the green muse has released it’s winter 06 issue, featuring the poetry of HAP published poet C.S. Fuqua. the issue also features four poems from my chapbook, "splattered earth" (are the other 5 poems in the chapbook worth the dollar-fifty? only one way to find out…).
check out the whole issue here, and my contribution here.
11/23/2006
11/16/2006
three poems
red fez has released it’s winter 06 issue, which includes three of my poems:
a note to all the poets of the world
she worries about me, you see
sniped
if interested, i encourage you to read the whole issue, as red fez is always one of the best reads out there.
a note to all the poets of the world
she worries about me, you see
sniped
if interested, i encourage you to read the whole issue, as red fez is always one of the best reads out there.
11/11/2006
remembrance day
here in ghana i find that old wars are recalled with the same strange mix of nostalgia, pride and horror as they are in canada, except these wars weren’t fought an ocean away, but instead right here. being so near the battlegrounds, and their repercussions, puts a new spin on yet another canadian holiday (no one gave me candy on halloween).
on top of that i just finished reading Slaughterhouse 5 (as part of my “read all those books you really should have read ages ago” campaign), which contains, for me, one of the most powerful anti-war messages i’ve ever encountered. in other words, i’m feeling the holiday more than most years.
along those lines, here are two poems by Carl Sandburg, written during WWI:
Murmurings in a Field Hospital
Salvage
on top of that i just finished reading Slaughterhouse 5 (as part of my “read all those books you really should have read ages ago” campaign), which contains, for me, one of the most powerful anti-war messages i’ve ever encountered. in other words, i’m feeling the holiday more than most years.
along those lines, here are two poems by Carl Sandburg, written during WWI:
Murmurings in a Field Hospital
Salvage
11/07/2006
hey ted's head. you look cold. can i get you a toque?
my poem "hey ted's head. you look cold. can i get you a toque?" has been published in feathertale.
read it here.
read it here.
11/02/2006
on women and CFCs
she tells me she believes
every weather front contains
its own story
and each morning
dewy grass lingers
as a reminder that
an abbreviated history of the earth
has played out while we slept.
she smiles and i quiver inside,
flooded with images of
the countless icebergs that will soon
lumber up on arctic beaches
and collapse into thunder,
never to be reconstituted.
the sand beneath them
drowned, turned to seabed.
the rocks on the shore now
battered by the rising waves,
relentlessly bullied into sand.
each grain a new birth,
its own trembling world.
from the november 2006 issue of High Altitude Poetry
read more of my poems from HAP here.
every weather front contains
its own story
and each morning
dewy grass lingers
as a reminder that
an abbreviated history of the earth
has played out while we slept.
she smiles and i quiver inside,
flooded with images of
the countless icebergs that will soon
lumber up on arctic beaches
and collapse into thunder,
never to be reconstituted.
the sand beneath them
drowned, turned to seabed.
the rocks on the shore now
battered by the rising waves,
relentlessly bullied into sand.
each grain a new birth,
its own trembling world.
from the november 2006 issue of High Altitude Poetry
read more of my poems from HAP here.
10/27/2006
hook
after
we'd freed
the pelican
from the hook
snagged in
its mouth
we gathered
over the
body of its
partner -
who had
flown too
close, been
tangled in
the fishing
line and
drowned.
the first
of us
to speak
offered that
maybe it
had died
trying to
free the
other and
though we
all knew
that was
preposterous
we said
nothing,
our wings
folded, our
mouths
aching.
from the winter 2006 issue of One Cool Word
we'd freed
the pelican
from the hook
snagged in
its mouth
we gathered
over the
body of its
partner -
who had
flown too
close, been
tangled in
the fishing
line and
drowned.
the first
of us
to speak
offered that
maybe it
had died
trying to
free the
other and
though we
all knew
that was
preposterous
we said
nothing,
our wings
folded, our
mouths
aching.
from the winter 2006 issue of One Cool Word
10/26/2006
10/17/2006
is the hardest part
just as an update, because i haven’t posted anything in quite a while:
a poem of mine is coming out in feathertale around the end of the month. it’s about ted william’s cryogenically frozen head.
in november, those fine folk at One Cool Word will be printing a poem of mine, too. this one’s about pelicans. (they’ll also be printing a poem by liam ford).
then, in november, also, The Green Muse will be doing a profile thang on my chapbook, featuring four of its poems. they are about china, the country (though one of them does have a reference to dinnerware, also).
in other words:
1. november will be neat.
2. i write poems about strange things.
3. tom petty was right.
meanwhile, i have to figure out how to come up with a halloween costume in a country where they don’t celebrate halloween. so far i have a scraggly white beard which i extracted from a pill bottle…
a poem of mine is coming out in feathertale around the end of the month. it’s about ted william’s cryogenically frozen head.
in november, those fine folk at One Cool Word will be printing a poem of mine, too. this one’s about pelicans. (they’ll also be printing a poem by liam ford).
then, in november, also, The Green Muse will be doing a profile thang on my chapbook, featuring four of its poems. they are about china, the country (though one of them does have a reference to dinnerware, also).
in other words:
1. november will be neat.
2. i write poems about strange things.
3. tom petty was right.
meanwhile, i have to figure out how to come up with a halloween costume in a country where they don’t celebrate halloween. so far i have a scraggly white beard which i extracted from a pill bottle…
10/08/2006
the legacy
as i noted a few posts ago, i am currently living in Accra, Ghana, playing doting housewife to my partner, Marta, who is working here on a CIDA internship. my writing is coming slowly, but my reading and appreciation of Ghanaian poetry is rushing along. while it is endlessly difficult to find books in this city (beyond harlequin romances), whenever i come across a good shop the percentage of its shelves devoted to poetry always astounds me.
so far, the Ghanaian poet I encourage one and all to read is Kobena Eyi Acquah. his “In the Navel of the Soul” is taught to secondary school students here, and sweet god - if only we could have been so fortunate in high school. check him out, if you can find his work anywhere. if not, i’ll be back in March with a couple of his books (and i’d happily take orders for further copies, as books usually go for 1-3 bucks around here).
Marta and i spent much of the day yesterday at the University of Ghana, Legon, which has an excellent bookstore and library (where i read an issue of The Dalhousie Review featuring HAP contributor Jesse Ferguson). i mostly went to the library to attempt to discover whether The Legacy, a student-run lit journal that operated out of Legon in the 70s, was still functioning. short answer: heck no. in fact, the librarian was only able to find one dusty issue of The Legacy in the stacks. it was a bit crushing, but that one issue certainly was worth the effort put into the search. the poem below was pulled from it (with apologies from the author for not achieving prior approval, but damned if i can find you), and is representative of the high quality of the entire publication.
Hopefully, thirty years from now, people will be able to look back on what we are producing today with as much admiration.
We Are The Meaning
(To Nanaa)
Another day another world and
To live with dignity, to understand
That it is not easy to fly when
We have put our wings up for sale,
So treat me warm, gentle presence:
There is no greater sadness here
Than the lonely life
A wholeness within, these longings
For a dim freedom, a just place -
So where is this the choice, the essence?
Another day, other ways to
Mutter trembling apologies for
Nothing, for this tortured charade
Made of discarded bits of us all.
And so we lean before the spell
Of the evil eye shaking our hands
Unbelieving, that this life is a dream
That we are the meaning.
- Eugene Opoku-Agyeman
from The Legacy: A Student Literary Journal, University of Ghana, Legon
(Volume III, No. 2: September 1977)
so far, the Ghanaian poet I encourage one and all to read is Kobena Eyi Acquah. his “In the Navel of the Soul” is taught to secondary school students here, and sweet god - if only we could have been so fortunate in high school. check him out, if you can find his work anywhere. if not, i’ll be back in March with a couple of his books (and i’d happily take orders for further copies, as books usually go for 1-3 bucks around here).
Marta and i spent much of the day yesterday at the University of Ghana, Legon, which has an excellent bookstore and library (where i read an issue of The Dalhousie Review featuring HAP contributor Jesse Ferguson). i mostly went to the library to attempt to discover whether The Legacy, a student-run lit journal that operated out of Legon in the 70s, was still functioning. short answer: heck no. in fact, the librarian was only able to find one dusty issue of The Legacy in the stacks. it was a bit crushing, but that one issue certainly was worth the effort put into the search. the poem below was pulled from it (with apologies from the author for not achieving prior approval, but damned if i can find you), and is representative of the high quality of the entire publication.
Hopefully, thirty years from now, people will be able to look back on what we are producing today with as much admiration.
We Are The Meaning
(To Nanaa)
Another day another world and
To live with dignity, to understand
That it is not easy to fly when
We have put our wings up for sale,
So treat me warm, gentle presence:
There is no greater sadness here
Than the lonely life
A wholeness within, these longings
For a dim freedom, a just place -
So where is this the choice, the essence?
Another day, other ways to
Mutter trembling apologies for
Nothing, for this tortured charade
Made of discarded bits of us all.
And so we lean before the spell
Of the evil eye shaking our hands
Unbelieving, that this life is a dream
That we are the meaning.
- Eugene Opoku-Agyeman
from The Legacy: A Student Literary Journal, University of Ghana, Legon
(Volume III, No. 2: September 1977)
10/02/2006
a poem
eclectica magazine just came out with a new issue, featuring a poem of mine called "the silence is worse".
if you're interested, you can read the poem here, or the whole issue here.
if you're interested, you can read the poem here, or the whole issue here.
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