Dragonfly: Any of various large insects of the order Odonata or suborder Anisoptera, having a long slender body and two pairs of narrow, net-veined wings that are usually held outstretched while the insect is at rest. Also called regionally darner, darning needle, mosquito fly, mosquito hawk, needle, skeeter hawk.
Poetry: The art or work of a poet.
Prolixity: Excessive wordiness in speech or writing; longwindedness
My newest poet-crush is Mary Biddinger. I say this often, but it's always a great day when you discover an amazing new poet. Support poets! Buy Poetry!
This is one of my favorite poems from this book. I had a really hard time choosing just one poem to post because they're all superb. This is my favorite because I love the imagery:
Girl In Chair
By Mary
Biddinger
The
streets sew themselves
a
beaded mat you can buy
every
night.Catfish in bed
with
the rushes.Everything
sleeping
deep together.
Needlepoint
is half blood
most of
the time.You miss
once,
twice, by the window.
How
else to stitch flowers,
or the
red mailbox waiting
for a
postman’s blue vest.
All a
game of in and out.
Blood
waiting to dump
its
oxygen, the mosquito
and
waxwing, storm fronts
quaking
above as moths.
A
seam-ripper hacks
the
work in seconds, string
cut to
a quarter.Your love
is the
one sunk, midnight
in the
Monongahela.How
did you
not wake when
the
river broke like a pane?
A page
slits your fingertip
but you
keep turning.Now
the
cicadas start their fall
from
tree to lawn.Cherry
blossoms
ride the gutters.
Lightning
on the air, men
chasing
their hats home.
From:“Prairie Fever” by Mary Biddinger, pages 53,
54
(The Monongahela is a river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-central West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania.)
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"Saint Monica" by Mary Biddinger
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and her newest book, coming soon: "O, Holy Insurgency"
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"Poetry is life distilled." ~Gwendolyn Brooks
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Happy Thanksgiving!
For each new morning with its light, For rest and shelter of the
night, For health and food, for love and friends, For everything Thy
goodness sends. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson
I potted this tiny plant in March. I watered it and cared for it all summer. I was patient. Yesterday, November 16, 2012, it produced one perfect white flower. I went outside this morning and it was pink. I swear to you, my heart lifted. I live for surprises like this.
xo,
~Marion
* * * * *
"I slept the afternoon, but you know what Breton says: I was not in the mood for visitors. Picture yourself inside that word. And yes, my house is a word, but my words, aren’t they words also? Today, the sky just wouldn’t happen. Today, I was blind-sided. Neither pain, nor its powdered absence. Like most days, I became the kitchen sill. I’m simply saying what I always say: what is lace-winged cannot be strong."
Olena Kalytiak Davis, from: "And Her Soul Out Of Nothing", page 3
* * * * *
"I'm feeling terrifically heavy.
I'm feeling as well-grounded as the dead." ~Olena Kalytiak Davis, page 19
* * * * *
"Oh, my cloud covered heart." ~Olena Kalytiak Davis, page 3
I love Ms. Verlee's book, "Racing Hummingbirds" from which this poem, "40 Love Letters" comes. I'm on my second copy because I tore out several poems and sent to friends. :-)
Enjoy! Support Poets. BUY POETRY!!!
~Marion
40 Love Letters
By Jeanann Verlee
Dear Dennis, I still think of you.
Dear Andre,
I saw you kiss her.
I haven’t looked back.
Dear Patrick,
You’re just too young.
Dear Eric,
I said horrible things about
you.
Your teeth are fine,
it’s the rest of you I don’t
like.
Dear Greg,
Thank you for the poem, for
every single scar.
Dear William,
I love you, simple.
I like that we will never be we.
Dear Jay,
The bruises fell off
eventually.
Dear Michael,
I’ll never be enough to fill
the shoes
that will one day stand at
your side.
Dear Ben,
I did read your letters.
All of them.
Dear Freeman,
I’ll never stop looking over
my shoulder,
boots laced, ready to run.
Dear Jon,
I’ll always love you.
You are all there ever was.
Dear Derek,
There was no one thing,
your everything is
impossible.
Dear Eddie,
We are refracting magnets.
We will battle this to the
end.
Dear Dennis,
I still think of you.
Dear Ryan,
I love you, simple.
Sex under the streetlight was
a delicious accident.
Dear Kevin,
Your kiss came too late.
My lips were already dancing
in the other room with Jon.
Dear Ethan,
No.
Dear Joseph,
I said you were too pretty.
They said to try it anyway.
They are fools.
Dear Avery,
You are the definition of unrequited.
Dear Skippy,
I’m sorry about the whiskey
and the tampon.
I’m sorry I never called you.
Dear Nate,
Until you mocked my smile, I
was yours.
Dear Marc,
I like your wife too much.
Is your brother still single?
Dear Mitch,
You were my biggest mistake.
I’m sure that only makes your
smile more sinister.
Dear Allen,
While you poured Guinness for
Patrick,
I pictured you bending me
over the bar.
Dear Graham,
I’d have swallowed that
bullet.
Dear Miguel,
You said a man never forgets
his first redhead.
What color are my eyes?
Dear Dennis,
I still think of you.
Dear Francis,
I’d have broken you in half.
Dear Chris,
I’m sorry I stalked you.
I’d try to forget me, too.
Dear Dex,
I can’t be with you again.
Just accept it.
Dear Dr. Matthews,
No.
I’ll have you fired.
Again.
Dear Aiden,
I wrote a poem about you.
It’s everyone’s favorite.
I find it trite.
Dear Logan,
I think I finally stopped
wanting you.
Dear Cynthia,
I was drunk.
I thought you were, too.
Dear Ricky,
Maybe it was the red dress
or because I was fifteen.
Your brother married my
mother
on the same day I first
touched your cock.
Maybe you’re still a pervert.
Call me.
Dear Jeff,
I was your biggest mistake.
Dear Robert,
You are more than beer and
vomit.
You are more than I could
ever put into a poem.
Dear Dennis,
I still think of you.
Dear Dennis,
I keep your photos in a box.
Each
one, still in its frame.
I'm on my fourth or fifth reading of "The History of Love" by Nicole Krauss. This book is in my top five favorite books of all time, ever. This book led me to my #1 favorite book:
"The Street of Crocodiles and Other Stories" by Bruno Schulz. This book has no equal. Do not die having NOT read this book. It will change your life. I weep all the way through it every time I read it because it is too much---too beautiful, too rich, too unique. After reading one chapter, I realized that I looked at the world through new eyes. (Also, knowing that Mr. Schulz was shot in the head at age 50 by a Nazi and that his magnum opus, "The Messiah" was lost just breaks my heart into a million pieces.) But reading this book is like falling into a lake of color & words & otherness & mystery & magic. It is like no other book on earth. And then I read that Ms. Krauss is married to the writer, Jonathan Safran Foer, which led me to fetch my copy of:
"Tree of Codes" by Jonathan Safran Foer which is more a work of art than a simple book because he took "The Street of Crocodiles" and selectively cut out words to create a new book which is in itself a miracle and a wonder. And then I read more books by Ms. Krauss and Mr. Foer.
One tree is
black. One window is yellow as butter.
A woman leans down to catch a
child who has run into her arms this moment.
Stars rise. Moths
flutter. Apples sweeten in the dark.
from "In a Time of Violence",
1994 W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., New York, NY
____________________________________
I shared this poem with a friend last week. It was the first poem I'd ever read by Eavan Boland and I fell instantly in love with her poetry. It's a great day when you discover a new poet. This moment is all we have, so cherish it. It's what I'm trying to do.
I added a used tube ticket, kleenex, several Polo mints (furry), a tampon, pesetas, a florin. Not wishing to be presumptuous, not trusting you either, a pack of 3. I have a pen. There is space for my guardian angel, she has to fold her wings. Passport. A key. Anguish, at what I said/didn’t say when once you needed/didn’t need me. Anadin. A credit card. His face the last time, my impatience, my useless youth. That empty sack, my heart. A box of matches.
from: "Staying Alive: Real Poems for Unreal Times" edited by Neil Astley, page 116
florin - a former British coin worth two shillings or a gold coin formerly used in Eurpoe pesetas - monetary unit of Spain before the Euro anadin - a brand of painkiller sold in the UK
