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Emily Dickinson Pulls an All Nighter
Some write Essays - days ahead - I - write them - cloaked - in Fear! With a “Bull of Red” - become my Muse, The Harshest Judge, my mirror - Some finish papers - quietly - I rail - in unknown Tongues - The clock - decrees my Destiny…
Someone Who’ll Chew
I heard that you’re paleo now That you gave up grains and you’re off the cow It seems that you’re trimmer too ‘Spose the thrill of seeing your feet is something new Hey mate, how can you deny pie? Not like you to pass up Chocolate Mousse Delight I’m having…
Babysitting Blues
I’ve baby-sat children before Between the ages of ten and four. Kids this age can speak and think, And know how to eat and drink. To these kids I know what to say I know fun games to make them play. And most of all I keep them quiet And…
Talking to the Dead on Television
“I’m getting a George here” he says to the adoring throng “He may be alive, or he may be dead but I don’t really know.” I expect an apparition or at least the faint strains of celestial music, but am greeted instead by comatose nods and one stifled sob from…
A Cautionary Tale
The clock screamed “You’re late!” I sprang from my bed. I jumped in the shower and this is what I said, “I must get to work, I just don’t have time to scrub this old shower of its soap crust and slime.” This was the habit, my modus operandi, so…
Acceptance Speech
To the cast and crew of Shootout at Red Rock Ranch who, on instruction from the offshore production team, herded three hundred panic-stricken black-tailed antelope through the makeshift movie ranch saloon just prior to the filming of the climactic barroom scene, unwittingly setting off the poor creatures’ fight or flight…
24 Hours - A Mother’s Collection of Haikus
1 PM Tasteless chicken cubes. Yellow, thin, salty liquid. “Where is letter P?” 2 PM Dozing with Teddy, Nana’s quilt tucked under chin. Pray dog does not bark. 3 PM Try a hand at crafts; Up to elbows in Play-Doh. Not in baby’s nose! 4 PM Sweet dog needs relief.…
I Hate to Ask
I hate to ask, but would you click This blinking rainbow fetching stick? For every click, a dollar goes To stray dogs in the Poconos. Now take a sec, if you don’t mind, To “kiss” my child at BabyFind. The baby with the highest tally Wins a trip to Simi…
The Agamemnon Rag
Atlas, you’re Homer. I am so glad you’re Hera. Thera so many things to tell you. I went on that minotaur of the museum. The new display centaurs on how you can contract Sisyphus if you don’t use a Trojan on your Dictys. It was all Greek to me, see.…
Je M’Appelle Pam. Non. Merci.
(With apologies to John Keats) Oh, what can ail thee, English girl? In what pain d'you languish? And why d'you wander Dover docks Alone and in such anguish? I see no lily on thy brow, But it would be quite horrid To have a flower sprouting From the middle of…
Rumpelstiltskin
Once upon a time, a miller told the King that his daughter spun straw into gold. The miller sold the daughter to the King to pay the daughter’s cellphone bill and laughed at the King’s stupidity. The miller will not be referenced again in this poem. The King locked his…
Medicinal Onanism
On the very rare occasion that my affable persuasion is replaced by something less than copacetic, you’ll be surprised to see my smile is disingenuine and vile and there’s a dark and twisted change to my aesthetic No longer sociable but rude with countenance reflecting mood I metamorphasise, personifying Id…
Piggly Wiggly Goes to the Funeral Home
We ride the Pullman car in silence from New Orleans to my Daddy’s home in Alabama. We are in front, with Daddy in the box car. Mother’s blue serge pants and sweater pick up lint; she pecks at fluff with her fingers in a capsule of silence. The main street…
Shoat Changed
While fixing the fence by the road ‘long my field, Came a luxury car and a lady “well-heeled”. She stopped to inquire about my fat pet, Who lay near to the road and was taking a rest. Most farmers have Collies or Shepherds or mutts, Who round up the the…
Shoppin’ Spree
Cash burnin’ a hole in my pocket Gotta buy me a new pair o’ pants Flameproof this time And while I’m at it Gonna buy me some spiffy new knee joints, self-lubricatin’ A pair o’ 20-20 eyeballs Permaplucked brows, preshaved legs A belly so flat it’ll double as a ironin’…
The Emperor’s New Jump Rope
On family movie night we watched “Jump In”, a Disney Channel Original (2007) featuring teen heartthrob Corbin Bleu. We cheered during the double-dutch competition scenes. “Wow,” my kids said as the credits ran. “We want to try that.” “You bet,” I told them. “Just as soon as we get a…
Bladed Lady
I wanted to kill Jack Opdyke. I never told anyone. It wasn't personal, and I was just a college kid of nineteen at the time. Jack was a retired engineer of some indiscernible age. Fifty and seventy seemed equal to me, incalculable measures of years beyond mine. The way he…
Go Agro
It was the night of our first roller derby bout and I wanted to puke. But bent over a toilet was no place for a team captain, and so instead I went over last minute strategy with my team, the Iron Maidens, while the Skate-a-Rama slowly filled with East Texans,…
Ticket to an Execution
Over two hundred were gathered in the smoky, noisy Knights of Columbus hall although the bouts didn't start for another half hour. The hall was enormous, designed with enough room for weddings, dances—even sporting events—but somewhere in the planning no one thought to address acoustics. The sounds of wooden chairs…
The Beautiful Game
I was born Juan Jose Guzman and on my fourteenth birthday, I became Brian Jorge Osario. In our Latino community, paperwork was passed around and shared for all sorts of reasons. Brian was my twelve-year old cousin. I wanted to play travel soccer, move on to an academy program, and…
Morning Crew
On the morning of their last row, the four college boys grip the boat with straight arms above their heads and walk out of the boathouse. Coxswain's voice whispers in the dark and her breath disappears like cigarette smoke. Their socked feet patter down the ramp to the floating wooden…
The Weight of Silver
The full body blow from a rubberized door sends her in an awkward spiral to the pool of chocolate water below. She bobs up in a spin then swims through the mess like she knows what she is doing. A brawny-brown woman fish. Slippery liquid clings to her body like…
Pundits
It’s a play of five acts, broken pacts, suspect facts. Well, he’s got to be unhappy with that, the prat. Didn’t even manage to avenge his father’s death, He has the mentality all right but where’s the action? You have to ask where Laertes was in the first half. Paris…
Harlem River Anthem
Sludge shive to the Hudson's circuitry, its skeleton tides warp past salute cityslickers' car tires and black liquor store bags. Hull rot. Engine stain for the psyche. Fecund with vanity, no New Yorkers dare claim immunity stricter than its oarsmen. Bending their oars into the seamy pry of eel-churned waters,…
Mother Teresa Plays Tennis
It’s hard to play tennis and be Mother Teresa at the same time. —Maria Sharapova It is a philosophy of sport, the killer instinct take no prisoners approach; as my wrestling coach would say, Punish your opponent, make him hurt, push his face into the mat. Once in tennis class…
Pastimes
Stop commanded the officer's white-gloved hands, so we stood on the curb. My father squinted to hold back the sun's rays, and I waited, anxiously, to go to that cavernous stadium a summer late, the summer after his first promise because then I couldn't walk for weeks, my foot squashed…
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Insights from Editors and Judges
Interviews with literary editors and contest judges, conducted by Jendi Reiter
Award-Winning Poetry and Prose
Award-winning poetry, fiction, and nonfiction curated by Jendi Reiter
A Hero for the People by Arthur Powers
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Fish Publishing Short Memoir Prize
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Words That Rhyme
Paul Aubrian created this site featuring lists of words that rhyme with a particular word or syllable. A fun way for formal poets to expand their vocabulary
Timothy Steele
Website of neo-formalist poet Timothy Steele, a professor of English at California State University, Los Angeles, includes selections from his poetry and critical essays as well as a useful introduction to traditional poetic forms and meters
Poetry Through the Ages
Poetry Through the Ages, a project of the Institute for Dynamic Educational Advancement (IDEA), is a free online exhibit that showcases poetic forms and movements from different cultures, with examples and instructions
Poetry Dances
The writers’ forum FanStory sponsors this website for emerging writers, which offers tips on writing in a variety of poetic forms
Landays: Poetry of Afghan Women
The Poetry Foundation website features this essay on landays, a traditional poetic form among the Pashto-speaking people of Afghanistan, which has become a clandestine outlet for women to express dissent and speak of forbidden subjects like love and sensuality
Indrisos
Indriso is a form created by contemporary Spanish poet Isidro Iturat
Digital Poetry
Brian Kim Stefans presents “the dreamlife of letters”.
Concrete Poetry
Concrete poetry physically arranges words and letters on a page to create an effect that adds meaning to a poem
Clerihew
A Word A Day defines a clerihew as “a humorous, pseudo-biographical verse of four lines of uneven length, with the rhyming scheme AABB, and the first line containing the name of the subject.”
Chiasmus.com
Chiasmus is “a reversal in the order of words in two otherwise parallel phrases
The Poetess in America, an essay by Annie Finch
A well-researched defense of poets who fell out of fashion with the rise of literary modernism
The Fortunes of Formalism
Poet and critic David Yezzi makes the case for mastery of verse forms and prosody as essential to the education of a poet, and gives a historical perspective on formalism’s loss of status
The Chapbook Review
The name of this monthly online journal is self-explanatory
Text Etc
Formerly Poetry Magic: A large collection of articles on writing poetry, understanding poetry and getting published
