Category Archives: Poems & Stories
April & National Poetry Month–And NaPoWriMo Returns!
This year, I am again going to participate in the National Poetry Writing Month project–“NaPoWriMo” to insiders! If you aren’t familiar with this annual “poetry boot camp”, you can learn more about it here. This is a fantastic website–run by a visionary volunteer poet named Maureen Thorsen–that offers poetry lovers a wealth of ideas and interesting links, and even provides writing prompt suggestions each day in April. (Thank you, Maureen!)
Analogous to National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), which attracts more than 300,000 writers who sign up to write 50,000 words during the month of November (and hold themselves accountable by posting their word counts each day), the poetry version invites poets to write (and if they wish, to share publicly through online posting) one poem each day in April.
Having made it across the finishing line last year without skipping any days, I am looking forward to this April’s poetic marathon. I shall try to find some graphic accompaniment for each day’s poem, too.
Thank you for your support–and if you, too, are participating this year, let me know. We can silently cheer each other on!
Yours in Poetry,
April 27, 2017 Poem in Your Pocket Day & Poem: “Portable”
Portable
for Sandy Petrek
A taste for home
pierces the tongue
early, is easy
to carry
across oceans,
or a whole lifetime.
You’ve been
teaching me
the anchoring tang
of the fresh-caught
raspberry, still dewy,
sun-and-wind
ripened, just outside
your door;
how to reach
through a forest
of obstacles—
tough green canes,
thorns, tears—
to lift a brief
sweetness to the lips,
and to let it linger.
Leslie Schultz
All over the country, today is POEM IN YOUR POCKET DAY.
(A few years ago, my friend, Sandy Petrek and I spearheaded an effort to bring this celebration to Northfield. Look for the red boxes downtown and elsewhere, or tuck a favorite poem fro home into your pocket–read it to someone else or just to yourself, and consider passing it along before the day is done.) LESLIE
Check out other participants at the NaPoWriMo Challenge 2017 home site!
April 28, 2017 Poem “Death”
Death
I hate you and the horse you rode in on.
I hate your black hat, your black boots, your cloak
darker than oblivion. Carrion
memories attend you, and I hate them—oak-
galled ink scribblings in the margins of your
book. I hate the pain you cut with a steel
quill across the faces I love, how you roar
in bone-silence, deeper and more surreal
than the bedrock ticking of clocks or time
itself. I hate how you invade this form
of love, this sonnet, twisting its pretzeled rhyme
to your own echoless ends: unsound, infirm.
I shall stare you down. I shall take the reins.
Pale horse, your rider walks away in chains.
Leslie Schultz
The photograph of the white swirl on the water was taken at the glacial pothole park at Taylor’s Falls on the St. Croix River, a bit north of here. The other photographs were taken in Savannah, Georgia.
LESLIE
Check out other participants at the NaPoWriMo Challenge 2017 home site!
Poet-Artist Collaboration XVI Reading on April 8, 2017 at The Crossings in Zumbrota
For the 16th year in a row, Crossings at Carnegie, a lively art center and concert venue in Zumbrota, Minnesota, has brought poets together with visual artists. Each year, poets send in poems and, through a blind judging process, upwards of two dozen are selected. Meanwhile, through a similar juried process, an equal number of visual artists are selected. The end result is a month-long exhibit at The Crossings to celebrate National Poetry Month, and the highlight is a celebratory reception and reading. This year, on Saturday, April 8, artists, poets, friends, family, and art-and-poetry lovers generally will gather for a feast of great food and wine and a chance to hear poems read, to view the art works inspired by the poems, and to hear a little bit about the inspiration behind the work.
I will be there to read my poem, “Nomad’s Daughter,” and I would love to see you, too, if your schedule allows.
The Crossings is a very dynamic place. I have participated in four past Poet-Artist Collaborations, and, some years ago, they hosted a joint exhibition of my photographs and those of Northfielder Patsy Dew. They always have something interesting going on, and their shop is full of unusual and beautiful merchandise that makes finding a perfect gift quite easy. It is worth checking out any day of the year! For directions, and for more information about the depth of program offerings, from classes and concerts, to exhibitions and shop offerings, you can find out more about The Crossings at Carnegie by checking out their website.