March, 2014

FEATURED POET:  Elizabeth Austen is the Washington State Poet Laureate for 2014-16. Her debut collection, Every Dress a Decision (Blue Begonia Press, 2011) was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award. She’s also the author of two chapbooks, The Girl Who Goes Alone (Floating Bridge Press, 2010) andWhere Currents Meet (Toadlily Press, 2010). She produces poetry programming for NPR-affiliate KUOW 94.9 and earned an MFA at Antioch University LA. She makes her living at Seattle Children’s Hospital, where she also offers poetry and journaling workshops for the staff.

A FORMAL FEELING COMES

After Dickinson and Atwood

Start with what is near.

Your own hand. Knotted pine. Graying

picnic table. See before you speak.

Knotted hand, graying pine, empty

table. When you cannot

welcome what is difficult

to say, repeat a gesture—

open your hand, set

the table with familiar linen—

until it is ritual, until it calms

your need. Find your allies

in the speechless beauties—pine,

yes, and maple, hemlock, fir.

Form lends freedom, if not

ease.  Take whatever

hand is offered, sit

at the table spread before you.

Let quiet include birdsong.

NOT YET

                        …my disordered soul thirsts

                        after something it cannot name.

                                                       —Jane Kenyon

How many summer afternoons found us

at this lakeshore, unable to account

for our fate? Dear whirligig,

you want what is only possible

with stillness. We have yet to learn the names

of nearly everything we love. These

tiny birds in the yellowing lilac—who are they?

Branch to branch—in search of what?

Each winter we earn the next summer’s light

until—not yet—it arrives unannounced:

our last. From the corner of an eye

we’ll see—not yet—how perfect and brief

our bodies were—how even one afternoon

of lakewater and sunlight, the girlchild

splashing in the shallows, the laughter

carried from a far shore—

how even this was enough, seen

from the diminishing vista of a rearview mirror.

mirror.

WRITE YOUR POEM:

Who is your mentor?  Renoir used to sit in the Louvre and paint the Master's, finding inspiration. Which poet do you emulate?  Take a page out of the Washington State Laureate's book.  Keep following.  Keep learning. Here is one by Margaret Atwood.  Write your song on the back of your electrical bill.  Send the poem in the envelope and keep the lights on.

Is/Not

Love is not a profession
genteel or otherwise

sex is not dentistry
the slick filling of aches and cavities

you are not my doctor
you are not my cure,

nobody has that
power, you are merely a fellow/traveller

Give up this medical concern,
buttoned, attentive,

permit yourself anger
and permit me mine

which needs neither
your approval nor your suprise

which does not need to be made legal
which is not against a disease

but agaist you,
which does not need to be understood

or washed or cauterized,
which needs instead

to be said and said.
Permit me the present tense. 

February 2014

FEATURED POET: Joannie Stangeland’s new book, In Both Hands, was published by Ravenna Press, which also published Into the Rumored Spring. Joannie’s also the author of two chapbooks: Weathered Steps and A Steady Longing for Flight, which won the Floating Bridge Press Chapbook Award. Her poems have appeared in Superstition Review,Tulane Review, Valparaiso Poetry Review, First Water: Best of Pirene’s Fountain and other journals and anthologies. 

Roost

Words tonight fly out as black as crows,

oily and stubborn, ruffled and sharp.

Feathers may litter the floor.

The air holds a fever, a taut pitch,

a howl we hitch to, each unsure

of our turf. Bristling, a hiss—

and it isn’t the kettle or the cat.

But we swallow the rest, stinging

until the barbs wing into the night.

We settle our worries like eggs.

Tomorrow, we draw the same breath

when we see the mountains rising

into morning, as white as clouds.

A crow’s nest is a sloppy mess,

a loose muddle of twigs in a tree.

Love is like that—on a hard day, held

with spit and bits of string—

on a good day, home.

A Pocket of Time

The sky drops like a crow’s night wing

and clouds build behind the dry hill.

A thimble of weather,

a pocket of time.

You reach in for the moments,

warm your hands. You have stood

on this shore, listened for the gossip

of dried grass, the secrets reeds tell.

At the cusp of another decade,

language is fledging.

Swallow the light on the wind.

Stay for the heron that might alight

before dark. The old words fly south,

leave nests of questions in the shadows—

What is the length of an hour?

What is my deepest fire?

What blessed letting go

will give you back the sunlight

on the thickest cedars,

the clear path through them?

WRITE YOUR POEM:

At times a poem takes on historic proportions when a non-existent prisoner memorizes it.  This poem itself was written by someone in a hospital, struggling against their own existence.  This was the favorite poem of Nelson Mandela.  What is the power of poetry?  It gives the poet life.  It gives the listener life.  Write your poem.  Share it with the wind.  Who knows who will pick it up.

Invictus- William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,

      Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

      For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

      I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

      My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

      Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

      Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

      How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate,

      I am the captain of my soul.

January 2014

FEATURED POET: Tim McNulty is a poet, essayist, and nature writer. He is the author of three poetry collections,Ascendance, In Blue Mountain Dusk, and Pawtracks, and ten poetry chapbooks.  He is also the author of eleven books on natural history, including Olympic National Park: A Natural History.  He lives with his family in the foothills of Washington’s Olympic Mountains.Check him out here!


Some Ducks

"Now, if we're real quiet...," I whisper to Caitlin,

and with the next step

a thunder of wings fills the sky,

cloudburst of feathers and spray

as dozens of mallards explode

                        from the small pond.

Blue-white shimmer of wingbars and vapor

billows across the winter sky.

Caitlin stands frozen,

as a second, then third wave

                        erupts before us,

astonished

that our quiet approach

could trigger such spectacular alarm.

The roiled surface splashes up in waves

over the shore ice,

the din of wingbeats fades,

and the sky is suddenly

                        monumental in its emptiness.

Our eyes meet with my unfinished thought:

"...we might see some ducks."

Tim McNulty

My Father Speaking

In those years, the oughts and early teens,

it was woods from Mt. Pleasant Street clear

to West Peak.  Eight of us kids then—

Fran wasn't born yet—and I'll be honest,

we were often hungry.  We'd find food

where we could.

In fall when the chestnuts were ripe

we'd comb McCarty's woods for them.

We smaller kids would get a boost up

to the lower limbs, but

the big boys would find stout logs

and give the trees a whack. Oh brother,

would those chestnuts come showering down.

We'd fill gunnysacks, all we could carry,

and haul them back to Ma

who'd roast them in the cookstove. 

The house would fill with their flavor,

the nicest, sweetest nuts you ever ate.

In 1917 the blight took them all. 

They never came back.

When you were kids I'd bring home

bags of European chestnuts, remember?

But nothing, nothing compared to those wild nuts

from the woods.

To tell the truth,

I don't know what we'd have done without them.

Tim McNulty

Write your Poem!

What does your family inspire for the internal portion of the poem.   Although poetry was the language of royal court life and even the story telling medium poets seem to always find gentle ways to address what is intimate and central.  Write your poem in the snow, or on a napkin and let the ink float away in a melting drift.  

Baby's World

I wish I could take a quiet corner in the heart of my baby's very
own world.
I know it has stars that talk to him, and a sky that stoops
down to his face to amuse him with its silly clouds and rainbows.
Those who make believe to be dumb, and look as if they never
could move, come creeping to his window with their stories and with
trays crowded with bright toys.
I wish I could travel by the road that crosses baby's mind,
and out beyond all bounds;
Where messengers run errands for no cause between the kingdoms
of kings of no history;
Where Reason makes kites of her laws and flies them, the Truth
sets Fact free from its fetters. 

Rabindranath Tagor

November 2013

FEATURED POET: Alice Derry:   Her third collection of poetry, Strangers to Their Courage (Louisiana State University Press, 2001), was a finalist for the 2002 Washington Book Award. Stages of Twilight (Breitenbush, 1986), Derry's first collection, won the King County Publication Award, chosen by Raymond Carver ; Clearwater was published by Blue Begonia Press in 1997. Derry also has three chapbooks: Getting Used to the Body (Sagittarius Press, 1989), Not As You Once Imagined (Trask House, 1993), and translations from the German poet Rainer Rilke (Pleasure Boat Studio, 2002). Derry has won a number of prizes, and her poems have been widely published in anthologies. She teaches English and German at Peninsula College in Port Angeles on Washington's Olympic Peninsula where she has co-directed the Foothills Writers' Series since 1980. Tremolo is her fourth collection. 

NOOTKA

            —Peninsula wild rose

I’m learning to balance

on the roadside bank,

teetering at the edge

where the bramble sprawls,

and the full force

of the roses’ scent                                                      

can reach me.

After I’m quiet enough

the swallows—gray, blue, gold—

resume their swoop and dive

for insects.

One petal near me loosens

to fall; in the thick of bloom,

one bud unfolds.

I’m suspended

as neither bird nor flower

seem to be.

―Alice Derry

AFTER DAYS OF RAIN 

                       

Three nights in a row, a full moon

blasts in our windows,

taking sleep. Before it wanes,

we wake one morning

to a thin wafer of blessing                 

hung in washed blue.

Winter crawls to its end.

When the cold descends again

briefly, the willows, their catkins

already turned from gray

to expectant yellow, wait.

The hawk resumes her place

at the highest point on the alder.

―Alice Derry 

WRITE YOUR POEM
With the season of consumption gratitude comes to mind for small graces.  Think through all the reasons and write your own poem in reaction to a new poem by Alice Derry from her manuscript Hunger.

THEY START USING CHILDREN AS LIVING SHIELDS 

                        —the wars, 2013

Readied for burial

in their white blanket cocoons,

the children lie side by side

as if they were at a sleepover.

Staying up way past

their bedtime, hide-and-seek,

tickling, or mid-story, mid-word,

they pause for a minute,

and their eyes, sensing

immobility, close.
Then the parents come

to tuck covers around them.

               

If this row of boys and girls

were the only one.

―Alice Derry 

October 2013

FEATURED POET: John C. Mannone- Nominated three times for the Pushcart Prize he has work in The Baltimore Review, Prime Mincer, Pirene's Fountain, Prairie Wolf Press Review,Tipton Poetry Journal, Pedestal and others.  He's the 2013 Rhysling Chair, poetry editor for Silver Blade, and a college professor.  Visit Art of Poetry: http://jcmannone.wordpress.com

DEATH APPROACHES

My harp is also turned to mourning

― Job 30:31

It always comes when it's dark. I feel it lurk
trying to get a foothold in the crack of my skin,
in the thinning shadow where I hide.  The terror
is soon upon me, my soul is poured out.  Death

approaches with a shear garment to bury me.
It drifts in with a foul wind―disease grips 
me around the neck, strangles me until I shake
with dust and ashes.  And I cry out, yet no one

hears me.  The beast lurches, its long-needle
talons pierce my bones, grapple my insides.
My skin turns black with blood, my bones burn.
But in the twinkling of the dawn, its trammel-veil

will tear, its hooks will break to dullness, melt
as if its own dragon's breath was turned upon it.
I will dress in the glory the stars and rejoice.

O death, where is thy string?
O grave, where is thy victory?
―I Corinthians 15:55

―John Mannone

WRITE YOUR POEM
'Tis the season for the dark side.  Some of us struggle with more reality of the dark than the light and so there can be comfort when the lights go out and we don't face our lighter counterparts in the sun.  We witness to those things people dream of and don't speak.   What do you write down on the edge of those realities?   Write it on the candy wrapper on Hallowed Eve and let it blow in the wind.

A DREAM
In visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed-
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream- that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro' storm and night,
So trembled from afar-
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day-star?

―Edgar Allen Poe

September 2013

Check out our new website!
http://www.cavemoonpress.com/

FEATURED POET:  Carol Smallwood’s books include Women on Poetry: Writing, Revising, Publishing and Teaching, foreword by Molly Peacock (McFarland, 2012) on Poets & Writers Magazine list of Best Books for Writers; Women Writing on Family: Tips on Writing, Teaching and Publishing (Key Publishing House, 2012); Compartments: Poems on Nature, Femininity, and Other Realms (Anaphora Literary Press, 2011). Carol has founded, supports humane societies. 

 Check out her latest call for submission here: 

Leaves on Edge

scurry, whirlpool

underfoot

Aspen, maple, oak

rattle snare drums

Some defy gravity--

and as quickly fall

- Carol Smallwood

(First appeared: Boston Literary Magazine Fall 2011)

Ice in Lemonade

is for those with time

to glimpse the wonder of

summer's brevity

- Carol Smallwood

WRITE YOUR POEM:

A cold rain starting

A cold rain starting
And no hat --
So? 

Matsuo Basho

How long does your poem have to be to capture the moment?  Write your poem on a leaf.  Watch it blow away in the river and the rain.

August, 2013

Thanks for reading!
We have a new website up and running so check us out at our new home
http://www.cavemoonpress.com/

FEATURED POET: Esther Altshul Helfgott is a nonfiction writer and poet with a Ph.D. in history from the University of Washington. Her work appears in the Journal of Poetry Therapy, Maggid: A Journal of Jewish Literature, Drash: Northwest Mosaic, American Imago: Psychoanalysis and the Human Sciences, Raven Chronicles, Floating Bridge Review. Beyond Forgetting: Poetry and Prose about Alzheimer’s Disease, Jack Straw Anthology, Blue Lyra Revie, HistoryLink, and elsewhere. She is a longtime literary activist, a 2010 Jack Straw poet, and the founder of Seattle’s “It’s About Time Writer’s Reading Series,” now in its 23nd year. She is the author of the The Homeless One: A Poem in Many Voices (Kota, 2000), a poetic docu-drama about schizophrenia and homelessness, which has been performed as a play. For three years, Esther wrote the blog “Witnessing Alzheimer’s: A Caregiver’s View,” for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer online. Her wish is that young people get to know their grandparents, and hold their hands. www.estherhelfgott.com

Look for her new release on Amazon!  Just click the photo!

Here's a couple of poems to check out.

November 3, 2005

Alzheimer Couple

They have grown

into each other

like two plants

in a small pot.

Arms and legs

encircling

the same

trunk

they wait

for anyone

to come

and water

them.

— Esther Altshul Helfgott

April 26, 2009

Thirty Seconds Before Dinner

He was different tonight

more withdrawn

though he did raise his arm

when he saw a motorcycle

hanging on the wall.

You wouldn’t expect

to see a Harley-Davidson

in a nursing home

but this Harley flew

out of the picture frame

as if it were a bird.

Abe was astonished,

even though his facial muscles

remained tight

and his mouth stayed closed.

For thirty seconds his eyes lit up.

Afterwards, we returned to where we were before:

me wondering what to do next,

he not waiting to go to dinner.

— Esther Altshul Helfgott

WRITE YOUR POEM:

Когда для смертного умолкнет шумный день И на немые стогны града Полупрозрачная наляжет ночи тень, И сон, дневных трудов награда, В то время для меня влачатся в тишине Часы томительного бденья: В бездействии ночном живей горят во мне Змеи сердечной угрызенья; Мечты кипят; в уме, подавленном тоской, Теснится тяжких дум избыток; Воспоминание безмолвно предо мной Свой длинный развивает свиток: И, с отвращением читая жизнь мою, Я трепещу, и проклинаю, И горько жалуюсь, и горько слезы лью,- Но строк печальных не смываю 1828 Alexandr Sergeevich Pushkin What lines have you written that hold both? Write your poem with a stick in the sand on the beach. Write it in your journal and translate it once. Pushkin was able to combine Slavic church influence, with European idioms and Russian vernacular giving a voice to a new way of poetry. What are you combining? Give your poem to your granddaughter. Give it to your spouse. Write it to the aunt who passed on and you remember.

Whene'er for mortal men the noisy day grows still And half-transparent shadows of the night. And slumber, the reward of daily labors, Sinks down upon the muted city streets That is the time of night for me, when silent hours Drag by in agonizing wakefulness: During the idle night the sting of my heart's serpent Flames up in me more fervently; Imagination boils: my mind, opppressed by yearning, Plays host to a tormenting crowd of thoughts; Before my eyes, remembrance silently Draws out its lengthy scroll; And I, repulsed, review the story of my life, I shudder and I curse, Weep bitter tears and bitterly complain, But cannot wash the dismal lines away.

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