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To order, go here.

January 2012

One of my poems, "The Gardener's Tale" has just been published at Eye to the Telescope.  Go here to read it.

October 2011

Two of my poems, "Ash Wednesday on I95 South" and "Ash Wednesday in Miami" have just been published at Hobble Creek Review.  Go here to read them.

June 2011

 Adanna has published one of my poems, "Household Spells."  It appears below:

Household Spells


They paint me as a siren,
and if you squint at the canvas, you can almost hear
the melody I used to bewitch the wayfarers.

Too often, I’m seen as the cruel jailor
who kept marooned men against their will.
I should have sent that sloppy Ulysses
on his way sooner. All that moping.

But worse, he kept working on home
improvement projects, even when I begged
him not to. All that hammering!
I thought I’d go mad.

He forced on me a new filing system,
and now I can’t find a thing.
He rearranged all my kitchen cabinets.
Spare me from men who don’t cook
but feel called to impose a rational
system to a kitchen arranged for usefulness.
I hid my cast iron skillet.
I know he’s a big believer in cookware
made of fused metals,
but I know the strength that comes from cooking
with my grandmother’s perfectly seasoned pans.

When he eyed the quilts
and told me the price they might fetch
on the mainland, I knew it was time
for him to go. I encouraged
him to tell me all about the faithful Penelope,
and in a week, I was rid of him.

I don’t miss him much, but I find myself pondering
Penelope. Will she mourn her missing
solitude? Has she kept a list of projects
for him to complete when he returns?
He’s been gone for years.
will she still love a man bewitched by wanderlust?

May 2011

Emrys has published one of my poems, "Sigh."  It appears below:

Sigh

In your heavy sigh, I hear the sound
of glaciers melting drop by drop,
the crunch of the boot on the neck,
the whispered plotting of antibacterial-resistant staph
germs in a sterile operating room,
the creak of a joint
before it turns to the scraping of bone on bone,
the steady drip of every leaking piece
of plumbing that ever betrayed me.

January 2011

Pre-publication orders for my chapbook I Stand Here Shredding Documents will begin March 29 and run through May 11, 2011.  You can order through the Finishing Line Press website (www.finishinglinepress.com) once the sales begin, and you'll save on shipping if you order during the pre-publication dates.

November 2010

My poem "Sharing the Sea of Surround Sound" is up at Qarrtsiluni.  Go here to read it and you can also hear me read it, if you're so inclined.

October 2010

My second chapbook I Stand Here Shredding Documents will be published by Finishing Line Press. HURRAH!!!!  Stay tuned for more information!

The Healing Muse has published two of my poems, "Immunities" and "Transfiguration Sunday on the Cancer Ward." They appear below:

Immunities


She sees the Dalai Lama at Whole
Foods Market. He compares
brands of vitamin C.
She observes his weary
face, his rumpled
robes and finds a strange
comfort in the realization that even the holiest
among us has need
now and then of an immune system boost.
“Namaste,” she whispers,
as she reaches
for a can of soy protein. 

Transfiguration Sunday on the Cancer Ward


He waits with them because who knows
better how disconcerting
it is to discern one’s disjointed bones
dissolving into water. He remembers
how it feels to be forsaken.
He remembers feeling life flow out of him,
only a husk of his former humanity remaining.

Here, he can’t do much.
In a world of free will, cancer cells can multiply,
bright sons of the morning who would rather reign
in hell than serve in heaven.
Here on the cancer ward, he can’t do
much, but he does what he can.

He brings ice chips and water to those annoyed
by their drought desert mouths.
He offers consolation to the woman who complains
that she can see all her bones through her translucent skin.
He offers tales of transfiguration,
and holds out the hope of resurrection.
He reminisces with those who are too far
gone to remain on the earthly plane much longer.
They trade tales of what they’ll miss most:
crisp sheets on a fresh-made bed,
long lingering meals,
birdsong in the morning,
the change in light that signals a new season,
homemade bread,
the soft rains and gentle sunsets,
a perfect bottle of wine. 

 

September 2010 

One of my poems, "Sleepless Beauties," appears in the latest edition of The Innisfree Poetry Journal. Go here to read it.

My poem, "Left Behind," is up at Qarrtsiluni. Go here to read it or to click on the link to hear me read it.

August 2010

This poem appears in Reeds and Rushes: Pitch, Buzz, and Hum, edited by Kathleen Burgess, published by Pudding House Publications, which also publishes my chapbook. Go here to buy either or both.

Damnable Instruments


I have piped miracles
with this flute. Even when the Nazis
shut us out of their culture, we created
our own operas and orchestras.
They took away our instruments, but I could hide
my flute. And we could always sing.

My flute bought my passage out. I hated to sell
it, but a trade for a ticket to freedom
seemed fair. And I got a job teaching tiny
fingers to work magic on shrunken pipes.

Then the letters streamed in. Every family
member left behind implored me to find
a way to rescue them. I did my best,
but I was no Pied Piper. Besides, Hitler’s
ears, deaf to the magic of music, certainly would pay
no attention to my desperate notes.
And music teachers made such little bits of money.

My mother’s correspondence grew increasingly desperate.
She accused me of hardening my heart,
of only being interested in my music,
the way I’d always been. Did she not know
of my frantic attempts which consumed
all my free time while my flute pouted
in its case? Did she not meet me
in my nightmares, not see me watching
in the shadows, unable to stop her tortures?

Damnable instrument. Every time I touch
it, I think of my mother’s hysterical accusations
that I love my flute more than her. I cease
all playing, cut my teaching ties.
I get a job selling shoes and sturdy
boots, so much more practical than
ethereal music.

July 2010

I have one poem up at Poets for Living Waters.  It appears below:

Alternate Apocalypse #3


We expected mushroom clouds and radiation.
We didn’t anticipate a plume on the ocean floor,
an unstoppable gusher.
We thought we would run out of oil.

We didn’t anticipate a plume on the ocean floor.
We assumed precautions had been taken.
We thought we would run out of oil.
Now we worry the flow will never stop.

We assumed precautions had been taken.
We thought there was an emergency plan.
Now we worry the flow will never stop.
We face a future of oily seas.

We thought there was an emergency plan.
We thought they cared about the environment.
We face a future of oily seas,
a fishless existence our fate.

We thought they cared about the environment.
Now we watch migratory birds slicked with petroleum.
A fishless future our fate,
we cry over lost treasures.

Now we watch migratory birds slicked with petroleum.
We hear the stories of generations living on the water.
We cry over lost treasures,
marine animals, an ecosystem, an ocean, a planet.

We hear the stories of generations living on the water.
All these cultures will evaporate:
marine animals, an ecosystem, an ocean, a planet.
We expected mushroom clouds and radiation.

June 2010

I have two poems up at the South Florida edition of Poets and Artists. You can read the entire issue here. I'm on page 73.

May 2010

My poem "I Stand Here Shredding Documents" has just been published in Poetry East.  It appears below.

I Stand Here Shredding Documents


I stand here shredding documents.
I think of my mother and her basket
of ironing, the baskets of clothes,
both clean and dirty, the constants
of laundry and housekeeping.

I yearned for a different set of baskets,
an inbox and an outbox,
clothes that need professional attention
from dry cleaners and a house
so uninhabited
that it didn't get dirty.

Now I have become my father,
a woman of file cabinets
and endless meetings of infinite boredom.
I stand at the shredder,
my daily friend, and think of work
that is never finished.

Late April, 2010

Two of my poems have just been published in the anthology In Our Own Words:  A Generation Defining Itself.  The generation?  Generation X, of course.

Looking for Bishop Tutu


Some women dream of movie stars, yearn
for those long fingers to snake
out the clogged plumbing of all their dreams,
to let life flow through them again.

Others weep for babies they can never
hold, daydream about perfect
families, feel time running out, sliding
away, drop by drop, never to be regained.

I long for Desmond Tutu’s blessing,
his hands on my head, the heels of his palms
cool against my cheeks. All my inner demons
would be still and silent before this man.

He brings enlightenment. I listen
to him, and I understand the role of suffering
in this world. He transforms the most brutal
tragedy into a lesson of God’s grace.

 Well of Poverty

You plot against the maids. The dormitory bathrooms
aren’t kept clean enough for you. You scheme
to get the maid fired. I look at her bent back and gnarled
fingers and see my mother. No wonder she was always anxious
to get to work, to be surrounded by the spotless,
smooth surfaces she couldn’t have at home.
The clean scent of bleach reminds me of bedtime, her hands
tucking the covers around me.

I linger in lengthy showers and revel in the boundless
hot water. Sometimes, I flush the toilet twice
just because I can. I look at your designer
clothes and can only imagine what you paid for name
brand socks and t-shirts. I know you cannot understand
my roots: the well that ran dry, the living scratched
out of a plot of malnourished soil.

You complain about the food quality.
You despise the menus heavy with meats
and dairy products. You feel you’re paying
too much. I cannot believe the choices
of entrees, vegetables, and desserts. I could eat every one.
I gorge myself until I am full for the first time.
And each day, I get to live this dream all over again.

You keep to the Interstates, stay
purposefully blind. You would laugh at our roof
stitched together with stolen shingles,
turn up your perfect nose at our junky cars.

You cannot know the joy of singing our pain
away. You cannot know the rapture
of an apple pie in a month without sweetness.
You do not long for your people, feel
the rip made in the family fabric.
You sleep your guilt-free nights between your fresh
sheets, while I work a second job to pay
for my books, to have extra to send back.
You do not feel your family clutching the heels
of your feet as you climb up the ladder, out of the well
of poverty, clinging and pushing away.

April 2010

My poem, "Thanks Giving," has just been published in Big Muddy:  A Journal of the Mississippi River Valley.  It appears below:

Thanks Giving


Finally, I am with my own kinsfolk.
I do not feel a freak of nature anymore.
Here beneath this hook
where my great grandfather butchered hogs and deer,
I stare into faces familiar to me.
My future face.


I have the strong, solid body
which doesn’t belong to this age
of computers and office politics.
I was meant to be up at half a crack of dawn,
fixing a huge breakfast
before I plowed a field and put an addition on the house.
All in a day’s work.

The strength of my people lies
buried in my bones and brain,
a genetic code impossible
to diet or exercise away.
My hips would balance a baby
while I shaped bread dough and slaughtered chickens,
if only I would comply.

But I’ll submit to my genetic destiny on some level.
I will always awaken before sunrise,
always keep an eye to the sky,
track the weather like a second religion.
I’ll cook enough food for a small third world country
and share my good fortune with others.
I’ll tell the family stories
about strong women
with indomitable wills.

January 2010

My poem, "New Kid," has just been published in Chiron Review.  It appears below:

New Kid


If Jesus came to your high school,
he'd be that boy with the untuned guitar,
which most days was missing a string.
Could he not afford a packet of guitar strings?
Did he not know how to tune the thing?
Hadn't he heard of an electronic tuner?
Jesus would smile that half smile and keep playing,
but offer no answers.

If Jesus came to your high school,
he'd hang out with the strange and demented.
He'd sneak smokes with the drug addled.
He'd join Chorus, where the otherworldly
quality of his voice wouldn’t quite blend.
He'd play flute in Band.
He'd spend his lunch hour in the library, reading and reshelving.

You would hear his songs echoing
in your head, down the hallways, across the years.
They'd shimmer at you and just when you thought you grasped
their meaning, your analytical processes would collapse.
Instead, you write strange poems
to delight your children who draw mystical
pictures to illustrate your poems inspired
by Jesus, who sang the songs of angels,
that year he came to your high school.

October 2009

My poem, "Strange Communions," has just been published in North American Review.  It appears below: 

Strange Communions


Jesus showed up at our church to help
with hurricane clean up.
“The Bishop was so busy,” he explained.
“But I had some time on my hands,
so I loaded the truck with tarps and water,
and came on down. What can I do?”

“Our roof needs a miracle,” I said.
“Do you know a good roofer?”

“I used to be a carpenter.
Of course, that’s getting to be a long time ago.
Let me see what I can do.”

I set to work ripping up the soaked
carpet in the sanctuary.
As I added a piece of dripping padding
to the pile, I noticed Christ across the street,
at the house with the fallen
tree that took out both cars and the porch.
He walked right up to the door to see
how the household was doing. I dragged
sopping carpet, trip after trip, while Jesus sat
on the porch and listened to the old woman’s sad
saga. The rough edges made my hands bleed.

Good smells made me wander down the dark
church hall to our scarcely used
kitchen, where I found Christ cooking.
“I found these odds and ends and decided
to make some lunch. Luckily, you’ve got a gas stove.”
I shrugged. “Why not? Otherwise, it’s just going to rot.”
How he made the delicious fish stew and homemade
bread out of the scraps he found
in our kitchen, I couldn’t explain.
We went out together to invite
the neighborhood in for a hot
meal, even though they weren’t church members.
We all spoke different languages,
but a hot lunch served by candlelight translates
across cultures.

I dragged drywall, black with mold, to our dumpster,
and noticed Christ walking by the cars in line
for the gas station on the corner.
When I got closer, I noticed he handed
out fresh-baked cookies and bottled water.
“Have some sweetness.
Life is hard when you can’t get necessities.”
Some drivers stared at him, like he was one of those predatory
scammers they’d been warned against.
“What’s the catch?” they growled.
“No catch,” he said with that convincing smile.
“Just a gift of grace, freely given. You’re free
to accept or refuse.” A strange communion.

Jesus left while there was still
much work to do: new carpet to be installed,
drywall to be hung, fencing to be constructed
around church grounds. I watch him drive
his empty truck, followed
by some of the neighbors, away from the church.

The next time it rained, I noticed
that the long, leaking roof had healed.

September 2009

My poem, "Lectio" is up at the online journal Innisfree Poetry Journal.  Go here to read it.

Mid August 2009

My poem, "Missing," is up at the online journal Qarrtsiluni, and if you're so inclined, you can hear me read it.  Go here to read/hear it.

Early August 2009

My poem, "Collective," is up at the online journal Qarrtsiluni, and if you're so inclined, you can hear me read it.  Go here to read/hear it.

Late July, 2009

My poem, "Watertight Seal," was published in the Summer 2009 issue of Naugatuck River Review.  It appears below:

Watertight Seal


The rain spits against the window. I prefer
water contained in these days when I can barely hold
my own tears inside. I help
you with your homework while downstairs
your mother simmers soup for a simple supper.
Soon she will be off to seminary, and I will sweep
up the crumbs, wash the dishes, and make sure you sleep
in your safe bed, a clean boy with his homework done.

This house is our island where we have washed
ashore after being spit out of our previous cozy
domains. I miss the family life of my undergraduate
dorm, and you miss your father. Your mom yearns
for a more stable financial future as she worries
about losing this house, our last life raft.

Shattered survivors, we huddle close
for warmth and safety in the darkness. Your mom
wanted a babysitter, and I needed the money.
But as the years go by, we share
meals, even when it’s not a babysitting night.
I wash my clothes at your house and stay
with you when you’re sick. We celebrate
life events, this family made of castaways.

Years pass, and we find other life preservers.
My husband landscapes your yard. Your new step-dad
finds me an agent. You fall in love for the first time.
We grow new skin over old scars,
a watertight seal.

July 2009

--My poem, "Reunion," was published in Southern Women's Review.  You can go here to download your copy, and then you'll need to scroll to page 48 to read it.

--Chiron Review published two of my poems; I've pasted them below:

Basal Cell Penelope

A stay-put Penelope, my skin cancer harbors
no desire to wander, to conquer the new worlds
of my inner organs. She’ll leave that travel
to the other adventurers. Let them explore
the inner cavities, ride the bloodstream
to the far reaches of the known universe
of the human body.

She stays home, even though there might be better climates,
if only she would go. She remains on the craggy cliff
of my upper arm, subject to winds and harsh weather.
She could find a more tropical clime,
a lush landscape in the lining of my lungs,
the rich reproductive tissues.
But no use telling Penelope, loyal to a fault.

She weaves a strange tapestry on the top of my arm.
Weaving and unweaving, one evening a scab,
next morning, smooth skin. In this way, she weaves
herself space and time.

But in the end, I go to the doctor, who punishes
her for her lack of wanderlust.
Too easy to excise.
She should have headed inland long ago.

April 2009

My poem, "Huck at Midlife," was published in the Winter 2009 issue of New Delta Review.  It appears below:

Huck at Midlife


Huck reconsiders his adolescence, that dogged
pursuit of unshod feet and freedom
of all sorts. At what point
did he decide that money mattered?

Huck rests his hands on his paunch, a pregnant
flab of flesh foretelling of future heart attacks.
He wonders what’s become of Jim
and all the other friends of his youth.

Have they forgiven him for the arrogance
that comes with youth? He flushes
each time he thinks of wrong directions,
fleeing north only to find himself back in slave territory.

Huck balances the bank accounts,
his ledgers neat and contained. He’s ahead
with his scheduled personnel reviews,
taxes paid according to the timetable.

He returns to his snug house, the wilderness
kept outside where it belongs.
His wife has kept dinner warm. She bustles
in the kitchen while he kisses his sleeping children.

Only late at night does his faithfulness
waver. Only after midnight does he let
himself think of his first love,
that river, awful, still, and grand.

Late March, 2009

Three of my poems have just been posted at the online journal Clapboard House.  Go here to view them.

Feb. 2009

Jan. 2009 

--I've been invited to read at the Library of Congress as part of the Poetry at Noon Reading Series!  I'll be reading Feb. 10, 2009.

--My poem, "Eucharist," was published in the Winter 08/09 issue of Ruminate.  It appears below:

Eucharist


I knead the bread leavened with beer,
stew a lamb shank in a pot of lentils,
prepare a salad of apples, walnuts, and raisins,
sweetened with wine and honey.
No one ever had herbs as bitter as this late season lettuce.

My friends gather at dusk, a motley band
of ragtags, fleeing from the Philistines of academia:
a Marxist, a Hindu, a Wiccan, a Charismatic Catholic,
and me, a lapsed Lutheran longing for liturgy.

Later, having drunk several bottles of wine
with prices that could have paid our grad
school rents, we eat desserts from disparate
cultures and tell our daughters tales from our deviant days.
We agree to meet again.

Gnarled vegetables coaxed from their dark hiding places
transform into a hearty broth.
Fire transubstantiates flour and water into life giving loaves.
Outcasts scavenged from the margins of education
share a meal and memories and begin to mold
a new family, a different covenant.

late Dec. 2008

My poem, "The Precious Nature of Junk," was published in the Fall 2008 issue of Interdisciplinary Humanities (the "Quiltworks" issue).  It appears below:

The Precious Nature of Junk

If God is an old woman,
She uses no recipe.
Long ago she learned
what she needed to know:
how to make do with scarce
resources, how to create successful
substitutions, how to create
magic from simple kitchen chemistry.

If God is an old woman,
She saves all our old clothes. She alone
has a vision of a collage of cloth.
She cuts new shapes out of our discards
and pieces them into an intricate quilt,
even though she knows we will fail
to appreciate her demonstrated skill.

If God is an old woman,
She longs for closer connection.
She sends cards for every occasion
and fills the answering machine with cryptic
messages. She has such important
information to pass on and such little
time left. We listen
and wonder at her mental state.

If God is an old woman,
She knows that everything could have a larger
purpose. She hoards items we’d have discarded
long ago. She understands the precious
nature of junk.

Nov. 2008 

My poem, "Lying in State," was published in the Fall 2008 issue of The South Carolina Review.  It appears below:

Lying in State

On the day that Ronald Reagan dies,
in the shadow of the Interstate, I offer
a homeless man a loaf of banana bread
which he grabs, as if afraid
I’ll rescind my offer.

Reagan’s body flies across the continent
to lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda,
that branch of government which made policies
he tried to evade.
I report to work, teach English to the children
of families who fled Reagan’s foreign
policies, Cold War containment and interference.

On the day of Reagan’s funeral, I plant
a tree and remember his claim
that creatures of this leafy clan cause pollution.
I think of ICBMs fertilizing far away fields
and Adam dead of AIDS these twenty years,
his bones blending into the earth.