My golden shovel, “Verdict,” has been accepted for publication in Volume 3 of the Antifa Literary Journal. It is based on an oft-quoted stanza from Seamus Heaney’s The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles’ Philoctetes. This golden shovel is a poetic form in which the last word of each line is made from the words of a preexisting poem to which the poet is paying homage. This form was invented by Terrance Hayes whose 2010 poem, “The Golden Shovel,” is based on “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks. Her short poem begins with this epigraph: The Pool Players. Seven at the Golden Shovel. That is where Hayes got the name for his new form…
