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13 poets born in January –
prize-winners, laureates,
or writers in obscurity –
they’ve all written for us
as we’re weaving through
an ever-perplexing Now.
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January 11
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1948 - Diane Wald born in Paterson, New Jersey; American poet and novelist. she earned a BA from Montclair State College and an MFA from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She has lived near Boston since 1972. Her latest novel is The Bayrose Files. She won the 2005 Zanne Halley Poetry Prize for her poem “the corgis of queen elizabeth.” Her poetry collections include: Double Mirror; Lucid Suitcase; The Yellow Hotel; Wonderbender; and The Warhol Pillows.
Lilac Time
by Diane Wald
.
Lewis is gone, who came to tell me
in the middle of the night
that our lodgepole pine had fallen.
.
My dear Jane is gone, who vastly preferred
voluptuary to economizer.
.
And Hank? He’s gone—whose dark lip intrigued me.
His father chewed ice
and spat it at passersby.
.
Jameson just slid away, the whole time molding
slippery clay into a hollow moon
with his lunatic hands.
.
In his bedroom closet, Sweet, his cat,
birthed six wild clots of love
bred of her secret nights, while we,
still young,
.
scrubbed our speechless faces.
Is lilac the word
you can never remember?
.
I thought so. Don’t worry.
It all will bloom again.
.
“Lilac Time” © 2024 by Diane Ward appeared in the Fall 2024 edition of Body, an online literary site
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January 12
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1871 – Eugéne Nielen Marais born, South African journalist, lawyer, naturalist, essayist, and poet in Afrikaans; publisher-editor of the Afrikaner newspaper, Land en Volk; he studied law in England, and nature in the Waterberg Mountains in Pretoria, including termites, puff adders, spitting cobras, and baboons, and wrote his findings in Afrikaans. He was the first person to study the behavior of wild primates. Several of his books on nature have been translated into English, including The Soul of the White Ant: the First Book of Ethology and The Soul of the Ape. He discovered the Waterberg cycad, dubbed Encephalartos eugene-maraisii. He had become addicted to morphine at a young age, considered non-habit forming at the time, and suffered in later life from recurring bouts of malaria. In March 1936, deprived of morphine for several days, he committed suicide by shooting himself with a shotgun at age 65.
Winternag (Winter's Night)
by Eugéne Nielen Marais
.
O cold is the slight wind,
and keen.
Bare and bright in dim light
is seen,
as vast as the graces of God,
the veld's starlit and fire-scarred sod.
To the high edge of the lands,
spread through the scorched sands,
new seed-grass is stirring
like beckoning hands.
.
O mournful the tune
of the East-wind refrain,
like the song of a girl
who loved but in vain.
One drop of dew glistens
on each grass-blade's fold
and fast does it pale
to frost in the cold!
.
- originally published in Afrikaans in 1905 - translation by At de Lange
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1915 – Margaret Danner born in Kentucky, but grew up in Chicago’s South Side; American poet, editor, and African-American cultural activist. In 1951, she was the first Black woman on the staff of Poetry magazine. She lived for many years in Detroit, where she co-founded Boone House, a cultural center for Black writers, artists and musicians. In the 1960s, she joined the Baháʼí Faith, and toured as a poet and writer sponsored by the Baháʼí Teaching Committee. Danner died at age 68 on January 1, 1984, in Chicago. A retrospective of her work, These Blazing Forms: the Life and Work of Margaret Danner, was published in the March 2022 issue of Poetry magazine.
This poem is Danner’s tribute to Bushman, a Western Lowland Gorilla from Cameroon, the first gorilla at the Lincoln Park Zoo, who died in captivity on January 1, 1951.
Best Loved of Africa
by Margaret Danner
.
It is New Year’s day.
The blasé people rise.
They face a sleet-like ray
Of light. The low slung skies
Send shadows down. It’s dark.
.
The earth is treacherous to the tread.
And deep in the upstairs bedroom
Of his terraced suite in Lincoln Park
Lies Bushman, best loved of Africa, huge
And beautifully black as he ever was, but dead.
.
“Best Loved of Africa” appeared in the October 1956 issue of Poetry magazine – © 1951 by Margaret Danner
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January 13
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1957 – Claudia Emerson born in Chatham, Virginia; American poet; She was Poet Laureate of Virginia (2008-2010). Her poetry collections include Pharaoh, Pharaoh; Pinion: An Elegy; Figure Studies; and Late Wife, which won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. She died of cancer at age 57 in December 2014, and three of her collections were published posthumously.
Migraine: Aura and Aftermath
by Claudia Emerson
.
First, part of the world disappears. Something
is missing from everything: the cat’s eye,
ear, the left side of its face; two fingers
from my right hand; the words from the end
of a sentence. The absence is at first
more absolute than whatever darkness
I imagine the blind perceive. Perfect,
without color or motion, nothing replaces
.
what is gone. The senses do not contradict. My arm
goes numb, my leg. Though I have felt the cold air
of this disappearance before, each time the aura
deceives me to believe reality itself
has failed. I fear this more than what it warns
because I cannot remember I will survive it.
.
The other half of me will shine all night,
defined by the eclipse.
Then, in the relieved
wake of the day that follows it, I will
find my hand, count my fingers, and beginning
to see again, will recognize myself
restored to the evening of a righted room.
.
“Migraine: Aura and Aftermath” from Ungrafted: New and Selected Poems, © 2024 by Claudia Emerson – Louisiana State University Press
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January 14
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1914 – Dudley Randall born in Washington DC; African-American poet and poetry publisher. From age nine, he grew up in Detroit, where his first poems were published in the Detroit Free Press. He worked in Ford’ River Foundry before serving in the South Pacific during WWII. Randall earned a BA in English from Wayne University and a MA in library science from the University of Michigan, and became the reference librarian for Wayne County. He was fluent in Russian; visited Europe, Africa, and Russia; and later translated many Russian poems into English. Between 1965 and 1977, he was the founder, editor, and publisher of Broadside Press, which became a forum for almost every major Black poet who began their careers during those years, among them Melvin Tolson, Sonia Sanchez, Audre Lorde, Gwendolyn Brooks, Etheridge Knight, and Margaret Walker. His own poems appeared in collections which included Poem Counterpoem; Cities Burning; More to Remember: Poems of Four Decades; and After the Killing. He died at age 86 in August 2000.
Laughter in the Slums
by Dudley Randall
.
In crippled streets where happiness seems buried
under the sooty snow of northern winter,
sudden as bells at twilight,
bright as the moon, full as the sun, there blossoms
in southern throats rich flower of flush fields
hot with the furnace sun of Georgia Junes,
laughter that cold and blizzards could not kill.
.
“Laughter in the Slums” from Roses and Revolutions: The Selected Writings of Dudley Randall, © 2009 by Dudley Randall, edited by Melba J. Boyd – Wayne State University Press
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1919 – Kaifi Azmi born to a Shia Muslim family of artists in Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh, India; Indian Urdu language poet, writer, and lyricist-songwriter. He wrote his first ghazal when he was 11, but his first poetry collection, Jhankar, was published in 1943 when he was 24. During the partition of India in 1947, he was hounded by the British police for being a “card-carrying communist,” and was denied a visa for Pakistan for several years. Many of his lyrics and songs were written for over 50 films, from 1951 until 2003, and he is regarded as the one who brought Urdu literature to Indian motion pictures. In 2000, he was conferred the first Millennium Award by the Government of Delhi and the Delhi Urdu Academy. He died in May 2002 at age 83.
One moment (Ek lamha)
by Kaifi Azmi
.
What we call life, is but a few moments—
and within them that one moment—
when a pair of expressive eyes
look up from a teacup
and drown in the heart—
drowning, say:
today, you should keep your silence—
today, I will keep mine.
Let us just sit,
hand in hand
with our mutual gift of grief,
with our shared heat of emotions.
Who knows in this moment
on some distant mountain—
the snow might start to melt.
.
“One Moment” from Selected Poems, by Kaifi Azmi, translation © 2002 by Pavan K. Varma – Penguin Random House India
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1968 – Caroline Maun born in Lansing, Michigan, but her family moved to Englewood, Florida, when she was a toddler; American poet, author, lyricist, and musician. She earned a Ph.D. in English from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville in 1998, and taught creative writing at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, serving as Chair of the English Department from 2018 to 2024. Her partner had a serious motorcycle accident in March 2012. Her book, Accident, was about the accident and its aftermath. Maun’s poetry collections include: The Sleeping; Cures and Poisons; and Greatest Hits.
My Mother’s Last Purse Is a Bag of Poems
by Caroline Maun
.
A small photo album, pictures of her
in her twenties, before her marriage
and children, bright slubbed silk bodice
dresses with circle skirts mid-calf
above spike heels, hat and gloves
to match, swathed in sunshine.
She left pregnant with a toddler,
but this small album also survived.
.
The flip phone is sticky now with years
of oozing. Passport in a plastic sleeve,
a map of our village folded to center
our house, marked with a star.
A savings book with ten thousand dollars even
in a bank near where she’d been born,
just in case she had to leave again.
.
“My Mother’s Last Purse Is a Bag of Poems” from What Remains, © 2013 by Caroline Maun – Main Street Rag
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January 15
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1898 – Rachel Häring Korn born in Podliszki in the former Galicia region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, now divided between Ukraine and Poland; Canadian Yiddish language poet and author. Her father died when she was 12. During the WWI, her mother moved with Rachel and her two brothers to Vienna, where Rachel became fluent in German. After completing her education, she moved to Poland. Her first published poems were written in Polish. But after she married Hersh Korn, he taught her Yiddish, and she wrote in Yiddish from then on. When Poland was invaded by Germany in 1939, the family fled, but she and her daughter became separated from her husband, and went to Russia, where her daughter married. In 1945, Rachel returned to Poland. She was the first Jewish writer invited to become a member of the first PEN club in Stockholm, Sweden, where she lived until 1948, when she moved to Montreal, Canada. She died in Montreal at age 84 in September 1982.
I Shall Take With Me
by Rachel Häring Korn
.
I’ll take green meadows with me,
Scents of the grape-blossom from father’s
Orchard,
The narrow lanes between the rye,
Where my childish footsteps linger.
I shall take white, feathery clouds,
Where my head may find a softer place,
And as a head-rest for The Silence,
My mother’s weary, tender smile.
And with me shall I take the breath of
Words,
Their softest form, their purest sorrow,
And,
With the final tear,
First love.
.
– translated by Edward Ginsburg
“I Shall Take With Me” was published in its original Yiddish in Yiddish Poetry: Baskertkeit (Kismet), © 1949 by Rachel H. Korn – published in Canada
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1913 – Miriam Hyde born, Australian composer, pianist, poet, and music teacher; composer of over 150 works for piano, including Sonata in G minor for piano, and Valley of Rocks. Hyde also wrote 50 songs, several other instrumental works, and several books of poetry, including The Bliss of Solitude, A Few Poems, and Dawn to Dusk. She died at age 91 in 2005.
Winter Evening
by Miriam Hyde
.
What sounds shall we hear together, my dearest one,
When the shadows have fallen far, and the day is done?
The bright friendly crackle of logs sinking low in the grate,
The cry of birds in swift flight, as they wing their way late
To their nests on the crag o’er the ocean’s billowing foam;
The soft steady patter of rain on the roof of our home;
The wind at the window; the breaking of boughs in the storm;
Yet peace will be with us; the fireside will keep us warm,
And then when the stars shine again, and the evening is mild,
We shall hear the soft sigh from the cot of a slumbering child.
– Kirribilli [NSW Australia], ©1938 by Miriam Hyde
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1923 – Ivor Cutler born, Scottish songwriter, musician, poet, author, artist, and humorist. He made concert tours, produced records, and his performances were regularly presented on BBC Radio. Cutler appeared in the Beatle’s 1967 Magical Mystery Tour film. He also wrote 13 books of poetry, most of them for children, as well as many children’s storybooks. Cutler was a member of the Noise Abatement Society of the UK. He died at age 83 in 2006.
I Stopped It
by Ivor Cutler
.
It seems bossy of time
to go on and on
so I stopped it with my finger.
You would think I was a woman
stopping it with a finger.
A real man would stop it with both hands
and maybe a wrench to keep it stopped.
All right, I thought, I’ve stopped time,
and moved my eyes carefully to see.
It was just the same.
I grilled two kippers
with a fried egg on top.
The rest of the day passed
and when I went to bed
I took my finger off the clock.
So now I tolerate time.
Let it go its own way.
.
“I Stopped It” © 1985 by Ivor Cutler appeared the 100th issue of the poetry magazine Ambit
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January 16
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1874 – Robert W. Service born in England, English-Canadian poet, often called “the Bard of the Yukon.” Though technically a bank clerk, he spent much of his life travelling in the U.S. and Canada. His bank sent him to the Yukon, where he wrote some of his best-known poems, including “The Shooting of Dan McGrew” and “The Cremation of Sam McGee.” Although he had no experience of the gold rush or mining, his poems had a remarkable authenticity. When he published Songs of a Sourdough in 1907, it was hugely successful, as was his 1909 follow-up, Ballads of a Cheechako. A fast writer, he produced a large body of work, which enabled him move to the south of France, and to travel widely. During WWII, he lived in California, and when he and his wife returned to their home in France, they found it destroyed, and had to rebuild. He died at age 84 in Lancieux, Brittany in 1958.
The sunshine seeks my little room
by Robert W. Service
.
The sunshine seeks my little room
To tell me Paris streets are gay;
That children cry the lily bloom
All up and down the leafy way;
That half the town is mad with May,
With flame of flag and boom of bell:
For Carnival is King to-day;
So pen and page, awhile farewell.
.
“The sunshine seeks my little room” from Collected Poems of Robert Service, © 1954 by Robert Service – Dodd Mead
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1980 – Ester Naomi Perquin born in Utrecht and grew up in Zierikzee in the Netherlands; Dutch poet, editor, and columnist. She worked for the prison service to pay for her studies at the School of Creative Writing in Amsterdam. Perquin was the 2017-2019 Dichter des Vaderlands (Poet of the Fatherland – similar to Poet Laureate) and also served as Rotterdam’s City Poet. She has been editor of the literary journal Tirade, and wrote a column for the De Groene Amsterdammer weekly news magazine. Her poetry collections include Servetten Halfstok (Napkins At Half Mast); Namens de ander (On Behalf of the Other); and Celinspecties (Cell Inspections). In 2010, she was honored with the Anna Blaman Prijs, a poetry prize for body of work.
One Day You Slap the Child
by Ester Naomi Perquin
.
It is coincidence that the child no longer fits its recently purchased shoes.
Coincidence that it left its wet swimming gear on the stairs
to cultivate a selection of fungi.
.
It is coincidence that the child has grown taller than your belly button,
developed opinions and poor table manners. That on the white wall,
in very small letters, it has written its name.
.
After all, it doesn’t get slapped for getting too big
or because of what it’s done wrong.
.
It gets slapped because the tenderness has run out. Everything falters.
‘Tenderness brought us a long way,’ you say. ‘But the tank
is empty. The engine coughed and died.’
.
And you look down. And you slap the child.
.
– translated by David Colmer
“One Day You Slap the Child,” © 2017 by Ester Naomi Perquin, from Meervoudig afwezig (Multiple Absences) – Van Oorschot publishing
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January 17
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1914 – William E. Stafford born in Hutchinson, Kansas; American poet and pacifist; he was the eldest of 3 children. His father took him hunting and taught him trapping. By the time William was in his mid-teens, the Great Depression was forcing his family to move from town to town as his father searched for work. William helped out by delivering papers, working in sugar beet fields, raising vegetables, and as an electrician’s mate. By 1941, Stafford was working toward a master’s degree in English, but he was drafted before he could get his degree. As a registered pacifist, he worked on projects assigned to conscientious objectors in Arkansas, California, and Illinois. He spent 1942 to 1946 in work camps where he was paid $2.50 per month for work fighting fires, on soil conservation, and building and maintaining roads and trails. After the war, he briefly taught high school, worked for a church relief organization, then returned to the University of Kansas to complete his master’s degree in 1947. His master’s thesis was a memoir of his time as a conscientious objector, which became his first prose publication, Down in My Heart. He wrote every day, but didn’t begin to publish his poetry until he was in his forties. In 1948, he began teaching at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon, where he remained until his retirement in 1980, with the exception of sabbaticals, including one to earn his Ph.D. in creative writing from the University of Iowa in 1954, and another to serve as Poetry Consultant for the Library of Congress (1970-1971), now retitled United States Poet Laureate. His first major poetry collection, Traveling Through the Dark, won the 1963 National Book Award for Poetry; he was the 20th Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. A life-long pacifist, he called himself one of “the quiet of the land.” William Stafford died at age 79 at his home in Oregon on August 28, 1993.
Ask Me
by William Stafford
.
Some time when the river is ice ask me
mistakes I have made. Ask me whether
what I have done is my life. Others
have come in their slow way into
my thought, and some have tried to help
or to hurt: ask me what difference
their strongest love or hate has made.
.
I will listen to what you say.
You and I can turn and look
at the silent river and wait. We know
the current is there, hidden; and there
are comings and goings from miles away
.
that hold the stillness exactly before us.
What the river says, that is what I say.
.
“Ask Me” from Ask Me: 100 Essential Poems of William Stafford, © 2014 by Kim Stafford – Graywolf Press
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G’Morning/Afternoon/Evening MOTlies!
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