More Maui from Rhony Bhopla, Sacramento
Whenever we think, in these cell-like rooms,
That we may be losing our minds,
The wanton winter offers us
A bottle of chilled Rhine wine.
Freezing weather in a silver bucket
From Valhalla, this white wine.
It calls to mind a brilliant image:
Northerner as married man.
The Skalds, those northern poets, were savage;
They had no feeling for games.
And their northern listeners wanted only
Amber and feasts and flames,
They dreamt of nothing but tropical climates
Where magical sunsets glow—
But none of their straight-laced northern women
Ever wanted to go.
—Osip Mandelstam, translated by Paul Schmidt
_______________________
This'n'That:
Speaking of cabin fever, Molly Fisk of Nevada City writes: The March Boot Camp is almost upon us: 3/18-3/23. Come write with us if you're looking for an alternative to cabin fever, or are trying to finish a book of poems, or start one. In Boot Camps we write six poems in six days and have a lot of fun. It's intense, it's collegial, it's inspiring. More information is at http://www.poetrybootcamp.com. Also, now's the time to make housing reservations if you're coming to Boulder, Utah for the workshop in August. See my website for details, and e- me if you want more information (http://www.mollyfisk.com/html/teaching.html).
Today (3/3) is the deadline for the contest and early registration discount at the Pleasanton Poetry, Prose & Arts Festival which will be held Saturday, March 31, 2007. California Poet Laureate Al Young and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Michael Chabon are examples of the wealth of information and talent available to writers at this incredible annual event. There is a Prose and Poetry contest available to registered people; the contest applications are due no later than Saturday, March 3, the same as Early Registration discount. Go to www.PleasantonArts.org for all the pertinent information.
Calyx, a journal of art and literature by women, announces the May 31 deadline for its sixth annual Lois Cranston Memorial Poetry Prize ($300 plus publication). Final judge: Paulann Petersen. Fee: $15 per entry (three poems, six manuscript pages). Send to: Calyx, Lois Cranston Poetry Prize, PO Box B, Corvallis, OR 97339. Complete guidelines: calyx@proaxis.com or www.calyxpress.org
The New Jersey Rainbow Poets are offering a $1000 grand prize (and 50 prizes in all, totalling $50,000 annually, according to their website) for their religious poetry contest. Send one poem, 21 lines or less, to Free Poetry Contest, 103 N. Wood Ave., #70, Linden, NJ 07036 or rainbowpoets.com. Deadline is March 15.
And today, Edward Thomas would've been 129 years old:
THE GREEN ROADS
—Edward Thomas
The green roads that end in the forest
Are strewn with white goose feathers this June,
Like marks left behind, by someone gone to the forest
To show his track. But he has never come back.
Down each green road a cottage looks at the forest.
Round one the nettle towers; two are bathed in flowers.
An old man along the green road to the forest
Strays from one, from another a child alone.
In the thicket bordering the forest,
All day long a thrush twiddles his song.
It is old, but the trees are young in the forest,
All but one like a castle keep, in the middle deep.
That oak saw the ages pass in the forest:
They were a host, but their memories are lost,
For the tree is dead: all things forget the forest
Excepting perhaps me, when now I see
The old man, the child, the goose feathers at the edge of the forest,
And hear all day the thrush repeat his song.
_______________________
OUT IN THE DARK
—Edward Thomas
Out in the dark over the snow
The fallow fawns invisible go
With the fallow doe;
And the winds blow
Fast as the stars are slow.
Stealthily the dark haunts round
And, when the lamp goes, without sound
At a swifter bound
Than the swiftest hound,
Arrives, and all else is drowned;
And star and I and wind and deer,
Are in the dark together,—near,
Yet far,—and fear
Drums on my ear
In the sage company drear.
How weak and little is the light,
All the universe of sight,
Love and delight,
Before the might,
If you love it not, of night.
_______________________
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) 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.)
Whenever we think, in these cell-like rooms,
That we may be losing our minds,
The wanton winter offers us
A bottle of chilled Rhine wine.
Freezing weather in a silver bucket
From Valhalla, this white wine.
It calls to mind a brilliant image:
Northerner as married man.
The Skalds, those northern poets, were savage;
They had no feeling for games.
And their northern listeners wanted only
Amber and feasts and flames,
They dreamt of nothing but tropical climates
Where magical sunsets glow—
But none of their straight-laced northern women
Ever wanted to go.
—Osip Mandelstam, translated by Paul Schmidt
_______________________
This'n'That:
Speaking of cabin fever, Molly Fisk of Nevada City writes: The March Boot Camp is almost upon us: 3/18-3/23. Come write with us if you're looking for an alternative to cabin fever, or are trying to finish a book of poems, or start one. In Boot Camps we write six poems in six days and have a lot of fun. It's intense, it's collegial, it's inspiring. More information is at http://www.poetrybootcamp.com. Also, now's the time to make housing reservations if you're coming to Boulder, Utah for the workshop in August. See my website for details, and e- me if you want more information (http://www.mollyfisk.com/html/teaching.html).
Today (3/3) is the deadline for the contest and early registration discount at the Pleasanton Poetry, Prose & Arts Festival which will be held Saturday, March 31, 2007. California Poet Laureate Al Young and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Michael Chabon are examples of the wealth of information and talent available to writers at this incredible annual event. There is a Prose and Poetry contest available to registered people; the contest applications are due no later than Saturday, March 3, the same as Early Registration discount. Go to www.PleasantonArts.org for all the pertinent information.
Calyx, a journal of art and literature by women, announces the May 31 deadline for its sixth annual Lois Cranston Memorial Poetry Prize ($300 plus publication). Final judge: Paulann Petersen. Fee: $15 per entry (three poems, six manuscript pages). Send to: Calyx, Lois Cranston Poetry Prize, PO Box B, Corvallis, OR 97339. Complete guidelines: calyx@proaxis.com or www.calyxpress.org
The New Jersey Rainbow Poets are offering a $1000 grand prize (and 50 prizes in all, totalling $50,000 annually, according to their website) for their religious poetry contest. Send one poem, 21 lines or less, to Free Poetry Contest, 103 N. Wood Ave., #70, Linden, NJ 07036 or rainbowpoets.com. Deadline is March 15.
And today, Edward Thomas would've been 129 years old:
THE GREEN ROADS
—Edward Thomas
The green roads that end in the forest
Are strewn with white goose feathers this June,
Like marks left behind, by someone gone to the forest
To show his track. But he has never come back.
Down each green road a cottage looks at the forest.
Round one the nettle towers; two are bathed in flowers.
An old man along the green road to the forest
Strays from one, from another a child alone.
In the thicket bordering the forest,
All day long a thrush twiddles his song.
It is old, but the trees are young in the forest,
All but one like a castle keep, in the middle deep.
That oak saw the ages pass in the forest:
They were a host, but their memories are lost,
For the tree is dead: all things forget the forest
Excepting perhaps me, when now I see
The old man, the child, the goose feathers at the edge of the forest,
And hear all day the thrush repeat his song.
_______________________
OUT IN THE DARK
—Edward Thomas
Out in the dark over the snow
The fallow fawns invisible go
With the fallow doe;
And the winds blow
Fast as the stars are slow.
Stealthily the dark haunts round
And, when the lamp goes, without sound
At a swifter bound
Than the swiftest hound,
Arrives, and all else is drowned;
And star and I and wind and deer,
Are in the dark together,—near,
Yet far,—and fear
Drums on my ear
In the sage company drear.
How weak and little is the light,
All the universe of sight,
Love and delight,
Before the might,
If you love it not, of night.
_______________________
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) 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.)