actual murals themselves.
That wraps up a full week of five poem publications. I hope you’ve enjoyed them and aren’t jumping out of your tree to get away from my postings. Closing comments, but you are more than welcome to post at the site. Thank you!
I’ll leave you with the cutie pie Perry.
Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Art and Music, Inspiration, Poetry, Publishing
For the third day in a row, I have a poem published in the truly gorgeous journal Open: A Journal of Arts and Letters. Monday, they posted Imagine This Portrait. Yesterday it was Waterland.
Today is Eurydice. Check it out. It only took me five+ years to write it. This simple lil poem. Hmm. All I can tell you is that it was a hard one for me.
On a related topic. Hahaha, only if all topics relate to cats. Anyway, on a related topic, here is my Tiger Queenie Princess Mimi. I am starting a new hashtag that I want to try to use pretty often because I think it suits me and probably many other people: #poetswithcats
Some of you know, I am trying to reach a publication goal I set for myself for 2019. With 7 journals already publishing my poems and a prose piece in the process, I feel that I am halfway through my goal. BUT THEN WE ARE ALMOST HALFWAY THROUGH THE YEAR. No pressure.
Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Inspiration, Literary Journals, Poetry, Poetry Collection
I have a poem published today in the gorgeous journal Open: A Journal of Arts and Letters. Yesterday, they posted “Imagine This Portrait.” Tomorrow, they will publish a 3rd poem. But today is one of my favorite and weirdest poems of all.
This is the photo that inspired the poem.
Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Inspiration, Literary Journals, Poetry, Poetry Collection
I have a poem published today in the gorgeous journal Open: A Journal of Arts and Letters.
Somewhat new for me, this is a love poem. Maybe I should reword that. While I write a lot of poems with love, this poem has a romantic love relationship as the guiding inspiration.
They’ve paired the poem with a piece of glorious art by Roger Camp.
Also cool is that they have provided links for Kin Types and Doll God. You can pick up the former for around $6 today, although you know that is subject to change at any moment by Big Brother Amazon.
The gardener has been hard at work.
Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Arizona, Literary Journals, Poetry, Poetry Collection
Main Street Rag just published their latest issue, and in it is my review of Nancy Miller Gomez’s chapbook Punishment.
I’ve had a lot of friends who have taught in prisons around the country, and so when I heard her collection was based on her own experiences teaching poetry writing in a prison, I eagerly signed up to review it.
Here is a copy of my review (starts halfway down the page). Click on the image to read more closely.
Punishment is a Rattle Chapbook Series selection, and you can find links to poems and how to purchase the chapbook here:
I’ll leave you with the first and title poem in the book.
Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Book Review, Poetry, Poetry book, Poetry Collection, Writing
The Ekphrastic Review is a very unique literary magazine. The emphasis is on publishing writing that responds to visual art. Thus the name of the journal. Check out this article for explanation: Ekphrasis
I was thrilled to see the poem “Fishing” from my collection Doll God published there today. This is the first time that the poem is shown with the art that originally inspired it. It was this print that I own and is in my house that began this poem.
Here is the poem up at The Ekphrastic Review:
Thank you for reading it! Happy weekend!
Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Art and Music, Inspiration, Poetry, Publishing
Now that National Poetry Month and NaPoWriMo are over, I have been revising poems. Mainly, they have been small changes, so either I did better than I thought last month or (and more likely) I am still not seeing them clearly.
Spring is in full swing in Arizona, and everywhere I look it’s yellow, green, and blue.
I’ve been going through some of my mother-in-law’s paintings that were left over after she passed away. (She died 15 years ago, so it’s time to look at them again). The reason I pulled them out is because my daughter moved into her own place, and I am looking for paintings to bring her for her to choose from.
I wrote about my MIL’s art My Mother-in-Law’s Legacy, Part I and My Mother-in-Law’s Legacy, Part II and My Mother-in-Law’s Legacy, Part III
A lot of her paintings are portraits, and those are more difficult to hang on a wall than landscapes. I thought I’d share one of the portraits with you today. Maybe share some more later . . . .
Because my MIL was hired to paint a lot of celebrity portraits, the ones that are left are often “first drafts,” but sometimes she just painted them because they were famous and she hoped to sell those paintings.
Do you know who this is?
That’s right: Perry Como and his family, wife Roselle, son Ronnie, daughter Terri, and son David. Perry and Roselle were teenage sweethearts and were married until her death at age 84.
I love Perry Como’s voice and laidback coooool style. This is one of my favorites:
And this one, of course:
You might prefer different versions, but he’s pretty consistent, so they are all good!
OK, NOW FOR THE BIG QUESTION. Was Perry my sweet cat named after Perry Como?
Wait for it.
Perry the cat was named for Perry Como and Perry Mason!
OK, well, I didn’t exactly collapse. But it was tough.
The last two poems, for days 29 and 30, were:
The very last poem was a tribute to a friend who passed away–a poem that I had promised to her husband for her memorial service. Not sure he even wants it (I haven’t given it to him yet), but she was a fan of my poetry from the very beginning. She was such a good friend that she was a fan of anything I did. Nancy was 18 years older than me and her oldest child was my age. But age meant nothing to her, and I was in college when our friendship solidified into what it would remain. She accomplished a lot in her life, moving through stages of wildness and compromise, always reaching toward a form of enlightenment. I knew I couldn’t write a poem that she deserved, but I did my best, and that would have made her happy.
Mom has gone home, and the rest of my company is now gone. It was 11.5 months of people living here, visiting, etc. This Highly Sensitive introvert can’t take another minute.
The funny thing is that Nancy was an extrovert to my introvert, but that never stopped us both from having fun.
One (sample) memory from my 20s was of us partying at a showing of Reefer Madness. She dressed as Harpo Marx, and I was Carmen Miranda (you can see that carnivalesque switching of roles, right?). I am pretty sure we ended up getting kicked out of the movie for being too loud. Not blaming here, but she had a very boisterous, contagious laugh.
I called Nancy’s poem “You Are Loved” because she always ended every conversation, even every email, by saying “remember you are loved.”
I have lots of poem drafts to go through and revise. I keep thinking NaPoWriMo should be in the summer or fall. If you write all April and revise all May, sendouts in June is a great example of poor timing since a lot of journals shut down submissions for the summer.
Have a wonderful week and remember: you are loved.
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Spring Arizona during the day:
The bottom one is just budding.
Spring Arizona at night:
Filed under #amwriting, #AmWriting, #NaPoWriMo, Arizona, Flora, Garden, and Landscape, Poetry, Writing
Doll God (shipping within the U.S. included)
$10.00
