Tag Archives: Leslie Schultz Poetry

THIRD WEDNESDAY MAGAZINE Publishes Winter 2022 Issue; My Poem, “Dandelion,” is Included!

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Photo taken in front of City Lights Bookstore, haunt of Lawrence Ferlinghetti and site of many poetry readings (Leslie Schultz 1988)

You can read the digital version at no cost HERE

To purchase a paper copy or subscribe (or submit your own work, check out the Third Wednesday Magazine website.)

My poem, “Dandelion,” I just learned, is the winning “50/50” poem for this issue! Such a surprise and such a delight to me because I know the competition is stiff. In fact, this issue is jam-packed with 73 poems from 65 poets. It just arrived today, and you know that I will be curled up with it tomorrow. Fortunately it is predicted to be a snow day here.

(Please note that full biographies of poets are available on the earlier broadside posts the magazine published as each poem was accepted, and they are accessible on their website. As an example, here is what you find if you go to the right-hand search bar over “Posts” and search on my last name. You can do the same for any poet in this issue. You can also subscribe, free of charge, to receive posts of newly accepted poems for future issues.)

This issue’s cover (as you will see from the link above) is a splendid visual arts collage by editor-in-chief David Jibson called “No Strings Attached.” It is an homage to the famed City Lights Book Store in San Francisico and one of its celebrated poets, Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

Here is a link to the Poetry Foundation’s website post on the famous (an perennially delightful) poem referenced, “Don’t Let That Horse…”)

I was unable to figure out how to reproduce the cover image for the Winter 2022 issue from the pdf provided, and I was unwilling to wait until my own print copy arrived in the mail, so I am sharing two images from my own pilgrimage there many years ago. These were taken from inside the bookstore looking out. Only in San Francisco! (Or maybe Ann Arbor!)

Also City Lights! (Leslie Schultz, 1988)

Happy Reading!

THE ORCHARDS Winter Issue is Published! It Includes My Poems “Northern Months” and “Again”

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orchards front winter 2021

I awoke here in Northfield to snow sifting down this morning. Still dark out, the street and sidewalks were as bright as blank paper. The gardens, trees, and lawns were dark silhouettes and planes of shadow.

Then I discovered that the new issue of The Orchards had been published, always a cause for celebration. I love this wintery cover image of the vintage train steaming along a country track. It reminds me of how the holidays, fully laden with traditions and new surprises, advances upon us every year. It also seems an apt visual metaphor for this particular issue, filled as it is with 98 poems by 77 poets. I have not yet had time to read any of the other poets’ work, but I am looking forward to curling up with a cup of cocoa and slowly turning the pages of the paper copy I have ordered once it arrives. What better oasis of rich calm could I imagine on a snowy winter day?

This issue is available for purchase through Kelsay Books and Amazon, and the digital version is available for free. A link to the digital copy can be found on The Orchards Poetry Journal homepage. You can also publish a paper copy there.

Happy Reading!

Front Door with Square Wreath
Snow-capped Echinacea on Tim’s Post-stamp Prairie
Old Orchard Ladder Supporting a Kiwi Vine

TIPTON POETRY JOURNAL Publishes Its Summer 2021 Issue and Includes My Poem, “Worldly Goods”

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August Evening, Keepsake Cidery, Northfield (2021)

Tipton Poetry Journal has just released its latest issue. It can be read online here. Paper copies are available on Amazon.com. I am thrilled that the summer 2021 issue includes my own poem, “Worldly Goods.”

This issue of Tipton Poetry Journal also contains diverse work by these poets: Gilbert Allen, Jake Bailey, Bethany Bowman, Edward Bynum, Charles Cantrell, Susan Cossette, Rosaleen Crowley, Patricia Davis-Muffett, Milton P. Ehrlich, Kim Garcia, D. Walsh Gilbert, Morgan Hamill, Lois Marie Harrod, Lisa Hase-Jackson, John Haugh, M.A. Istvan, D.R. James, Nancy K. Jentsch, Tim Kahl, Michael Keshigian, W.F. Lantry, Doris Lynch, John Maurer, David Melville, Lorne Mook, Douglas Nordfors, Robert Okaji, Lynn Pattison, Simon Perchik, Roger Pfingston, Matt Prater, Donna Pucciani, Patrick T. Reardon, Janet Reed, Sarah Rehfeldt, Timothy Robbins, Russell Rowland, Claire Scott, Allen Shadow, Jeanine Stevens, R.S. Stewart, Vincent J. Tomeo, Robert Tremmel, Melanie Weldon-Soiset, Anne Whitehouse, A.D. Winans, Edytta Anna Wojnar, Kenton K. Yee, and Alessio Zanelli.

Dan Carpenter reviews Matthew Brennan’s collection, Snow in New York; (Lamar University Press, 2021).

Cover Photo:   “Old Barn: Brown County” by Brendan Crowley.

Wishing you superlative autumn weather–and satisfying reading–wherever you are!

Leslie

Postcard for April 26, 2021 & a Lagniappe for Richard Wilbur–My Poem “Two Voices in a Starbucks”

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After the post in the wee hours this morning on Richard Wilbur, I realized that I had neglected to mention one poem of his that has affected my own work. His “Two Voices in a Meadow” is masterful and lives in my heart and brain (yes, I do have it memorized!)

Some years ago, I wrote an homage poem to his poem. Mine is called “Two Voices in a Starbucks” and was first published in Mezzo Cammin and then included in my most recent book-length collection, Concertina.

I’m sharing it again, here, as a “lagniappe”, a little something extra, a Cajun French term I learned during my years in Lake Charles, Louisiana, where I encountered both Community Coffee and Wilbur’s poetry! (I am also including a link to his more masterful and nuanced poem–do read his first and last!)

LESLIE

Two Voices in a Starbucks
                        (for Richard Wilbur)
 
 
                        Coffee
 
I grow on mountain slopes
cooled by the breath of God,
a rosy, cozy berry.
My bean outshines its pod.
I submit to fire and blade.
My flavor is my yield.
Drop by drop, I offer up
the fragrance of the field.
 
                        Tea
 
My legend says the Buddha
refused his mountain sleep
by cutting off his eyelids:
these leaves you wake to steep.
Thanks to India and China
the world can now create
my delicate, leafy brew
to sip, to meditate.
 
 
Leslie Schultz
 

A New Anthology, AN AMARANTHINE SUMMER, Honoring Poet and Teacher Kim Bridgford, Includes Three of My Own Poems

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This lovely anthology, a festschrift honoring the late Dr. Kim Bridgford (whom I knew through her journal, Mezzo Cammin) is just out from Kelsay Books. It contains work from other poets whom I know (either personally and/or through their work)–Sally Nacker, Jean L. Kreiling, Karen Kelsay, and Ryan Wasser. Wasser, who is one of the editors who helmed this memorial volume, has also contribute a moving introduction that is a testimony to the positive and lasting effect Kim had on those around her. I am pleased to have three poems of my own included: “Rain Clouds to the East,” “Tiny Troubadour,” and “Silhouette: July Evening.”

It seems fitting for this to be published just as the summer season approaches, when living is a bit easier and the memories made a bit sweeter and more effortless.