"Bonsai" by Cecily Barnes

Who needs your stunted style, your tiny jewels

of thwarted art, to snatch a kite flown loose


or bad-thrown ball? Or your unsayable rules

of infinite pleasures unknown, delights abstruse,

to feel soft feathers, their talons' sponsal band?

To splinter a street, plumb galaxy's soil, or hold

a heaving noose? To grasp your child's hand?


To be unbound by any soul, un-bowled

by death, to

Place & Time

The atoms in a fluid can roll and tumble
and cascade around each other.
It's that flowing freedom that gives
fluid motion its hypnotic quality.

Allow yourself to become mesmerized
by the flow of a fast-moving river
around a bridge trestle and you'll know what I mean.

And there is dance in the roiling turbulence.
But, most importantly, the choreography
you're watching doesn't care about place and time.
What you see before your eyes today
is being repeated all across the cosmos.

If you don't believe me, go flush your toilet.



Taken from the NPR article, "How To See A Galaxy In Your Toilet Bowl", 18th February 2014. Submitted by Howie Good.

A Poetry Prompt from Kurt Vonnegut

In this reply to a high school class, Kurt Vonnegut gives a poetry prompt that you might want to try. It's not one that would work well for Poets Online, but it makes a fine point for us as poets.

Dear Xavier High School, and Ms. Lockwood, and Messrs Perin, McFeely, Batten, Maurer and Congiusta:

I thank you for your friendly letters. You sure know how to cheer up a really old geezer (84) in his sunset years. I don't make public appearances any more because I now resemble nothing so much as an iguana.

What I had to say to you, moreover, would not take long, to wit: Practice any art, music, singing, dancing, acting, drawing, painting, sculpting, poetry, fiction, essays, reportage, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what's inside you, to make your soul grow.

Seriously! I mean starting right now, do art and do it for the rest of your lives. Draw a funny or nice picture of Ms. Lockwood, and give it to her. Dance home after school, and sing in the shower and on and on. Make a face in your mashed potatoes. Pretend you're Count Dracula.

Here's an assignment for tonight, and I hope Ms. Lockwood will flunk you if you don't do it: Write a six line poem, about anything, but rhymed. No fair tennis without a net. Make it as good as you possibly can. But don't tell anybody what you're doing. Don't show it or recite it to anybody, not even your girlfriend or parents or whatever, or Ms. Lockwood. OK?

Tear it up into teeny-weeny pieces, and discard them into widely separated trash recepticals [sic]. You will find that you have already been gloriously rewarded for your poem. You have experienced becoming, learned a lot more about what's inside you, and you have made your soul grow.

God bless you all!
Kurt Vonnegut

via  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/14/kurt-vonnegut-xavier-letter_n_4964532.html

Weekend Poetry Retreat with Maria Gillan and Laura Boss

Do you need a poetry retreat that will give you the space and time to focus totally on your writing? Does having that time in a serene and beautiful setting away from the pressures and distractions of daily life and in the company of like-minded others sound inspiring?

Join poets Laura Boss and Maria Mazzioti Gillan on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday May 23, 24, and 25, 2014 (Friday dinner through Sunday lunch) at the St. Marguerite's Retreat House in Mendham, NJ for a poetry intensive weekend.

Participants arrive before 6 PM on Friday evening, have dinner, settle into their rooms, and begin to retreat from the distractions of the world.That evening, participants will be led into creating new work. After each workshop, each participant will have the opportunity to read their work in the group.

After Saturday breakfast, participants will move into two groups for morning workshops, followed by free time for socializing and exploring the grounds. After lunch, writing workshops will take place, followed by time to write. Each participant will have a chance to sign up in advance with Maria or Laura for one-on-one help with revision.

After dinner on Saturday evening, participants will be invited to read their poems to the groups, and the faculty will lead another workshop session on how to get published.

After Sunday breakfast, a final writing workshop and concluding reading by participants will serve as the �closing ceremony� to this inspiring and productive weekend and lunch provides a final opportunity for socializing.

The leaders envision this weekend as a retreat from the noise and bustle of daily life and see this retreat as a spiritual and creative break from our usual lives. The setting certainly allows us to take some time to look at life in a new light, to listen for our own voices, and to create in stillness, in quiet, and in community. These are times of contemplation and welcoming the muse.

The workshops will concentrate on "writing your way home" and the way writing can save us, save our stories and our lives. Participants should bring papers, pens, and the willingness to take some risks. Please also bring previously-written work for one-on-one sessions and for the readings.

St. Marguerite's Retreat House in Mendham, New Jersey is an English manor house situated on 93 acres of wooded land with pathways that lend themselves to the serene contemplation of nature and nurturing of your creative spirit. The Retreat House is located at the convent of Saint John the Baptist, 82 West Main Street in Mendham, NJ.

Fee Schedule:  $425 fee includes room, all meals, and all workshops.
Deposit by April 5, 2014 of $300
Balance due by April 19, 2014 $125
Early Bird Discount: Deduct $25 if paid in full by April 5, 2014
Full refund will be given prior to April 29, 2014.

For further information and to register, contact mariagillan@verizon.net or call  973-684-6554.

Selected Books by the Poets


LAURA BOSS: Arms: New and Selected Poems and Flashlight






MARIA GILLAN: What We Pass On: Collected Poems: 1980-2009 and The Place I Call Home

Problems

once i had a boil on my butt
and i went to the doctor. She told me

just to keep it clean and it will go away.
that was about a year ago now.

Now i get boils on my butt and in between my legs.
It is so annoying. It hurts when I sit down

and thats all we do in High School.
I am obese and my mother says

its because my legs are rubbing together.
She is probably right.

I am trying hard to lose weight
but these boils are getting in the way.

it is getting out of hand. Oh yeah, and
for some reason, which i don't know, all these boils

are leaving purple marks and not small ones.
I just need some help with this.

Is this a huge problem?



From a comment left at MedicineNet.com, 25 June 2013. Submitted by Jo Bell.

From the clods

i
Flocks of seagulls are flying with the rooks and starlings
white plumage makes them visible.
The grass has not grown,
would hardly hide a mouse.
The smallest bird injured by
how bitter the weather is.

ii
Sharp against the sky
four oxen draw the ancient wheeled plough
to and fro on that open ridge
like ploughing on the dome of St Paul�s:
nothing for the rooks.
Now and then a lark sings in despite of
the bitter wind shaking to pieces
agriculture generally
while the house is falling.



From Field and Farm by Richard Jefferies (Phoenix House, 1957), chapter V 'On the Farm'. Submitted by Rebecca Gethin.

The Votive Angel by Moira Wairama

Thinking it�s the delivery pizza,


he opens the door

to The Votive Angel,

arrayed in slogan-splattered silks,

carrying her sword-sharp pen.

Silently she strides past him,

her silver boots crunching empty beer cans.

�Apathetics,�
she roars to the house at large,

�Arise and vote.�



The woman in the kitchen stirring soup looks up,

�Who for, dear?� she inquires amiably.

�Think,�