This is one of the poems that you write just because you need to. And as a mother because you really need to. Then circumstances happen, and you need to raise awareness of the issue.
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"Beyond" and "Dead Sea" in Construction Lit Magazine
Nine years after a deadly tsunami slammed into South Eastern Asia, the land and people recovered. In the decades between when I travelled to the Israel side of the Dead Sea and the Jordanian side, wars had been fought and the border had softened. I am fascinated by the resilience that people and nature show over and over again.
"Cleave" in Penn Review
The word “cleave” is fantastic—a contronym (or anti-antonym) with contradictory meanings, but it also consumes the word “leave” and leads to “cleaver”. This poem explores the visceral nature of this delicious word.
Wandering Seeds in Twisted Vine Literary & Arts Journal
“Wandering Seeds” started as a reaction to this administration’s attempts to close our borders and ended up looking at globalization through the lens of the morning glory. How there is no way to wall off from the world.
"30 Seconds" in The Flexible Persona
In 1976, I travelled to Budapest, Hungary while it was under Soviet control. I had brought Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago on my trip. It was an illegal book there, so I slipped it to our assigned guide as I could tell he would honor it. “30 Seconds” tells that story of a little dissident act on both our parts. Later that year I met Solzhenitsyn who was a visiting professor at Stanford in a Round Table pizza place near campus. I told him the story. Given his extreme acts of dissidence, I don’t think mine was very impressive to him.
4 Poems In Angry Old Man
Angry Old Man Magazine publishes experimental poetry forms. I was delighted that they took for of my weirdest--erasures, sonic and one that is math formulas. Despite their unusual form, these poems deal with important global issues for the most part.
"With the Maasai" in Songs of Eretz Poetry Review
My broken Pantoum is up at Songs of Eretz about a drought I experienced long ago in East Africa. Once again this region is suffering through drought with expectation of malnourishment effecting 1.1 million children under five. Donations toward food security in the region can be made through CARE.
Finding My Way Home chapbook available on Amazon!
and stay tuned for a list of bookstores....
tealeaves
This haibun (Japanese form) poem was inspired by the video created to explain sexual consent. The animated video uses tea as a metaphor for sex. I was struck by how sharing a cup of tea can seem intimate, how there is often ceremony, tradition and expectation involved. This poem eventually evolved into the haibun form which not only played on the Japanese tea ceremony, but also enabled contrast in perspectives (hers/his) (prose/haiku-like) and pacing (fast/slow).
Family Secrets
I'm thrilled this poem was selected as a semi-finalist for the very prestigious Pablo Neruda Poetry Prize.
Grace
The Seattle Poet Laureate Claudia Castro Luna created a grid of poems about places in Seattle from Seattle poets. I was delighted to have "Grace" selected to bring to life my lovely neighborhood.