Once more another dreary Monday stares us in the face. The dollar is dumping, the wars drag on, and Jeff Gannon still has a blog. But take heart my dear Kossacks. All is not lost. Once again it's time for the one thing the GOP can't take away from you: my weekly series --
Monday Internet Poetry!
Each Monday morning and evening I'll post a diary about a poet I discovered online whose work I find worth sharing. A link to the last diary in this series can always be found about here. By clicking on those links, you can track back to all the prior diaries and catch up on all the great poets and poetry, that I, in my less than infinite wisdom have arbitrarily selected for your enjoyment.
This morning's poet is T.E. Ballard, and a very good one she is, too.
More after the fold . . .
Three times nominated for a
Pushcart Prize, T.E. Ballard is a professional artist and writer residing in the Midwest with her two young daughters. She was born in a small town (Berwick, Maine, to be exact) and comes from a long line of writers, artists and politicians. Her poem "Seal Island" won second place with the American Association of University Women. She was also a Special Merit Winner in the 2002
Muriel Craft Bailey Memorial Award sponsored by
The Comstock Review, and her poem, "Revelation" was included in the
Best of Melic Poetry: The First Five Years.
Now for a few samples of her poetry. The first is from the online journal, Casa Poema:
The Sweet Sound Of Bees
Could you love a bee
that buzzed, tickled your ear,
brought tiny legs up to lips,
while amber honey dripped
down your breast?
And if he followed it there
carried it down
to the place where you open
like flowers, clear petals. If wings
grew tongues, and he said
you were enough
the very essence of you
that he could live, grow
in the sweet sugar of your hip.
Would you then turn and walk away?
Say he is not a man with legs,
speak of spiders or ants
who would deny you both a place.
What if these were not reasons
just something you said,
for the hum had grown so sweet,
you realized an ability to sting.
My second selection from her online poems is found at the journal, three candles:
A Green So Small
I love like this,
scarlet branches touching down to blue,
hyacinths, tulips, indigo.
Spring is too much,
with her small dropper
where is the rationing?
A still voice remembers,
speaks in tongues of drought, dry wind.
Here on the top soil
a line, an opening of clay.
A hungry god who eats
all that we have loved, our very bone.
Green, sweet green, sex
on fingers, dark tips
of where you open like clouds.
I drink in rivers of scarlet, drown
to your blue. Why do I love like this,
why is it impossible
to pick a single bloom?
Other places to find her poetry online are at:
Mindfire which also includes an interview.
Tryst, where she is the featured poet. Her poems there include my favorite of hers, The Butcher's Daughter which won the IBPC online poetry competition for January, 2002.
The Drunken Boat
Mi Poesias
Eclectica
Enjoy the poetry and have a great day. Monday evening's edition of this series will be posted after 6 p.m. EST.
