Pounding Advice

In a short essay in 1913, Ezra Pound made a list of A Few 'Don’ts' For Writing Poetry.

"It is better to present one Image in a lifetime than to produce voluminous works."

• A Few 'Don’ts'
• The full-length essay, along with his "Retrospect" about imagist poetry, can be found here on the Poetry Foundation page.
• Ezra Pound
• More Pound quotes 

The Gambler

The Gambler is an odd little internet 'zine, founded by Kelly Jones, with an even odder method of editing: it's a gamble.  Yes, they edit using a strong element of chance: using a lottery, or cards, or dice to pick what's in the 'zine and what isn't.  They say:

"Work is selected by using a method that relies on chance. Submissions are collected and numbered in the order they arrive and then a random selection of numbers decides what work goes up. Those randomly selected winning numbers may come from anywhere: a Powerball ticket, an editor’s social security number, or numbers that are divisible by nine. Why nine? Why not?"

Actually, what they choose ends up being pretty interesting-- who would have thought it?
So, my poem "What if you die--" was one of the lottery winners in the most recent issue (dang-- if I'da knew I waz lucky, I woulda bought a Mega-millions.)
Ya feeling lucky, punk?

The Great Bookstores of Cleveland

Sam Allard, in Cleveland Scene, writes

Where to Find the Gospel of the Written Word in Cleveland

I remember Booksellers. I remember when Joseph Beth opened in Shaker Square. It's been a cold winter for bookstores all over, but handful of quirky independents have weathered the storm. 

Wouldn't today be a good day to go visit a nice bookstore?

Mac's Backs.  Photo by GL

Hessler!

Believe it or not, spring is coming, and you know what the means: the Hessler Street Fair Poetry Contest is looking for entries!

Celebrate the Hessler Street Fair!!!
2014 Hessler Street Fair Poetry Contest & Book

1st Place Winning Poet receives $100
2nd Place Winning Poet receives $50
3rd Place Winning Poet receives $25

Mac's Backs on Coventry road will host the Poetry reading of entries for the 2014 Hessler Street Fair Poetry contest.

The rules for 2014

• Submit up to 5 original poems. Only selected poems will be included. Each poem must have your name, street address, city, state, zip code, telephone number and e-mail address.
• Open to ages 14 and up.
• Shorter poems of one page or less will be favored.
• Poets published in the book may purchase one copy of the Hessler 2014 Poetry and Prose Annual from the Hessler Street Fair Booth at Hessler Rd. & Hessler Ct. during the days of the 2014 Fair for half price. Full price will be charged for additional copies at the Fair Booth or at Mac's Backs paperbacks, 1820 Coventry Road, Cleveland Heights, OH - 216-321-2665
• Emailed entries are strongly preferred. Entry deadline is April 6, 2014. Book will be released in early May.
• A qualifying round of readings will be held at Mac's Backs Books on Coventry on Wednesday May 14th, 2014 at 7pm. About 20 minutes after all poets have read, the winners will be announced and prizes will be handed out. If you have won in the last three years you can submit to the book but will not be eligible to win a prize. To receive a prize you must read on the designated day during the Hessler Street Fair.

Poetry has always been an integral part of the Hessler Street Fair, sometimes having its own stage on the street and sometimes combining with music on the main stage, but always doing something interesting. The top three winners will be given the opportunity to read from the stage at the Hessler Street Fair, simulcast on live radio and the web, during the Fair. Poetry read on air must not include any words designated to be obscene language as stated by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

All entries should be emailed (no snail mail entries please) to: hesslerstreetpoetry@gmail.com

• Blog posts about poetry at previous years' Hessler Street Fair

Cleveland Public Poetry 2014

The City in Winter

Lake Erie and Cleveland, Winter 2014
Sam Hubish
(used with permission)

The most recent issue of Lady Smith's 'zine The City Poetry is out, a theme issue on winter. It's a beautiful 'zine, as much art as it is poetry.  Worth checking out just because it's gorgeous, but I will point out that it also has (among works from many poets) a handful of haiku and a tanka from me.

cities have souls too, you know,
some malignant and ugly,
sneering, full of derision;
some benign and beautiful,
some merely indifferent
and uninviting, bland, lacking
ambiance, pizzazz, character.

some cities spit dust.
some cities swallow without chewing first.
some cities rust out before their time,
arthritic and osteoporotic,
empty windows, crumbling bricks,
wasted motion.

 --from "Got Soul"

Dianne Borsenik

It Can; It Will, by Adam Brodsky
(used with permission)

• The City Poetry: winter issue

We only come out at night...

Vertigo Xi'an Xavier at Poets Haven is putting out a series of miniature chapbooks, small enough to carry in a shirt pocket. His latest, We Only Come Out at Night, features poetry and fiction about vampires and werewolves. If you're a vampire-fan, check it out-- it includes, among many others, some poems by me, and by Mary. --no sparkles, I don't think, though. Sorry!

•  Poets Haven Digest Series, We Only Come Out at Night.

Cleveland Collaborative Renga: Finished!

We have now finished the Cleveland  renga!  Congratulations to all who participated by contributing lines!
(to see the opening stanzas, click here for part one, click here for part two, and here for part three).
Anyone can join in!  To contribute, add your stanza to the comments!

---

                         a shred of light left to hold
                         -but inadequate; I fear for this anchor 

waves reflect gold, bronze,
or ash floating like soot
where her hopes burned, capsized, sank 

     frozen iron ore freighter
     begins to buoy free of ice

           buckled open
           listing to the right
           falling in love again 


               underneath the old-growth oak
               just breaking into spring's green


                    overcast sky
                    the potholes gather
                    cherry blossoms

                         scent of earth on gentle breezes
                         where Lakeview's carved stone reposes
  

---

---

Background info:

Let's do renku 

Do you know... renku?

Let's do renku (2)

Songs in the Key of Cleveland: the Best Cleveland Poems

Last May, some of the best poets in Cleveland were invited to compete in the Best Cleveland Poem contest, and the top poets were invited to perform their poems for an audience at Willoughby Brewing Company.

• "Poets Salute Cleveland in Verse" (Plain Dealer) 

Now, Crisis Chronicles Press has published Songs in the Key of Cleveland: An Anthology of the 2013 Best Cleveland Poem Competition, featuring the best poems from the contest.
The anthology has poems by by Catherine Criswell, Katie Daley, T.M. Göttl, Dianne Borsenik, Geoffrey Landis, Joshua Gage, Terry Provost, Jack McGuane, Ruth J. Coffey, Martin Snyder, Jeffrey Bowen, Mary A. Turzillo and Ray McNiece.

to get a copy: order directly from Crisis Chronicles Press, or ask at your local poetry-friendly indie bookstore (like maybe Guide to Kulchur, on the west side, or Mac's Backs, in Coventry)

The official book launch will be March 3rd reading at the "Mondays At Mahall's" reading series (first Monday of every month, 7:30 – 9:30pm, at Mahall's 20 Lanes, 13200 Madison Avenue, Lakewood).  See you there?

Russell Atkins

From Diane Kendig:
This year has been the best of times, it has been the worst of times for Cleveland poet Russell Atkins. The best is the new book on him by Pleiades Press, Russell Atkins: On the Life and Work of an American Master, ed. by former Clevelander Kevin Prufer and Michael Dumanis. Please consider ordering a copy from your favorite independent bookstore.

The worst was the forcible removal of Russell to a nursing home, without allowing him to take his possessions. Four of us have been visiting and assisting him in recovering from all this.

He has an 88th birthday coming up next week which we will be celebrating with his favorite cake on Thursday, Feb. 27th. If anyone would like to attend, please email Diane Kendig or Bob McDonough for the time and locale and so we have enough cake. If you can't attend but would like to wish him well, please send a card to

Russell Atkins
The Grande Pavilions
24613 Broadway Avenue
Oakwood Village, OH 44146


Diane Kendig
Web page: http://dianekendig.com/
Blog, Home Again: http://dianekendig.blogspot.com/

"This is an astounding tribute to one of the most innovative American artists, Russell Atkins, by a small, independent publisher, Pleiades Press. Prufer, a professor in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston , and Dumanis, a professor at Bennington College, put together this labor of love, paying homage to Atkins, this peerless yet largely unknown poet, composer, dramatist, theorist, and editor."

--Robert Fleming 

"Russell Atkins is an American original, representative of an often African-American or increasingly Hispanic American working class side of American culture and society which is at an ever increasing rate being dropped by the wayside. This is the down and out, every day underbelly of American cities. As Sean Singer argues, for Atkins “the urban environment is a vital source for [Atkins’] imagination. Urban life, and specifically black urban life, is important to his work. Cleveland, and the cultural imagination of Cleveland, are ‘main characters’ in most of Atkins’ work.” His writings are of a quirky, odd sort and there’s no easy “fit” for them, since there’s often nothing very fashionable happening in them—not now and not at the time he was writing. Born and raised in Cleveland, he’s never left. The majority of his published books come from small presses, with the possible exception of Paul Bremen’s Heritage Series published out of London in the 60s. In 1976, Cleveland State University brought out the largest selection of his poems entitled Here In The. There has been little attention given his work on any significant public level since. The inclusion of Russell Atkins’ work in the Unsung Masters series by Pleiades Press seems destined. He’s exactly of the sort whose work and life this project is meant to serve."

--Patrick James Dunagan

---

• Rediscovering Russell Atkins, from Belt Magazine

Snoetry is back!

60 poets in 11 hours-- plus you!  Yes, Snoetry is back, this time at Guide to Kulchur bookstore, in the Gordon Square district near the Capitol Theatre and Cleveland Public Theatre.

Courtesy of The Tao of Jesus Crisis:

FIRST TIME IN CLEVELAND!

Featuring writers from several states! Lix & Kix, clevelandpoetry.com and friends present the 4th almost annual Snoetry winter wordfest, Sunday 16 March from noon to 11 pm at Guide To Kulchur: Text, Art, and News in the Gordon Square arts district of Cleveland, Ohio.

Open mic from noon to 1 p.m. 60 featured poets from 1 to 11 p.m.

Potluck and BYOB. If you have any questions, please contact John on Facebook or at jc at crisischronicles.com.

Full [perhaps still evolving] schedule:

Noon: Open Mic
1pm: John Burroughs (Cleveland)
1:10 Mark Sebastian Jordan (Mansfield)
1:20 Heather Ann Schmidt with Marc Shepard (Michigan/Oberlin)
1:30 Clarissa Jakobsons (Aurora)
1:40 Barton D. Smock (Columbus)
1:50 Helen Shepard (Oberlin)
2 pm: Kathy Smith (Cleveland)
2:10 Steve Brightman (Kent)
2:20 Blaire Bommer (Cleveland)
2:30 Juliet Cook (Medina)
2:40 Steven Smith (Cleveland)
2:50 Suzanne Savickas (Cleveland)
3 pm: Marisa Moks-Unger (Erie)
3:10 Jeffrey Bowen (Cleveland)
3:20 Bree [a.k.a. Zlee Zlee] (Cleveland)
3:30 Marissa Hyde (Cleveland)
3:40 Chuck Joy (Erie)
3:50 James E. Stanley (Cleveland)
4 pm: Jennifer Hambrick (Columbus)
4:10 Rose M Smith (Columbus)
4:20 Dianne Borsenik (Elyria)
4:30 Eric Anderson (Elyria)
4:40 Claire McMahon (Cleveland)
4:50 Tracie Morell (Erie)
5 pm: Bradley K Meyer (Dayton)
5:10 Ellis E-matic Crockett (Erie)
5:20 Alex Nielsen (Cleveland)
5:30 Dan Smith (Cleveland)
5:40 Bridget Kriner (Cleveland)
5:50 Megan Collins (Erie)
6 pm: Gork (Cleveland)
6:10 Josh Romig (Ravenna)
6:20 Amanda Oaks (Pennsylvania)
6:30 Mary O'Malley (Cleveland)
6:40 elliot smith (Erie)
6:50 Adam Sagert (Lorain)
7 pm: Christine Howey (Cleveland)
7:10 Kelly Boyer Sagert (Lorain)
7:20 Andy Roberts (Columbus)
7:30 Ryan Sagert (Lorain)
7:40 Brian Fugett (Dayton)
7:50 Theresa Göttl (Cleveland)
8 pm: Steve Thomas (Cleveland)
8:10 Cee Williams (Erie)
8:20 Lennart Lundh (Illinois)
8:30 Mistress Rosie [a.k.a. Lisa Dabrowski] (Lorain)
8:40 mark s. kuhar [a.k.a. Mark Cueball] (Medina)
8:50 Catherine Criswell (Cleveland)
9 pm: Shelly Ann (Cleveland)
9:10 Jim Lang (Cleveland)
9:20 Christina M. Brooks (Detroit)
9:30 Gavin Corey (Boston)
9:40 Shelley Chernin (Cleveland)
9:50 Vladimir Swirynsky (Cleveland)
10 pm Christopher Franke (Cleveland)
10:10 Mark Cronin (Cleveland)
10:20 Cavana Faithwalker (Cleveland)
10:30 Steve Goldberg (Cleveland)
10:40 Julie Ursem Marchand (Elyria)
10:50 Ra Washington (Cleveland)

Peace, love and poetry....
John

Or check the Snoetry-4 facebook page.
...and, if you're suffering from withdrawal from not enough Snoetry: join the Snoetry Withdrawal support group.

Cleveland Collaborative Renga: Part 3!

Contribute to the Cleveland Collaborative Renga!
We are now halfway through the renga
(to see the opening stanzas, click here for part one, and click here for part two).
Anyone can join in!  To contribute, add your stanza to the comments!

---

                          eleven roses -- heart pierced
                          by thorns of the absent stem

a sidewalk crevice
in the cracked city concrete:
a purple thistle

     feeble is the gardener
     who tends to our pavement fields

          whispered words fall blind
          pavement ends where waves begin
          Erie's shore purring

               the lake's syntax -- like driftwood,
               baring its truth in silence

                    steam rises
                    from the wet sidewalk
                    her broken English 

                         freejazz punk noise rock music
                         blasts out of the clubs and bars

modern dancers spin
Pirate's Cove weaves siroccos
bright Pere Ubu night

     freighter glides silently;
     radio plays blue velvet

          the night's ballet--
          adagio of river and bridges
          sailors delight

                wind scuds leaf-sail galleons
                stars drown: chilly ecstasy

                     one ship left, seeking
                     the safe harbor of the moon
                     before it, too, dies

                         a shred of light left to hold
                         -but inadequate; I fear for this anchor 

waves reflect gold, bronze,
or ash floating like soot
where her hopes burned, capsized, sank
 
     exploded like the helm
     of the Titanic on ice
 
           slashed open
           listing to the right
           falling in love again

---

• Renga are poems which alternate three line verses in haiku format (5-7-5) with two line verses (7-7).  
• Each verse links to the previous verse, but not to verses before that.

Join the fun!
To add a stanza, go on to part 4

---

Background info:

Let's do renku 

Do you know... renku?

Let's do renku (2)

 

Slices from a Silver Blade

The most recent issue of  Silver Blade Magazine has Mary A. Turzillo and me as the featured poets, including a couple of poems from each of us, and an interview with both of us by editor John C. Mannone.
And he says flattering things about us, too!

• Introduction
• Interview
• Silver Blade home page

The Literary Industrial Complex...

Michael Lista, in the (Canadian) National Post, warns of the "literary industrial complex". His advice: publish less.
Ouch!  I think I like this guy.

"...like the munitions factory whose only enemy is an armistice, the Literary Industrial Complex in this country requires an unbroken draught of verbiage, regardless of the quality, for its continued solvency. It dovetails nicely with the post-Humanist aesthetic that presently predominates English-language verse, which values the elliptical, the runic, the evasively verbose, in which questions of aesthetic merit dissolve in a sociological and stylistic bath, poems that buy into what Ange Mlinko has called “the sense that the lid has been ripped off any consensual definition of poetry, and that for a new generation it has been a test of one’s authenticity to write poems that evade all criteria for a ‘good poem.’ ” And the more of it the better."

And he has advice for literary magazines, too (or at least, Canadian literary magazines): Why literary magazines should fold

• Publish less
• Why literary magazines should fold

Alex Bevan and Rachel Brown

Songwriting is a form of poetry, too.

"I have no wings... I have no wheels…
only these dreams I fasten to my heels…
I have no wings… I have no road…
only these songs to sing before I go…"

--Alex Bevan

 

Alex Bevan and Rachel Brown: 2 of Cleveland's best storytelling singers unite for a songwriters night

• Alex Bevan
• Rachel Brown

Miser

Miser, a Cleveland 'zine put out by Nicole Hennessy and Lauren Dulay, just got a nice call-out by Nikki Delamotte in Cellar Door Cleveland.

...Miser’s duality is more than the sum of its creators; it’s the duality of the role of the publisher and artist and the strange ways a community can become intertwined without ever meeting (Miser accepts submissions internationally but is primarily Northeast Ohio-based), it’s the disparity between artistic institutions that are funded and those just trying to stay afloat. Miser currently operates under $35-a-year subscriptions and various personal donations often from appearances at events.“No one has ever seen or known what our printers really are. They’re mysteriously almost falling through the ceiling upstairs right now,” Hennessy says...

---

• check out the interview with Lauren and Nicole on Cleveland.com
• or the article about Miser Magazine at Cool Cleveland
• Like them out on Facebook at MiserMagazine
• Buy an issue, or a subscription 

Bilgere Reviewed

George Bilgere's new collection of poetry, Imperial, just got a review by John Freeman in the Plain Dealer.

"Bilgere, who teaches at John Carroll University, is a companionable guide to what he calls, a little obviously, 'the shared mystery / of being human.' His lines possess the easy, colloquial rhythm of prose and the imagist glint of good poetry.
He recalls 'the dark mouths of garages' in his childhood St. Louis, lobsters’ 'steaming vaults / ready to be plundered.'"
...

• Imperial (University of Pittsburgh Press)

Amazing Cleveland Poets Stories

Horray for dan smith and J.E. Stanley, whose recent chapbook collections of speculative poetry were just reviewed in Amazing Stories by Diane Severson. Says Diane:
"Today’s post brings you two poetry reviews of chapbooks by Cleveland poets, one each by J. E. Stanley and dan smith. The Greater Cleveland area is a little hotbed of genre poetry! It is lucky enough to count Mary A. Turzillo, Geoffrey A. Landis and Joshua Gage among its inhabitants. Those three are award-winning poets whose work I’ve reviewed and podcasted here and on Poetry Planet. With this post I bring you two more fine genre poets and introduce a lovely small press (NightBallet Press), edited by Dianne Borsenik, which produces saddle-stitching bound chapbooks and broadsides, attractively presented with heavy paper and color photographs gracing the covers and the interiors."

...(and, scroll down, and find some readings on MP3.)

• From Night Ballet Press:
• Selected Regions of the Moon, by J. E. Stanley, on Amazon for $8.00.
• The Liquid of Her Skin, the Suns of Her Eyes by dan smith: 5.00 plus $3.00 shipping direct from Nightballet, or on Amazon for $8.00.

Eye to the Telescope: Speculative Juxtapositions

Cleveland's Joshua Gage is the guest editor of SFPA's Eye to the Telescope web poetry-zine, for a theme issue "Juxtapositions in Speculative Poetry."  A half dozen poems, all in one way or another dealing with the theme of juxtaposition.
From Josh's introduction:

Juxtaposition is one of the basic and essential craft tools that every writer needs to master. It is also one of the most effective tools a writer can use because it forces the reader to contemplate new ideas and to place the familiar in new contexts. When used effectively, juxtaposition forces the reader to be complicit in the writing of the poem, forces them to participate in the logic and sense of the poem, creating a more fulfilling reading experience. Speculative literature thrives on juxtaposition, often asking readers to place the known and ordinary against the unfamiliar, the strange, and the fantastic. It is in these pairings, these juxtapositions, that the imagination flourishes and the reader is rewarded with new perspectives, new ideas and views on the world. The poems in this issue will, through juxtaposition, reward you in such a way.

Cleveland Cinquain

photo by Geoffrey Landis

Michael Ceraolo is one of our most widely-published poets, but seems to be yet one of the lesser known ones.  This one was published in the January 2014 issue of Long Story Short.

CLEVELAND CINQUAIN

by Michael Ceraolo

Mounds of

plowed snow remain

after inches of rain,

held together by the debris

from streets

Chapbook Review: Tangled Shadows--senryu and haiku by Eliot Nicely

 

 

     Elliot Nicely lives in Amherst, Ohio where his boys are teaching him to giggle and dance again. His poems have been published in Acorn, Atlas Poetica, Mayfly, Paper Wasp Acorn, frogpond, bottle rockets, Kokako, Modern Haiku, Notes From the Gean, moonset, and White Lotus. His book, Tangled Shadows, is available on Rosenberry books. The book itself is hand bound, with a heavy Somerset cotton cover, and stab bound with a linen cord--a very elegant thing to behold.

 

     The senryu in this book are quite striking and poignant. They work as commentary on the human condition, displaying a wry sense of humor that is the hallmark of good senryu, and that is often lost in modern attempts at the form.

                           first date

                           no fortune cookies

                           with the bill

     The haiku in this collection are more subtle, and very successful. They juxtapose the natural world against the human, often with surprising results. Despite their understanding of haiku and its history, they still read as quite contemporary.

                                                        indian summer

                                                        ...the rest of 

                                                        our argument

     While the bulk of these poems are quite successful, Nicely occasionally gets heavy handed with his juxtapositions, and the poems read as clever, lacking in the the elegance and natural ease that a haiku should contain.

                                         the promise
                                         it won’t happen again
                                         black-eyed susans

     Overall this is a strong collection. It is visually stunning, and the haiku and senryu contained within will draw readers back to them again and again.

Geoffrey A. Landis is the 2014 winner of the Robert A. Heinlein Award

 Geoffrey A. Landis to Receive 2014 Robert A. Heinlein Award

Geoffrey A. Landis, science fiction author and scientist working for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), is the 2014 winner of the Robert A. Heinlein Award. The award is bestowed for outstanding published works in science fiction and technical writings that inspire the human exploration of space. This award is in recognition of Mr. Landis’ body of work including five books, 83 short stories and 76 poems in the SF field as well as over 353 science fact publications.

The award will be presented on Friday, May 23, 2014 at opening ceremonies during Balticon 48, the Maryland Regional Science Fiction Convention. Balticon and the Robert A. Heinlein Award are both managed and sponsored by The Baltimore Science Fiction Society.

The Robert A. Heinlein Award is a sterling silver medallion bearing the image of Robert A. Heinlein, as depicted by artist Arlin Robbins. The medallion is matched with a red-white-blue lanyard. In addition, the winner receives two lapel pins for use when a large medallion is impractical, and a plaque describing the award, suitable for home or office wall display.

Winners of the Robert A. Heinlein Award:

• 2014 Geoffrey A. Landis
• 2013 Allen Steele and Yoji Kondo
• 2012 Stanley Schmidt
• 2011 Connie Willis
• 2009 Joe Haldeman and John Varley
• 2008 Ben Bova and Spider Robinson
• 2007 Elizabeth Moon and Anne McCaffrey
• 2006 Greg Bear and Jack Williamson
• 2005 Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven
• 2004 Arthur C. Clarke
• 2003 Michael Flynn and Virginia Heinlein

More information on the Robert A. Heinlein Award, including past winners, can be found at http://www.bsfs.org/bsfsheinlein.htm

More information on Geoffrey A. Landis can be found at http://www.geoffreylandis.com/
More information on Balticon can be found at www.balticon.org

Best Poets in Cleveland

CBS Cleveland lists their choices for the best poets in Cleveland.

Ray McNiece
www.raymcniece.com

George Bilgere
www.georgebilgere.com

Susan Grimm
www.thewhitespaceinsidethepoem.blogspot.com

Sarah Gridley
www.case.edu/artsci/engl/Gridley/Gridley.html

Phil Metres

www.philipmetres.com

Agree?  Disagree?

• Best Local Poets In Cleveland

Cleveland Collaborative Renga- part 2!

the Cleveland Collaborative Renga!
We have now finished the opening six verses (the "jo"), and now we're in the main part (the "ha").
(to see the opening stanzas, click here, to continue to part 3, click here).

---

Public Square:
privatized
and empty

      cars roll past the monument,
      bronze soldiers from long ago

          statues of soldiers--
          their cast iron eyes downcast--
          retreat from my love. 

              the abandoned Siamese
              blue eyes dim in winter light

                   ghosts of the city
                   shadows beneath parked cars
                   silent, waiting, watching

                        eidolons of burnt rivers
                        histories of bone and ash

ancient children dance
rose blown wind rings water songs
insubstantial Moon

      our paths always circle back
      how well our feet know these roads

           Euclid Avenue 
           red, green, blue line, trolley stops 
           time leaves us baggage.

                tactical assault backpacks
                to carry childhood sorrows

                     blue sky morning
                     your pink hair-rollers
                     on the floor 

                          eleven roses -- heart pierced
                          by thorns of the absent stem

---

Renga are poems which alternate three line verses in haiku format (5-7-5) with two line verses (7-7).  

Each verse links to the previous verse, but not to verses before that.

Join the fun!
To add a stanza, continue to part 3!

---

Background info:

• Let's do renku 
• Do you know... renku?
• Let's do renku (2)
• Collaborative Renga: start

Panda in the Pigg Penn

Happy New Year's, all.

Cleveland Heights poet Bree, the panda of Green Panda Press, was interviewed by Catfish McDaris in the blog Pigg Penn.

How long have you been writing? When i was 4 or 5 i wrote little satirical comic strips. When i was 9 i wrote stuff that would disturb anybodywith a heart. By 12 i wrote poetry, and by 14 i understood that it was poetry. i have never written a short story, however a few months ago a wrote a novel---it took me seven weeks, and i really like it. it will be the first piece of writing i actually peddle in the market. Its humor, love triangle, clevelandish. Stay tuned for that.