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HAVE YOU SUBMITTED YOUR POEM FOR GRIST 2004?
Every member of Thirty-Seven Cents is also a member of
Missouri State Poetry Society and hence has been allotted a page in the
state anthology, Grist. Please send a poem of 37 lines or
fewer (or two short poems totaling 37 lines or fewer) to Judy Young,
editor of this year's anthology. Her e-mail address is
jby213@aol.com. The deadline is
May 1, but send your poem/s earlier if possible.
You do not have to buy an anthology to be included, but
if you wish to purchase a copy, send Judy $8.50 at this address:
Judy Young, 6155 E. Farm Road 132, Springfield, MO 65802.
HAVE YOU READ THE LATEST ISSUES OF YOUR ONLINE
NEWSLETTERS?
Remember to read Spare Mule Online and Strophes
Online by clicking on the CONTENTS menu. You can keep up with members
who get newsletters by mail by remembering to read them on the Net. The
April 1 issue of Spare Mule Online and the April 1 issue of
Strophes Online are both currently available to you..
HAVE YOU CHECKED OUT THE BULLETIN BOARD OF
THE MISSOURI WEB SITE RECENTLY?
Click on Missouri State Poetry Society on the CONTENTS
menu above. Then on the MSPS menu click on Bulletin Board for
information about various poet societies, including contests they are
sponsoring.
Remember that September 1 is the deadline for
our Summer Contest. As members of MSPS you can enter two poems for the
price of one entry. Details are given on the Summer Contest page at the
state web site. Click here.
TREAT YOURSELF TO SOME GOOD POETRY EVERY DAY IN APRIL,
NATIONAL POETRY MONTH:
The Daily Poetry Association of Charlottesville, Virginia, publisher
of Poetry Daily, is celebrating National Poetry Month by bringing
us a special poem each weekday in April. To receive these poems,
visit
http://www.poems.com/news.htm.
Each day a poet picks a poem to share with us along with the reason the
poet picked the poem. Try it, you'll like it. You will feel a
part of a very special group: poets.
THE ACADEMY OF AMERICAN POETRY ALSO HAS NATIONAL POETRY DAY PLANS:
To subscribe to the newsletter of the Academy, visit
http://www.poets.org/academy/contact.cfm. The
regular web site is at .
http://www.poets.org/ To keep up with what is
happening in American poetry, visit the site and subscribe to their free
newsletter.
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POEMS BY MEMBERS:
POETRY
Andrea Cloud
These little lovely simple rhymes
my pen and I compose
are harvest from our finer times
of reading verse and prose.
BLONDE IN FRONT
Mark Tappmeyer
A shame--
said the blonde in front--
that Emily should hole
up in her father's house
and not party at the
Amherst frats or
back-seat kiss or
dance in socks and pumps
and tight-fit dress or
marry an athlete or a lawyer.
All she did was stroll
her father's garden,
self-absorbed, and
leave words from her prismed--
she paused, searching--
her prisoned mind.
MONUMENT TO MYSELF
Tania Gray
the sky is light blue
cut with a white vapor trail
everything is strong green this year
emerald, kelly, chartreuse
green shades that jump out
that bit of red in the grass
is a cardinal getting his lunch
and those spots of fuschia, red, and pink
in the back of the garden
are the giant zinnias I planted
all cheerful colors except for
the dull orange and tan at my feet
which are the rocks I picked up
this morning while pulling weeds
the rocks never quit coming
but if you let the rocks stop you
you'll never have anything
just pile them up
make a cairn
"I lived here"
NIGHT HERON
Judy Young
There is a night heron perched on my wall
Under a multitude of stars,
White dots speckled on a black wash.
He stands with his long toes
Grasping an uneven blue line
Which contains his night.
If his mat and frame were a window,
Open instead of under glass,
He might turn his profiled head
To look at me,
Spread his wings and fly from his perch
Off into his starry night,
And I could step up to his vacated window,
Lean my elbows on the sill
And dream of flying.
I BRING YOU MEMORIES BOUQUETS
Valerie Esker
Remember when our love was new
like spring’s first tender violet?
Oh, we were young like spring then too!
Remember when our love was new?
Like kindled fire our passion grew.
Love’s cooler now, my sweet, and yet . . .
remember when our love was new
like spring’s first tender violet?
I SOUGHT YOU LONG, O LOVE
Pat Laster
Through mocking, taunting games of hide-and-seek
You torture and decay. A challenged sleuth,
I search in crannies vertical, oblique,
For angles, images. Like savage youth,
I rip apart the weedy, matted clumps
Of phrases adequate another time.
Your shadow leads me farther, over humps
Of clichés, scrabbling for a word sublime.
Perhaps my efforts trample fragile seed.
Oh, accents, meter, rhyme, emerge now from
Your hiding place. Give up; no more impede
My crazed, frenetic goal to pen a psalm.
The chase was long, through bramble, thicket, thorn;
The prize is won: a sonnet newly born.
THE VISION
Bev Conklin
I had a vision
one beautiful night,
when I found I couldn't sleep.
I mentally stepped up and back
and saw a wondrous sight
that birthed a deep understanding.
Looking down from afar
both in time and space,
our world seemed to be moving--
constantly, slowly, inexorably
changing.
The result of an Infinite Will?
Homesteads and farms became cities,
which tumbled, burned, and decayed;
then slowly started to green again
as our earth fought to regain
the splendor and beauty
ordained by our awesome energies,
combined in fervent desire.
SOUNDS NATURAL
Tom Padgett
If hawks' talks' squawks
or seals' meals' squeals
or gnus' crews' moos
bother you--
or yaks' snacks' smacks,
giraffes' calf's laughs--
go home.
Get out of the zoo!
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IS THERE A BUBBLE IN THE RUBBLE?
Gwen Eisenmann
Poets, in villanelles, exact their rhymes,
and Robert Wallace says they ask for trouble.
Un-poets simply settle for sometimes.
Assigning villanelles in overtimes,
a teacher's left with un-poetic rubble.
Poets, in villanelles, exact their rhymes.
What if my villanelles are pantomimes,
like shadows of a Dylan Thomas double?
Un-poets simply settle for sometimes.
Oh Muse, forsake me not, my spirit climbs,
expands, becomes an iridescent bubble!
Poets, in villanelles, exact their rhymes.
My bubble bursts, my verse resembles crimes
against the art of poetry. I hobble.
Un-poets simply settle for sometimes.
And then the last verse sounds it welcome chimes.
I rhymed. I leave this villanellous stubble.
Poets, in villanelles, exact their rhymes.
Un-poets simply settle for sometimes.
PLANS IN MOTION
Jean Even
Plans feed on action,
Action gained by movement.
Movement is doing;
By doing you gain.
Gain is profitable.
Profit coming from plans,
A plan set into motion
Is doing something.
Doing something is a goal.
A goal is your reward.
Receiving a reward
Is an act of doing.
Now help me, Lord,
to do something, please.
HAPPINESS IS IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER
Velvet Fackeldey
All the ones who left me behind
are happy with their new loves.
From my lonely perspective
I see them together,
laughing, touching.
I try not to look,
but it's like standing by a coffin.
I have to see their smiles
and know my pain,
and I die again.
EPHEMERA
Phyllis Moutray
Friendship,
like a Monarch butterfly,
sometimes flutters away
at the slightest
arbitrary
breeze.
LEMON LAW
Harding Stedler
Night life
in red-light districts
leads to obituaries
in next day's paper,
cardboard coffins,
and extraterrestrial experiences.
Naughty seldom leads
to resurrection,
more often to junkyards
of human carcases
where canaries
temper rejection
in song.
I carry porcelain statues
of the Virgin Mary
and stand
outside the rim of fire
as bodies wrapped in dish towels
go up in smoke
on funeral pyres
below a Tibetan mountain
in uninhibited jungles
without restraint.
IN ERRANT SAINTS
Todd Sukany
Though saved by His faith and redeemed by
the blood of the Lamb, I have a
question: divine nature or |
sinful nature? I don’t
understand the rub
since the entire
thing is all
about
me.
AMANDA'S GRANDFATHER
Wesley Willis
Accept, dear girl, these words now spoken.
Your Grandfather loved you dearly.
With his death, your heart is broken,
For you loved him sincerely.
Your Grandfather's days away have flown,
And now he is laid to rest.
Your loss makes you stand out, alone,
As if he loved you best.
But see his life as he lived it, whole,
His race won to the last mile,
In heaven are his heart and soul,
And one day we'll see his smile.
Remember that in heaven above
He knows no tears, no strife.
The angels sing of his endless love
And his eternal life.
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