It has no effect on them, the zookeeper replied,when asked about the rhino’s missing horn.Better dehorned than dead.Saw it off now before they come in the nightto murder and dethrone your crowning gloryto be ground into magical cure-all powderor carved into obscene jeweled daggersto adorn a prince’s empty existence.Just remove the profit motive.How easy it […]
My poem “What Survives” was just published by Panoply, a Literary Zine. A cento is a poetic form composed entirely of lines from poems by other poets. It comes from the Latin word for patchwork.
Now that we know how they signal each otherthrough root hairs and fungal threads of meaning,will we ever learn to read these signalsand know what it is they talk aboutin the dark loamy layers below? Surely there must be moreto their talk than survivalas when insects or fires threaten,just as we sapiens came to learngrunts
What Do Trees Talk About? Read More »
Dear Friends, I am excited to announce that my new poetry collection, Death at the Mall, has just been published by Kelsay Books. For me, it represents a milestone in my poetic journey. It features 54 all new poems as well as 16 poems selected from my four previous books. Not only is this my
Death at the Mall: New and Selected Poems Read More »
My poem “Imaginary Garden” has just been published in New Myths Magazine Issue #67 https://sites.google.com/newmyths.com/newmythscomissue67b/issue-67-stories/imaginary-garden It has also been nominated for a Readers Choice Award. If you go to the home page (https://sites.google.com/newmyths.com/newmyths-com-home/home-page) you can read and rank the nominated poems and stories.
I have long been fascinated by science fiction and often write poetry in this genre. Here is my latest offering, which suddenly decided it wished to become a shape poem. It was just published in issue #66 of NewMyths.com, a quarterly online magazine of science fiction and fantasy. You can read it here: https://sites.google.com/newmyths.com/newmyths-com-issue-66/issue-66-stories/memory-care
Those who would pigeonhole poetry, assigning it to a more restrictive category according to what they think it should be, ignore poetry’s dynamic flux and the range of things a poem can do for us. Some think poems should always be lyrical, dealing with personal feelings and emotions, with nary a trace of narrative. Some
America, We Call Your Name Read More »
It is very unusual for a literary journal to publish a previously published poem, especially one that has appeared in another journal. I am honored to appear here in Tipton Poetry Journal (see page 20). https://issuu.com/tiptonpoetryjournal/docs/tpj59 This poem, by the way, is from my second poetry collection, The Museum of Unwearable Shoes.
After Hearing the Young Black Poet Read More »
While the world does seem like it’s going to hell, here’s a fun video I made when I published my young adult novel, My Vacation in Hell. It’s a sequel to The Family That Wasn’t, in which John, a sexual abuse victim and frequent flyer of his imagination, must find a way out of the
A Young Man’s Journey Through Hell Read More »
We walk there to escape the heator the pall of ourcoffined lives. We are a rag-tag lot,from the lithe, pony-tailed womanwho waves as she whizzes past me, to seniors with walkers and trekking poles,stepping cautiously towardwhatever future awaits, big families sprawled across the aisles,briefly trying to hold it all togetheragainst the forces spinning them apart,