Medusa's Kitchen: Mad With Poetry—or is it the HEAT???

Sunday, June 25, 2006

Mad With Poetry—or is it the HEAT???

Mad with poetry,
I stride like Chikusai
into the wind.

***

Waterjar cracks—
I lie awake
this icy night.

***

Lips too chilled
for prattle—
autumn wind.

***

Still breathing
in an icy lump—
sea slugs.

***

Wintry day,
on my horse
a frozen shadow.

***

Snowy morning—
one crow
after another.

***

Lightning—
heron-cry
stabs darkness.

***

Has it returned,
the snow
we viewed together?

***

Sudden sun upon
the mountain path,
plum scent.

***

Moonlit plum tree—
wait,
spring will come.

(Today's winter poetry is from On Love and Barley by Basho, translated by Lucien Stryk)

_______________________

Send me your poems about winter before midnight Tuesday (6/27) and I'll send you a surprise. kathykieth@hotmail.com, or (postmarked) P.O. Box 1647, Orangevale, CA 95662.

Oh—and take a look at the Travel section of today's Sacramento Bee, where Marketer Extraordinaire Patricia Wellingham-Jones has gotten a poem published in a piece on honeymoons gone wrong. Pat has a very sharp eye, indeed, for unusual venues for her work; we could all take a lesson. Here's an address to view it on the Web: www.sacbee.com/content/lifestyle/story/14271564p-15082141c.html

_______________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.)

FOR YOUR READING PLEASURE~

Area journals to check out:

•••Brevities, the wee monthly published by Joyce Odam, seeks submissions of the proper size. Write to Joyce at joyceofwords@gmail.com for info.

•••Tule Review from Sac. Poetry Center: www.sacramentopoetrycenter.com

•••Canary, an environmental poetry journal, is ed. by Gail Entrekin, at www.canarylitmag.org

•••Ginosko; see GinoskoLiteraryJournal.com

•••Song of San Joaquin: www.chaparralpoets.org/SSJsubmissionGuide.html

For more journals, scroll down past this green box to the blue box below it, then keep scrolling past the calendar info to "Hot, Hot Journals Full of Hot, Hot Poetry!".

THE REST OF THE B-BOARD! Enter at your own risk; NorCal poetry is SMOKIN'!

Watch Medusa's UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS page on a daily basis for what cooks in NorCal poetry! (Like everything else, it keeps on changing...) Other sites to check for poetry news and area events include: •••www.facebook.com/sacpoetry.center

•••SPC's Community Calendar of Lit. Events: www.facebook.com/groups/SPCgroup/?notif_t=group_name_change&notif_id=1468146125061336

•••poetryindavis.com/archive/2016/10/2812

•••www.facebook.com/El-Dorado-Poetry-1237910429583182 for news about what's going on in El Dorado County poetry

•••sacramento365.com (go to Poetry & Literature under Performance)

•••Want to learn about some Bay Area events? Debralee Pagan (debralee@astoundnet) publishes an e-newsletter called "Strictly East" (Poetry Past the Caldecott Tunnel)—email her for a free subscription. See also www.poetryflash.org/.

Don't see your reading event listed on Medusa? That's probably because you didn't send it to us! It's such a shame to invite poets to read for you, and then fail to advertise them. So try to get your message out in a timely manner.

Online and otherwise—

Here are some journals and other publications that are local-ish (okay, there are some Bay Area ones in here, too). If we've left anybody out, let us know!

Plus, keep an eye on the college scene. Some of those journals accept submissions from non-students, though they usually have more limited (mostly annual) deadlines. Go to Medusa's Hot Links for Calaveras Station, Penumbra, Suisun Valley Review, Cosumnes River Journal, but be aware that college journals come and go in this time of tight funding.