The Apostrophe Blog
Two centos from my manuscript, I Am Speechless, have been selected for publication in We Dissent. We Resist. We Persist: An Anthology of Our Human Rights to be published by Flower Song Press in 2024. “The Poem of Your Body” was written after the May 2022 leak of a U.S. Supreme Court draft opinion to rescind Roe v. Wade; “Monster” was written on the day the Oklahoma state legislature passed a law banning abortion at conception.
What is a cento? It’s a form of found poetry made up of quotations from other works.
From Wikipedia:
A cento is a poetical work wholly composed of verses or passages taken from other authors((en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cento_(poetry))) in a new form or order. The Latin term cento derives from Greek κέντρων (gen. κέντρωνος), meaning “‘to plant slips’ (of trees).” A later word in Greek, κεντρόνη, means “patchwork garment.” According to Hugh Gerard Evelyn-White, “A cento is therefore a poem composed of odd fragments.” Think of it as a kind of patchwork quilt.
My two centos are fourteen lines each—so a nod to the sonnet—and consist of lines borrowed from the work of twenty-eight different poets including Gwendolyn Brooks, Terrance Hayes, Sylvia Plath, Adrienne Rich, Mark Strand, and William Carlos Williams.
Interests: Reading, writing, not arithmetic. The art and craft of poetry. Photography. Vegetable and flower gardening especially heirloom bulbs and dahlias. Movies in real theatres. Theatre on real stages. Art in real galleries. Crossword puzzles and, of course, Wordle. Singer-songwriters like Aimee Mann and Patti Griffin. All kinds of music especially 1930s jazz. Venice, Italy! The Dude abides.
- Acceptance News: “Paradise Road” - April 20, 2025
- All That Remains in the Light - April 16, 2025
- Walk an Alley, Stumble upon Art - April 8, 2025
