I have taken many trains across these United States. Many of them have romantic-sounding names—the Coast Starlight, the Empire Builder, the Capitol Limited, the California Zephyr, and the Texas Eagle are the names of a few
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Writing in Form: A Narrative Poem in Syllabics
My narrative poem in syllabics, “Old, New, Broken, Blue,” was published in the Traditional Form issue of Blast Furnace, Volume 2, No. 2 in Spring of 2012. The pattern is this: Each stanza has lines bearing five syllables followed by a final line of two beats…
Published Online after Being in Print: “And I will tell you a story”
The opening poem in my poetry collection, Every Door Recklessly Ajar—“And I Will Tell You a Story”—was recently re-published online in Fall 2024 at Poemeleon: A Literary Journal. It previously appeared in print in the journal, Gold Man Review, out of Salem Oregon.
Playing with Form: The Abecedarian
In Summer 2018, riverbabble published my poem, “First Line of Defense: A Cento.” Not only does this poem use the cento form, stitching together lines borrowed from other poets into a poem all its own, but it is also an (almost) abecedarian. An abecedarian is a poem in which the first letter of each line or stanza follows sequentially through the alphabet…
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Publication News: “Remembering Gravity”
Here is another one of my old chestnuts I Publication News: “Remembering Gravity”
Here is another one of my old chestnuts, as I call them—ditties I wrote when I was just taking up the pen and paper again almost twenty years ago and trying to re-learn what makes a good poem. Looking at these oldies but goodies again now, in 2024, I can see I would write them very differently now!
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A Group Poem at Tupelo Press
Several years back, the good folks at Tupleo Press came up with the idea for The Million-Line Poem. Poets would submit two lines—a couplet—and the world would see what a collaborative poetic effort could and would became. My two lines were from a poem I wrote long ago about The Combat Paper Project, which per Wikipedia, was“formed to help veterans cope with experiences in the war…
Publication News: Margie, the Journal of American Poetry
My poem, “The Weight of Too Much,” was published in Margie: The American Journal of Poetry in Fall 2006—one of my first poetry publication successes! Margie is an annual literary journal based in Chesterfield, Missouri that features the work of the nation’s leading poets. It journal was established in 2000; it is named after and dedicated to the memory of Marjorie J. Wilson (1955-1977). …
There are very few books whose titles begin with the letter X…
A while back, when I was putting together my abecedarian book-title manuscript, Miss Scarlet in the Library with a Rope, I struggled to find a book I’d read whose title began with the letter X. Then I searched for any book, figuring I could then read it. Nada
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Acceptance News: Gumball Poetry
My poem, “Gift Event for Our New Gilded Age” has been accepted for Fall 2024 publication by Gumball Poetry. Per the website, Gumball Poetry is a “single micro-journal in a capsule machine.” After over a decade offering poems published in various venues across the U.S. and on the web…
Honoring the Masters: Sugar Mule’s Via Walt Whitman: a 21st Century Gathering
A while back now, Sugar Mule published one of my poems in their ongoing project called Via Walt Whitman: a 21st Century Gathering. It is an ode with one of those (hopefully necessary) long explanatory titles: “Ode to the Past & Present Wilt of the Daisy, Bellis perennis, Pressed in The Illustrated Leaves of Grass, a June 1973 Graduation Gift from L.” This poem later appeared in my chapbook, Eternity a Coal’s Throw, published by Burning River Press…
