My boss asks me to watch 16 hours of camera footage. Instead I watch dandelions lose their heads at the slightest breeze. Nearby weeds shed their mustard petals. The sky dares me to name its every shade of blue. Cotton, Chromium, Seafoam, Tremor. There are more important things to worry about today than work, like breathing the grass-cut air, catching the sun’s bright spears. The swollen clouds are an army of angel wings descending. I watch their feathers fall.
Eric Raanan Fischman is an MFA graduate of Naropa University’s Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics. He has taught free writing workshops in Nederland, Boulder, and Longmont, Colorado, and has had work in Bombay Gin, Boulder Weekly, Suspect Press, and many more, as well as in local community fundraising anthologies from Punch Drunk Press and South Broadway Ghost Society. He also curates the Boulder/Denver metro area poetry calendar at boulderpoetryscene.com and is a regular contributor to the BPS blog. His first book, “Mordy Gets Enlightened,” was published through The Little Door in 2017.
This is a found poem from Grant, Mira. Symbiont. New York. Orbit, 2014. Print. Pages 444-472.
Jen MacBain-Stephens (she/her) went to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and now lives in Iowa where she is landlocked. Her fifth, full length poetry collection, “Pool Parties” is forthcoming from Unsolicited Press in 2023. She is also the author of fifteen chapbooks. Some of her work appears in The Pinch, Kestrel, Cleaver, Dream Pop, Slant, Yalobusha Review, and Grist. She is the director of the monthly reading series Today You are Perfect, sponsored by the non-profit Iowa City Poetry. Find her online at http://jennifermacbainstephens.com/.
As snow does to a fire gods who bit flowers of ink a nest of mad kisses down the long black river the milky way sky’s pale vertebrae archipelagos of stars
framed between small branches
blossoms of small arms , nails us naked to the color of pink hyacinth singing singing in deep red ripples your voice is a pale street lamp on calm black water
just (a word planted by the water
before I am a stone in a stone-swallowing river thrown
into
sleep
————————————————– your eyes
Donnie Hollingsworth has lived in many small Rocky Mountain towns and currently resides in Lamar, Colorado–where he teaches Art and English at the local community college–with his wife, cat, and dog. His art can be found here.
Only one cashier at the Giant Eagle today. I’m stuck in aisle 7 that begins with broth, stock, and soup and ends with canned vegetables.
I stare at a can of Jolly Green Giant green beans and wonder if, at 72, I’ll live long enough to get to the beef broth, much less to Amber, the patient and weary checkout lady.
Everyone fiddles with their phones. I pull mine out and say to the young couple behind me that I’m calling my attorney because I want to make out my will. They egg
me on with laughter. Let’s gather kindling, I say, make a fire, roast s’mores, sing Kumbaya. We’re bonding, I say, and they laugh some more— laugh at the old coot in aisle 7 near the veggies.
Earlier, at the deli, a sign reads, “Everyone’s having trouble getting workers. Be kind to the ones that showed up.” A man behind the counter says, “Can I help you?” “Is that a Boston accent
I hear?” I ask. “Actually,” he says, “I’m English. Been in Pittsburgh for forty years.” I learn that if you’re from England and live in Pittsburgh for forty years, you sound like you’re from Boston.
Later, in the grossly understaffed Post Office where Janelle, the sweetest and most patient person on the planet, is, as usual, the sole agent at the window, a man in line behind me asks where the Express
Mail envelops are. “Is that an Australian accent I hear?” I ask. “No,” he says, “I’m from Bermuda.” “We used to vacation there when our son was little,” I say. I tell him how Ari and I would go on
toad hunts at night, how the toads, of which there were hundreds, would exude an hallucinogenic spray when you picked them up. Once, when my wife asked Ari how the toad hunt went he said, “That un-
conscionable toad peed on my daddy,” which was pretty sophisticated for a five-year-old. In the morning we’d find hundreds of toads flattened by mopeds the locals drove. “There are hardly any toads left,”
the man from Bermuda says. “They’re going extinct along with bees, bats, and frogs.” We stand in silence for a few moments. Then he says, “We used to have a joke about the toads.” “Tell me,”
I say. “Why does a toad in Bermuda cross the road?” “Why?” I ask. “To find his flat mate,” he says. We laugh about that. Janelle laughs too.
Charlie Brice won the 2020 Field Guide Poetry Magazine Poetry Contest and placed third in the 2021 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Prize. His sixth full-length poetry collection is Pinnacles of Hope (Impspired Books, 2022). His poetry has been nominated three times for both the Best of Net Anthology and the Pushcart Prize and has appeared in Atlanta Review, The Honest Ulsterman, Ibbetson Street, The Paterson Literary Review, Impspired Magazine, Salamander Ink Magazine, and elsewhere.
Dear Ecopoets, Poets, Environmentalists, the Lovers of Nature and Potential Defenders of the Future Wolves in Colorado,
Many thanks for coming out tonight to learn more about the process of reintroducing the grey wolf into Colorado.
Your input can change the current plan to reintroduce wolves in our state.
Two events happened in 2020, the worst year in human history that gave me hope, caused me joy and provided inspiration and they both had to do with wolves.
In April 2020, Brice Maiurro and Shelsea Ochoa went to their front yard in Denver at 8PM and howled like wolves at the moon and their neighbors howled back.
Soon, all of Colorado joined in. For many more days than I can count, I went outside at 8 PM and howled joining my neighbors and I didn’t feel alone. I felt like I belonged to a community and that Coloradoans cared about each other. I was powerful and healing. Howling like wolves in Colorado charmed the rest of the world and made the news worldwide.
In November 2020, we passed Proposition 114 to reintroduce an endangered species, the grey wolf, back into the Colorado wild. This process has also been watched around the world.
I was hopeful because Coloradoan passed that could rewrite the narrative of wolves in the New West and leave behind the Old West wolf history of extermination, demonization and blood lust for trophy hunting of wolves.
In addition, the passing of Proposition 114 was wonderful environmental news. We were swarming the news about climate change, the Sixth Extinction, and in our state battling climate-change fueled wildfire after wildfire. It was a relief to me that my state was going to welcome an endangered species and be on the cutting edge of new ways to think about the wild.
First, the new law mentioned the words endangered species, which meant no one could kill wolves. Second, this foundational sentence was written in this law: “Grey Wolf” means nongame wildlife of the species Canis Lupus. The law clearly states that there will be no hunting of wolves, and no killing of wolves in our state as the law passed included the words endangered species and non-game species.
Both of these events inspired me to begin research and write my next book of poems, The Wolf Dossier. One main part of this book is reporting on the process and was filled with hope that wolves would find
Fast forward December 2023.
.
The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission ( CPW) released the Colorado Wolf Restoration and Management Draft Plan includes both delisting grey wolves from the federal Endangered Species Act and the killing of wolves. The CPW Draft Plan includes three methods to kill wolves in Colorado: recreational hunting, lethal control, and issuing permits for ranchers to kill conflict wolves.
How can recreational hunting be possible when the gray wolf is protected by the federal Endangered Species Act? There is a process the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service can use to delist any animal from the Endangered Species Act. The process is called the 10j rule, which gives states the power to manage any endangered species including wolves as they see fit.
That is why there are hunting wolf hunting seasons in Montana, Wyoming, Idaho and Wisconsin. These states decided on hunting as a wolf management tool. This past year Idaho passed a law to kill 90% of their wolves. Montana passed a law to kill 85% of their wolves. In Wisconsin, one third of their wolf population was killed in only 2 days of their first 2 week hunting season and they had to shut down their wolf hunting season early.
How can this be the future of wolves in our state?
CPW began the process to delist grey wolves in August 2022.
Proposition 114 defines wolves as a non-game species, which makes the hunting of wolves illegal. the current draft of CPW draft plan encourages non-lethal methods to control wolves, but does not require non-lethal methods as a the first line of defense against conflict wolves.
Under the CPW draft plan, hunting wolves will be permitted after 150 wolves live in Colorado for two years, or if the population grows to 400 wolves., whichever comes first. The draft plan calls for the 50 wolves to be reintroduced into our state over the next 3 to 5 years.
CPW proposes that 150 wolves will constitute a sustainable Colorado wolf population. This number relies on an outdated environmental analysis from 1994. Current science reports Colorado’s sustainable wolf population should be 750 wolves.
Ranchers are concerned wolves will kill their livestock. According to USDA statistics, wolves kill 0.009 percent of the livestock in the United States annually. Coloradoans voted to compensate ranchers for all livestock losses due to wolves.
Outfitters and hunters are worried wolves will cause a serious decline of the elk population. An eleven-year study in Montana of the elk in counties with wolf populations commissioned by the governor of Montana found no decline in the elk population.
Proposition 114 requires the CPW to listen ideas proposed by voters at public meetings and make changes before the plan to reintroduce wolves to Colorado is finalized.
Please note the word Draft.
I talked with the director of the Colorado Wolf Project on Monday Feb.13th. Many wolf advocates have been making public comment and he says the CPW is listening.
Call to Action: Stop the Killing of Wolves in Colorado
MAKE A PUBLIC COMMENT Public Comment ends Feb. 22nd Colorado Parks and Wildlife is required to revise the Colorado wolf reintroduction plan based on public comment. From the Office of Governor: Colorado Governor Jared Polis calls on the CPW to solicit and incorporate feedback from the public for the wolf reintroduction plan
“Governor Polis supports CPW’s ongoing work to develop a quality plan, including its extensive efforts to solicit and incorporate feedback from the public prior to finalizing that plan as long as it’s consistent with the law. Whenever the voters or the legislature enact a law, the Governor takes very seriously his responsibility to successfully implement it.” —-Statement from the Office of Governor Jared Polis
On Feb. 22, attend the last CPW public meeting in Denver to show your support for wolves.
CPW Headquarters Hunter Education Building 6060 Broadway Denver, CO 8:30am – 3:00pm, (Subject to change)
Share this information with friends and family. Ask them to make public comment of the CPW website and to share what may happen to Colorado wolves with others.
Image: Milo Weiler
The CPW Colorado Wolf Restoration and Management Plan is Available Here
“Others countered the (CPW appointed) advisory group was stacked with pro-ranching and pro-hunting members. They say that resulted in a plan that is tilted more toward allowing the killing of wolves instead of allowing the predator to establish its numbers in the state.”
OVER 3.4 MILLION PEOPLE WATCHED THE COLORADO PARKS AND WILDLIFE (CPW) WILDLIFE COMMISSIONERS WOLF REINTRODUCTION DRAFT PLAN ON THE CPW COMMISSIONERS YOUTUBE CHANNEL
This organization has been working for years on behalf of the wolves. Their website is incredible with lots of information on wolves in the Rockies. They have been in the forefront on behalf of wolves in the Proposition 114 process. Check out their website.
Talking Points from the Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center
Darlene Kobobel, founder of the Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center and member of the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Stakeholders Advisory Group, has detailed information about the CPW Draft Plan to reintroduce wolves to Colorado and alternate ways to reintroduce wolves in a safe and environmentally sound way.
Talking Points for Public Comment and Letters from the Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center, Divide, Colorado
Dear Readers: It is the 11th hour for the draft plan that is now in the hands of the CPW commissioners. As some of you are aware, I was a member of the SAG (Stakeholders Advisory Group) and my job was to bring diverse viewpoints to the group. After a long 18 months of meetings, we finally finished on October 2022. Our group consisted of individuals ranging from ranchers, trappers, and hunters; which compiled as the majority and a few that were pro-wolf. The draft was constructed of phases in developing a plan for the gray wolf reintroduction. There were 3 phases that we could live with and a Phase #4 that we could not. We walked away satisfied that we came to no consensus on Phase #4. See link for the complete draft plan. Phase #4 is on page iii.. Unfortunately, It is interesting that somehow Phase #4 was put into this draft even after the SAG had recommended that it be tabled until a future time. Below and on the following page is the language of Phase #4.
WOLVES MAY BE RECLASSIFIED AS A GAME SPECIES Phase 4 (Game species status): “Phase 4” refers to when the wolf may potentially be classified as a game species in the future. Phase 4 is not required under CRS 33-2-105.8. There is no population objective for wolves in this Plan. Long-term wolf management may include reclassification as a big game or furbearer species. Regulated public harvest of wolves by hunting during designated seasons is one tool that may help CPW manage wolf numbers and social acceptance of wolves upon delisting and reclassification as a game species.
Proposition #114 C.R.S. 33-2-105.8 precludes wolves as a non-game species. Recreational killing of wolves must not be considered in any future management scenario. hopefully be to show support by attending the upcoming meetings that will be held this month and next. I do know that thousands of support letters have been sent to the commissioners, however that may not be enough. I attended and spoke at the first public meeting on the January 19th meeting in Colorado Springs at Cheyenne Mountain Resort. I closed the Center down that day to have my entire staff attend, speak and show support for our wolves. I will be closing the Center again for the final meeting in Denver on February 22nd, 2023 so we can make another stand for what we believe in and for fairness to be amended in this final plan. There are many things in this plan that are not wolf friendly if you glance though this draft, but our main concern is Phase #4. Most of this draft lays heavy on compensation for ranchers and lethal take of wolves with very little about conflict management and non-lethal tools. There are no incentives or any language stronger than it is “encouraged”. In addition to this is the small number of wolves that are projected to be reintroduced. We feel that there is not much consideration for things that could occur such as poaching, wolves getting hit by cars, hunting mortalities, mange and more. Lastly, Phases 1 and 2 have these limited protections. In Phases 1 and 2, a limited duration permit for lethal take may be issued to a livestock owner or agent of the livestock owner on private or public land. A permit is required under state law (CRS 33-2-106.4). Non-lethal conflict mitigation measures will be considered prior to issuance of any lethal take permit. In Phase 3, the same permitting requirements exist. Further coordination with Colorado Department of Agriculture will be required as well per Colo. Rev. Stat. § 35-40-101(4). I am reaching out because we worked so hard to have this historic event for the return of the Gray wolf to be upon Colorado’s landscape after over 80 years of being absent due to being exterminated and now we feel that we have to fight again just to keep them safe. I am asking for anyone who cares about wolves to help me help the wolves. Below is information where you can speak up for wolves. There are opportunities for people who live in Colorado and people who are out of state. For people who want to speak at the meetings and for people who can just show up and stand in solidarity. After February 22nd, we are done and it is out of our hands. The commissioners are the decision makers and the more people who can voice their thoughts in support, shows strength from the people. Just close your eyes and think of why you have a love in your heart for wolves. That is why you need to help protect them.
Darlene Kobobel Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center
SUGGESTED TALKING POINTS from Darlene Kobobel
Gray wolves can bring about immensely positive ecological, economic and social opportunities for Coloradans. But these positive effects only occur when wolf family groups are intact and not disrupted by trophy hunting or lethal management.
No trophy hunting and no trapping or snaring, ever. Proposition 114 (statue 33-2-105.8) directs that wolves remain classified as a non-game species in Colorado, meaning no recreational trophy hunting, trapping or snaring. Respect the vote of the people.
Wolves need a minimum population of 750 individuals distributed across at least 10 of 13 wolf pack recovery zones on Colorado’s West Slope. A self-sustaining wolf population requires a minimum of 750 wolves. CPW’s plan for wolves to lose protected status when there are only 150- 200 anywhere in Colorado is a plan for failure – these numbers rely on outdated environmental analysis from the Northern Rockies in 1994. Without protected status, wolves are more likely to be killed and their populations decline.
Coexistence strategies that prevent and reduce conflict between livestock and wolves should be required on public lands. Non-lethal livestock-wolf coexistence strategies are both more effective and ethical than lethal strategies.
Compensation for livestock loss should not incentivize killing wolves and implementation of non- lethal coexistence measures should be a prerequisite for compensation for livestock loss. But CPW’s plan does not include any requirement for livestock owners to implement coexistence measures to be eligible for compensation for lost animals.
Wolves should be safe on public lands and not subject to being killed. Public lands provide the last refuge for biodiversity – as biodiversity crashes across the world, those lands and species, especially keystone carnivores such as wolves which enhance biodiversity, must be protected.
A wolf-killing loophole needs to be closed. Currently CPW’s plan states that “Any employee or agent of CPW or USFWS or appropriate state or federal or tribal agency, who is designated in writing, when acting in the course of official duties may take a wolf from the wild if such actions [are]…to avoid conflict with human activities.” This language opens wolf killing to any reason and undermines any wolf protections.
don’t open your eyes yet the want is ravaged and set alight I will call your pain to me name your beasts to do my bidding
call me back
to worship with wanton knees and eyes nail my collarbones to the bedroom door and drink from my bruised lips a dream like this demands a hungered sacrifice
call me back
to your kingdom on this starless night the rain so reckless in the shadows let me dream of your trembling spine and pry open your butterfly ribs
call me back
to plant moonflowers in your blood they only bloom carefree in the dark let me honour you with what remains beyond skin and crushed days
call me back
to your bed, your voice drowns out the world. Was it even real? I just want to feel you – here and here. all I touch is glass
awakening still / again
christmas morning constellations traced on your skin / undressed / spilled / beneath the quiver ing lashes and breathless light /enfolded below the midwinter dawn / so stolen between
the call of the day and the coffee /(do you want to go and see the worst of me?) /heaped clothes on the creaking floor / a tangible whisper in the curtains / the red farewell /stars sighing in your image/
and the resurrection of today/ sheltered twilight /can’t hide the embers mined in / the dead of night /still on my lips / I am still starving /my heart half eaten / still obsessed/with what remains
of the distant bedrock / the thunderwounds of yesterday / (do I not burn when I bleed?) I hold your hand/ through these hurting dreams to support their weight/ still /again/
we summoned and witnessed / an unspeakable trinity come / here / tonight /
Despair Desire & the small Death
(prayer is whatever you say on your knees) and if you can’t forgive what lurks below the skin / remember / I am fire-tongued and anointed by your touch /deciphering the holy infliction
of having been wild and perfect for a moment / (thirst to thirst) / surrender now / (your fingers in my hair / my mouth / covered in my blood) / hold me / in this space
we are rebuilding the universe / my words are the bare bones / painted with the colours
you have shown me
/ l o v e /
this is how we retaliate / desecrate the decaying temple /with solemn lunar devotions feral laments / spellbound in the marked sheets / the unmade bed
(I think we’d survive in the wild)
all hallowed to be read in case of emergency
we crossed this ocean /I lost the ground / the moon drew me/in /my crimson tides /beckoning your hands in red /on the mirroring surface / the light of early dawn come falling apart
celestial bodies of water / on the fine shoreline before sleep betroth my hands / to your breath/your elfin throat vowing /gasping / on half of the dead stars to be strange / to be beautiful / to be wild / to be/ open water
crashing on broken shells / blessed October sand a litany / a siren song / an unchanging state of affairs I am not going to hurt you /cannot resist the call of continued disturbance and fractures on the wind
a tear bled / into black ink stains/blossoms / into a word echoes into a constant dream yet untold /let’s send a postcard from where we fell
some things are better on paper /some things are better signed and sealed / in blood
When we share our stories, we realize that we are not alone with it. We begin to see the system that behind violence, injustice and exploitation. Telling our story is the connecting moment to take action and to initiate change.” Kate MacAlister (she/her) is an author, feminist activist and founder of the multilingual community arts and literature project Stimmen der Rebellion/Dengê Berxwedane/Voices of Rebellion. Her works have been published in journals and anthologies all over the world. Kate’s debut chapbook “songs of the blood” is filled with poetry that speaks of human connection and the dreams of revolution. Coffee, her cat Bella and, naturally, her activist friends are particularly important for her creative process. Find Kate on Instagram at @kissed.by_fire.
You double tap hold your Airpods. Noise canceling activated. You have your sunglasses on.
You are indoors, in a book shop, somewhere in St. Paul, Minnesota. You are waiting for your turn to read. All these people are here to watch you read. Not just you, though. It’s never just you.
Your mentor is on stage reading an essay. He is animated. He can spit like a muhfucka.
You realize what essay he’s reading, and how traumatic it is for you to listen to. It reminds you of the Summer of Floyd, when everything burned around you. When you were afraid of racists from Wisconsin, who drove through these streets, laying cans of gas in alleyways. Shooting up Black homes. Coming back later that night to set them on fire.
You ask yourself how on God’s green earth you ended up in a place as racist as America.
You realize you never had a choice. Much like being a writer, you never had a choice.
Your family left Africa for this shit.
On your first night in America, it was a drive-by on your block in Atlanta.
You’ve always told that story and repeated that catchphrase: we left Africa for this shit?
You’re in the thick of it now. That essay is starting to crescendo. You can see the impact it’s having on your mentor. He is getting more animated in his delivery.
Damn, that nigga can spit.
Also: he is feeling it. You are feeling it, too. Pacing the corners of the room, nervous. You turn on Kodak Black. Kodak raps about murder, but it calms you down. Kodak raps about the things which he was born into, which he had no choice but to survive. Kodak raps about the struggle cuz it made him a man. You know about the struggle, but this audience of white faces won’t understand.
Your mentor is done reading now. It’s almost your turn to go on stage. You instinctively start walking towards him. You meet him just outside the audience’s expectant eyes. White people are always expecting something from us, aren’t they?
You embrace your mentor, now. He is shaking. You see the tears in his eyes. Not quite tears, but more like… a swelling, of moisture, just shy, of teardrops.
You hug him now. You stand there hugging. It is a shared struggle, these Black male bodies, in this country built on the understanding that all your bodies are worth is the price of strange fruit.
Poplar trees, nigga. Emasculation. Manhood stuffed inside of mouth. Tarred and feathered.
This the country where niggas like you come up missing. Whether you rap about murder like Kodak, or you stand in front of white audiences like a poet professor. You could come up missing, young nigga. No matter how old you are, you will always be a boy to them.
And you know this. Not even deep down, you know this consciously.
That’s why you don’t care about their praise, about their critique, about their putdowns.
You don’t care about their fear of your manhood. About their fetishes surrounding it.
You don’t care about their cuckold fascination.
White wives, Black dick. You don’t care about it.
You only care about your words, about your honor, dignity, life.
You go on stage to spit these bars, but you don’t even care about them half the time.
You only care about this moment, this shared embrace. Two Black men, acknowledging each other’s existence. Holding each other in ways that the world is incapable of.
You only care about the now.
And now… you go on stage.
Dim the lights.
Turn off that Kodak.
Fade to Black Man.
Said Shaiye is an Autistic Somali Writer & Photographer. His debut book, Are You Borg Now? was a 2022 Minnesota Book Award Finalist in Creative Nonfiction & Memoir. He has contributed essays to the anthologies Muslim American Writers at Home, The Texas Review’s All-Poetry Issue, and We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World. He has published poetry & prose in Obsidian, Brittle Paper, Pithead Chapel, 580 Split, Entropy, Diagram, Rigorous, Night Heron Barks, and elsewhere. He holds an MFA from the University of Minnesota, where he was a Graduate Instructor of Creative Writing, as well as a Judd International Research Fellow. He teaches writing to Autistic kids through Unrestricted Interest, as well as in the English Departments of several colleges in the Twin Cities.
Josh Gaydos (he/him/his) is a self-taught poet that currently resides in Colorado. He has been published in Barren Magazine, Door Is A Jar Magazine, The Lettered Olive and The City Quill. For 2023, he is releasing a poem a week on his free substack at https://joshgaydos.substack.com/InstagramTwitter
Someday, somewhere – anywhere, unfailingly, you’ll find yourself, and that, and only that, can be the happiest or bitterest hour of your life.
Pablo Neruda
What does this quote mean to you?
Trite but true with some flowers is this Neruda quote to me. It’s stuck around since I read it and though I am finding that finding of self a great deal less static than this quote implies, it keeps me aware that I could wake up in a decade’s time and find what I’d been running for or running from had made me into something I despised. Sorry for rhyming so much.
What books have made an important impact on you and why?
Too many so I’ll pull the first five that come to mind. East of Eden by John Steinbeck, captures human nature and our interconnectedness, the fact he addressed it to his young sons and was saying “here it is, everything” and delivers. frank: sonnets by Diane Suess, for the “isness”, not answering the Sirens call on a happy feeling or ending, the ability to paint a landscape as big as a coast and also write a poem about the grout around a brick (I’m being figurative here). What Work Is by Phillip Levine, for laying out that blue-collar / American working condition with romanticism and disdain, to put himself in it, distance himself from it, and paint individuals like they were in the room with you. Voyage of the Sable Venus and Other Poems, the ‘other poems’ in that just drop you somewhere and you’re immersed, it could be India and you feel the dense downpour with a herd of water buffalo walking by or New Orleans, or Compton. Robin puts you there in a way I haven’t been transported before or since. Another big one for me is The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. My mom had given me that when I really went headfirst into this writing thing. That book helped me to make a point to find art and make space for art wherever I was. Watch a movie, read a book, spin some vinyl and pull feeling or a scene from everything.
What is the value of writing and art in the current state of the world?
Sanity. Gelling and coming to terms with the cracks.
How has writing and art helped to form the person you are today?
I wouldn’t be here without it, and I don’t just mean serving a guest editing stint for this press. I’d be dead, or fishing with my hands and a line in the Gulf, or possibly I’d be a merchant marine. Most likely dead though.
And here you are standing two feet bare on the floor of your kitchen turning back to the wall behind as though he were standing bare-footed there with you again as he did those years prior. Before the days dissolved into the rising of time immemorial and you who had just kept your head above water now live in the after so far below you have come to know the nocturnal creatures who in quiet habits roam from shore to shore only under all the weight of dark stars. What can you do but let flow through your fingers—the now and him too though he was yours for a time and gave you such happiness. The distances between keep widening and soon it will be that you cannot recall his eyes or the scent amongst his thick curls. Turns out you knew—had known all along this was coming. It was why you held him close for so long why you saved him in dreams so many times you lost count. It was the one sure thing you held in your heart and though you knew it to be true you gave him everything even so—even though you knew in the coming years he would be gone from you. And here you are standing two feet bare on the floor of your kitchen turning back to the wall behind you as though he were standing bare-footed there.
Jessica Rigney is a poet, artist, and filmmaker. She is the author of Follow a Field: a Photographic & Poetic Essay (2016), Entre Nous (2017), Careful Packages (2019), and Something Whole (2021). Her work was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2022. She lives and wanders in Colorado and northern New Mexico, where she films and collects feathers and stones. www.jessicarigney.com
This poem is from South Broadway Press’ new anthology, Dwell: Poems About Home.Purchase here.
There is no such second place in the world where so many noteworthy moments have been saved. How many of your breaths flickered on the walls, how many of your tears soaked the floor, nobody knows. A part of your heart will stay here forever, no matter where the wings of fate take you. It’s a magic point, the mind remembers it as the heart longs for it, one and only—home.
Norbert Góra is a 32-year-old poet and writer from Poland. He is the author of more than 100 poems which have been published in poetry anthologies in USA, UK, India, Nigeria, Kenya and Australia.
This poem is from South Broadway Press’ new anthology, Dwell: Poems About Home.Purchase here.
South Broadway Ghost Society 