THIRTY-SEVEN CENTS
Vol. 5, No. 6       An Online Chapter of Missouri State Poetry Society     June 2006

 

POETRY CAPTURES BEAUTY

June is the month when we usually receive a copy of Grist, our state society's anthology.  A hundred or more of the members and invited guests are represented by one page each of their work.  What a variety of poems the previous anthologies have presented to us!  If you ordered a copy from Bill Lower, our MSPS treasurer ($8.75 per copy, including mailing fees), you will receive a copy, featuring the art work of one of the members of Thirty-Seven Cents, Tania Gray, who has designed four covers for us.  In our anthology we use the metaphor of the poet as miller, producing poetry as ground grain (grist).  Our goal, of course, is to capture beauty in life to share with others, particularly to share the beauty in the lives of poets who belong to our state society.  Some of us write beautifully descriptive poems, delineating nature in words to match nature in pictures such as the beautiful picture above.  Others of us emphasize ideas in our poems, seeking to capture significant meanings well-expressed in the beauty of words.  Some tell entertaining stories, some propose provocative theories, some go where poets have never gone before, some stay home--but all of us seek to capture the beautiful.  So our challenge lies before us again: use what you have been given to decorate the world you occupy.  Keep those poems coming in.
                                                                                                                                                     --  Tom Padgett

 

CONTENTS:

Past Issue Next
       
Poems by Members
         
Workshop

Missouri State Poetry Society

Summer Contest

Spare Mule Online

National Federation of State Poetry Societies
 
Strophes Online


POETRY IN THE NEWS

Have you discounted much contemporary poetry as too obscure to occupy your time?  How do you distinguish subtle poetry from difficult poetry?  Read this review of Elizabeth Bishop's latest book for help.

How important is poetry in your life?  Would you like to know how several Americans responded to this question in a recent poll?  Click here to see.

Click Back on your toolbar to return here after finishing the column.
 

HAVE YOU VISITED THE WORKSHOP LATELY?

Click Workshop and do some of the lessons there.
If you have an idea for a new lesson, send it along. 

HAVE YOU READ YOUR ONLINE NEWSLETTERS?

Read Spare Mule Online and Strophes Online available to you by clicking the underlined titles.

HAVE YOU ENTERED A MSPS CONTEST RECENTLY?

Our new state president, Dale Ernst, is encouraging us to enter the MSPS Summer Contest

HAVE YOU SEEN THE BULLETIN BOARD LATELY? 

Visit our MSPS Bulletin Board for news of events and contests in our area.

AMERICAN LIFE IN POETRY

Ted Kooser, current U. S. Poet Laureate, in response to an interviewer for National Public Radio, stated that his "project" as laureate was to establish a weekly column featuring contemporary American poems supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska.  This column appears in on-line publications (such as Thirty-Seven Cents) as well as hard-copy newspapers.  Poets are asked to contact their local newspapers to inform them that such a column is available free to them and to relieve the editor by explaining that all of the poems that will appear week by week are accessible, not obscure poems. 

American Life in Poetry: Column 057
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

Midwestern poet Richard Newman traces the imaginary life of coins as a connection between people. The coins--seemingly of little value--become a ceremonial and communal currency.

COINS
Richard Newman

My change: a nickel caked with finger grime;
two nicked quarters not long for this life, worth
more for keeping dead eyes shut than bus fare;
a dime, shining in sunshine like a new dime;
grubby pennies, one stamped the year of my birth,
no brighter than I from 40 years of wear.

What purses, piggy banks, and window sills
have these coins known, their presidential heads
pinched into what beggar's chalky palm--
they circulate like tarnished red blood cells,
all of us exchanging the merest film
of our lives, and the lives of those long dead.

And now my turn in the convenience store,
I hand over my fist of change, still warm,
to the bored, lip-pierced check-out girl, once more
to be spun down cigarette machines, hurled
in fountains, flipped for luck--these dirty charms
chiming in the dark pockets of the world.

American Life in Poetry: Column 059
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE
Contrary to the glamorized accounts we often read about the lives of single women, Amy Fleury, a native of Kansas, presents us with a realistic, affirmative picture. Her poem playfully presents her life as serendipitous, yet she doesn't shy away from acknowledging loneliness.

AT TWENTY-EIGHT
Amy Fleury

It seems I get by on more luck than sense,
not the kind brought on by knuckle to wood,
breath on dice, or pennies found in the mud.
I shimmy and slip by on pure fool chance.
At turns charmed and cursed, a girl knows romance
as coffee, red wine, and books; solitude
she counts as daylight virtue and muted
evenings, the inventory of absence.
But this is no sorry spinster story,
just the way days string together a life.
Sometimes I eat soup right out of the pan.
Sometimes I don't care if I will marry.
I dance in my kitchen on Friday nights,
singing like only a lucky girl can.



 

 American Life in Poetry: Column 058
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE
A worm in an apple, a maggot in a bone, a person in the world. What might seem an odd assortment of creatures is beautifully interrelated by the Massachusetts poet Pat Schneider. Her poem suggests that each living thing is richly awake to its own particular, limited world.

THERE IS ANOTHER WAY
Pat Schneider

There is another way to enter an apple:
a worm's way.
The small, round door
closes behind her. The world
and all its necessities
ripen around her like a room.

In the sweet marrow of a bone,
the maggot does not remember
the wingspread
of the mother, the green
shine of her body, nor even
the last breath of the dying deer.

I, too, have forgotten
how I came here, breathing
this sweet wind, drinking rain,
encased by the limits
of what I can imagine
and by a husk of stars.


American Life in Poetry: Column 060
BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

Most of us have taken at least a moment or two to reflect upon what we have learned from our mothers. Through a catalog of meaningful actions that range from spiritual to domestic, Pennsylvanian Julia Kasdorf evokes the imprint of her mother's life on her own. As the poem closes, the speaker invites us to learn these actions of compassion.

WHAT I LEARNED FROM MY MOTHER
Julie Kasdorf

I learned from my mother how to love
the living, to have plenty of vases on hand
in case you have to rush to the hospital
with peonies cut from the lawn, black ants
still stuck to the buds. I learned to save jars
large enough to hold fruit salad for a whole
grieving household, to cube home-canned pears
and peaches, to slice through maroon grape skins
and flick out the sexual seeds with a knife point.
I learned to attend viewing even if I didn't know
the deceased, to press the moist hands
of the living, to look in their eyes and offer
sympathy, as though I understood loss even then.
I learned that whatever we say means nothing,
what anyone will remember is that we came.
I learned to believe I had the power to ease
awful pains materially like an angel.
Like a doctor, I learned to create
from another's suffering my own usefulness, and once
you know how to do this, you can never refuse.
To every house you enter, you must offer
healing: a chocolate cake you baked yourself,
the blessing of your voice, your chaste touch.
 

POET OF THE MONTH: GERALD STERN

For a brief biography and four poems, visit http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/231.

For an interview with Stern, visit
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/entertainment/july-dec98/stern_11-23.html

For another poem by Stern, visit http://www.poemhunter.com/gerald-stern/poet-10244/

For more poems and criticism of Stern, visit
http://www.pshares.org/Authors/authorDetails.cfm?prmAuthorID=1471
Buy a book of Sterns's poetry at  http://www.half.com/, or http://www.powells.com/,

or at http://www.amazon.com/


 POEMS BY MEMBERS

LUCIDITY
Steve Penticuff

slumber, slurp, wake up!
(lucidity in a cup)

lucidity
unless
coffee
induced
doesn't
inhabit
this
yahoo;

insight
nowadays
arrives

caffeinated,
unveiling
poetry
 

SITTING ON A BENCH AT McDONALDS
AFTER LUCIDITY POETRY RETREAT
In Response to Ronald and Steve
Todd Sukany

I met a new McFriend today,
no, not the white-faced one,
the salmon man with chocolate on top . . . 

Steve wearing a chest of blue and white flowers
and holding a red-striped ankle. After the camera
flashed, did you and Ronald compare shoe sizes?

discuss the disappearing “shoe tree”
of Eureka Springs? re-count steps
back from the pub in the rain?

I think you spoke of on-coming
traffic . . . of late night goosing bumps
. . . of collecting coins at the drive-thru.

I’m sure you knew even then that you’d wear
a new crown--poet laureate for a year. You
and Ronnie shared that inside smile.
 

I REMEMBER
Bev Conklin

I thought of you today,
when I heard that you had lost your loved one.
And I remembered . . .
the numbness--
the confusion--
the Question: "Why me?"
Nothing I can say, right now, will help . . .
but I can listen.
In the middle of the long night,
during the lonely summer hour.
Call me
and know that I will understand,
because--
I remember.


WHY I DON'T WORKOUT
Ben Nielsen

His arms are huge
Mine are small

Free weights are not liberating
And machines do rage

His legs are trees
Mine are stems

Running is painful and boring and slow
Biking is painful and boring and semi-slow

His body is a rocky
Mine is boney

I’ve got a long way to go
He’s already there


NEW FRUITS
Pat Durmon

It had rained in the night,
so I pulled on my boots
and headed out to be welcomed
by the sunrise and the soft, rich soil.
So much to be done— the clipping
of pine branches, the pulling of weeds,
the smaller trees needing mulch— and I felt
the sleeplessness in my back. Our own
double bed was cool now,
and the wheelbarrow waited.

And then, I remembered the blue-bird
box directly in front of our house,
out next to the road.
They had been coming and going
the day before. My boots squished straight
across the yard, leaving a trail of dark
holes in the thriving wet grass.
I unlatched and lifted the wooden roof
and smiled: new fruits in the womb.
 

LAST NIGHT'S RAIN
Judy Young

The leaves hang heavy in the trees,
Making it laborious for the breeze
To blow away drops of last night’s rain
And make them flutter once again.

The grasses bend down toward the sun
As heavy droplets down green troughs run
To moisten the earth with last night’s rain
Before they stand straight up again.

Each flower holds a drop or two,
Which rolled from petals to make a pool
Left in their centers from last night’s rain,
Where insects quenched their thirst again.

The clouds have pushed out from the sky
And left a sea of blue up high.
The only traces of last night’s rain
Will soon be gone from earthly plain.


OBEDIENCE TRAINING
Mark Tappmeyer

"Are not . . . the rivers of Damascus
better than any of the waters of Israel?"
2 Kings 5:12

My skin whitens
by the hour
while you treat me
like your dog,
your prized Aramean.
Is your wish that I
heel to your gait
and through the Sunday
park trot and roll
when you say over?
To my haunches fall
when you say sit?
Speak on hind feet
when you
from your pocket
bring out a treat
like the Jordan? 
A CRY FROM THE HEART:
HELP ME, I AM A TEEN.
Henrietta Romman

Tell me, Mother, tell me, Dad,
Am I happy, or am I sad?
Help me find each wound and heal
Any deep hurts that I feel.
Pray for me, Mom, do pray, Dad,
I'm confused, but I am glad
Just to feel while I am green
You're both with me as a teen.

If I sulk or weep or pine,
Teach me where to draw the line.
Take my hand, Mom, help me, Dad,
You're the only friends I've had.
Train me, use my heart, my mind
As my childhood falls behind.
Lift me gently when I fall--
I'm your own child after all.

Please remember I'm a teen:
I am tender, I am green.
Let me only find my rest
In your arms where it is best.
Help me keep full trust in God,
Point me to avoid His rod.
Take my hand, Mom, help me, Dad.
You're the only friends I've had.


ULYSSES S. GRANT AND THE BUNGLERS
Tom Padgett

The first of many inefficiencies:
My local congressman mistook my name
and added Simpson after Ulysses
to give me the initials of my fame.

A military snafu that I knew:
When we began the War Between the States,
my brilliant plan to cut the South in two
was tabled by my War Department mates.

The politics of botchers and their friends:
In my two terms as President I saw
the legislators work for their own ends
and blatantly proceed to break the law.

Since all my life such bunglers sealed by doom,
no telling whom they buried in my tomb.


QUESTIONS
Phyllis Moutray

If wishes were horses,
would beggars be riders?

If old became young
and right became might,
would luck ride beside me
all through the night?

If I always do what I always did,
would monotony dog me,
or change come despite
and laughter delight?

Would questions be answers?



 


 

IT'S ALL SMOKE AND MIRRORS
Tania Gray

Those emailed travel plans, those messages
about the fabled sights they'll see, the side
excursions, all the entertainment, food
and shows, all part of an Alaskan cruise.
Why does my sister act so gleeful, she
has been there, done that?. As my brother goes,
he wafts those images of glaciers, seals,
the Great Northwest spectacular. I hope
he doesn't write again "Wish you were here."
I hope he won't repeat on their return,
"You should have been there, Sis, you would have loved
it! You and Jerry really ought to go!"
Thank God my other correspondents are
succinct. My only parried counter-thrust
is spelling out the trivialities
I know: the wet sheets flapping on the line,
the cat stretched out on our front step, this year
the redbud and the dogwood bloomed at once.
I'll send my sibs a dispatch from our street:
"Wish you had seen the golden light that glowed
from everything, the sky, the grass, the clouds,
the trees! It seemed that incandescent lamps
were suddenly turned on. I walked outside
and bathed in liquid amber, felt transformed.
This was an Ozark-dawn phenomenon,
just one of many lovely things we see.
On second thought, I'll send it to myself:
a postcard on refrigerator door.


WHEN HELP IS NOT ON ITS WAY
David Van Bebber

Sweat dampens my back,
the hot carpet I lie on.
Above me the fan wobbles slowly
as it pounds the ceiling with its off-balance momentum
rocking like an out-of-balance wheel on a rusted-out station  
     wagon.
Some how it limps its way along.

I attempt to calm this inner storm.
But it’s attempting peace in a war-ravaged country
where bodies are spread through the streets,
among the buildings scattered remains.

Tears come when hope doesn’t.
 

THROUGH MY KITCHEN WINDOW
Laurence W. Thomas

Early rays insinuate that shadows are edgy,
greens without definition emerge
as carpets for squirrels who answer
the call of their sunflower breakfast.
Birds balance their constant hunger
against their need to survive
and assemble. Like ancient mosaics
doves flutter for water, cooing contentment.
My coffee reminds me that a daily renewal
triggers responses like petitioners
turning their heads in heliotropic obeisance
toward the king making his entrance.
They turn from their ritualistic obsequies,
the squirrels and birds genuflecting before the sun
as I turn from my obeisance to nature
to answer the demands of more mundane matters.


THE GOOD CITIZEN
A cinquain sequence
Pat Laster

Last year,
the old woman
defied age and quad cane
to come and vote. The clerk waved her
ahead

of you.
Assisting her,
I said, “Someday, you, too,
will be old and they’ll summon you
ahead."

This year,
my aged Mom
votes in heaven’s matters.
May she inspire us to duty:
voting.


OH, JACK . . .
 Diane Auser Stefan
In Memory of Jack Thomas,1944-2006.
Ozark Folk Center Knifemaker
 

These Ozark hills and streams and woods
grew deep in you, and you in them,
the man a part of the mountains,
the mountains a part of the man.

Your strength of character was forged
from childhood, following your father’s work..

Your eternal kindness gently grew in your
heart like a rainbow of Ozark wildflowers.
Your deep love of family was as natural and clear
as a spring day or winter night.

Your sharp wit was honed by a lifetime
of good friends and good laughs.
And you were, without a doubt,
the sharpest knife in the drawer!

Oh Jack--gone too soon,
yet always a part of the Ozarks
and always in our hearts.
We will miss you.

YOUNGSTOWN SKYLINE
Valerie Esker

Stark
against the sky
steel ghost
scrap metal now
once blast furnace
where hot molten iron
smelted into
flaming ingots
seared a place
in history
its cold remains
a disemboweled corpse
odd awkward tribute
to outmoded industry
to hungry men who journeyed
here
to earn a buck
then drink a beer

TAKING MY PULSE
Gwen Eisenmann

There are so many things on the shelves of my mind
tucked away in once-upon-a-times --
you know, those funny pictures falling out of albums
that you stored, and the nickels and dimes

of every day joys in my pockets with the secrets
that I won't let anyone see --
maybe it's good to take them out and air them.
It might be part of my integrity,

this obsession of mine that divides a line of words
and their letters into groups of four,
or into sequences of ascending numbers
even as I think them. What's more,

the music of the spheres has a rhythm, a time
that teaches us to breathe at birth,
and the sun measures years as I measure words
with a reach that teaches me the pulse of Earth.

So perhaps I should dust the shelves of my mind
and cherish whatever I find there
and count the secrets in the pockets of my years
as nuggets given me to share.

After all, who taught me to measure words,
who obsessed me with rhythm in a phrase?
It could have been a katydid or cricket in my childhood
tick-tocking, counting summer days.
 

HE THAT HAS AN EAR
Jean Even

He that has an ear, let him hear
The voice of God is beckoning.
In your heart, give ear to His voice.

He will give to you the fruits of life.
Out of the midst of Paradise,
You shall eat His hidden manna.

Receive the gift of His white stone.
Your new name written thereon
Was whispered in secret from His lips.

Life is yours in heavenly lands.
The voice of God is beckoning.
He that has an ear, let him hear.


DIVINE QUAKER
Harding Stedler

Grandma had too little staying-power
and did not travel well.
It may have been the Quaker in her.

Ever so many miles,
she'd ask the driver to stop
to allow her to "make water."
Neither was she a good hostess
when folks came to eat.
She'd no more than sit down
at the table
than she'd excuse herself
that she might "make wind."

She was a miracle worker,
forever making something,
be it biscuits from scratch,
a checkered apron,
witty conversation,
or something as unavoidable
as water or wind.


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