December 26, 2023
First a note about this week’s poem: You’ll notice, immediately, it’s longer than 10 lines. Sorry, I couldn’t help myself. It’s the end of the year, so I thought I’d throw in a few extra (10 to be exact).
The second thing you won’t necessarily notice but is worth telling you is that this week’s poem is composed of subject lines and preview texts from emails I’ve received over the past few months. I’ve weaved them together here and taken a few editorial liberties. In this way, the poem might be considered a “found” poem or a “hybrid” poem (if you care about such nomenclature). I highly encourage this activity if you’re ever looking for material. It’s a treasure trove in there!
And lastly, but certainly not leastly: Thank you, thank you, thank you for your readership and support this past year. I am a better writer for it. Scratch that, I am a better person for it.
year in review
There’s a chapbook gathering: “Year in Review.” Inside are positive affirmations
for the whole family, and an opportunity for last-minute holiday shopping.
Also, writing prompts. What you need to know: It might read like
a work of fiction or a housekeeping newsletter, or an update about dessert,
or a fact about the slow formation of lagoons, or a guide to the Netherlands
in spring, or the miniature worlds of leaving and letting go,
complete with custom images and ways to stay in touch.
No matter what, you have to remember these are challenging times,
uncanny and unconventional, the language of stars a mythology,
a missed connection, a smoky future.
But you’re invited to take one small step, or ten, and to be honest
about your thoughts and to make bread as if it were a spell,
and astonish yourself with lovegrams and red chairs and fan clubs.
Go on. Enter the cauldron and see where the squirrels are hiding all their acorns.
Watch the calendar for a January release. Even with a million things to juggle,
a payout is on its way, and you can always make a U-turn or an addendum.
But take care, even if it’s just three lines, because someone will read it
like a found letter, and be reminded of birds and wonder.
They will say to themselves, Oh honey, and discover their own way of writing
the last stanza, gathering a flock of pens in their tender hands.