Cold Sugar

Yesterday's cold pushed the plastic tubing off the taps. Still, several inches of sap in the buckets.
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Sugar - For The Beginner

The Rural Economy

Langstroth left the pulpit

Determined to find

God in the apiary. 

Capital G.

Who can be certain?

The poetry of the rural economy.

The asking and the knowing

Ripen and swarm into the

Dry hollows of a distant

Catalpa tree.

And if they survive the winter?

Cakes of pollen placed in a basket.

Jars of nectar hanging

Beneath the eaves.

Daze of Winter

He knocked himself out crashing into the window.

Then he came back to watch Tom brew.

Summer's Remains

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The Next Big Thing

Recently, I was tagged in a post by Sarah Jane Sloat.  I'm not so good at these sorts of things, but I'll give the tag a go.

What is your working title of your book /story/project? 

SO ber 

Where did the idea come from for the book? 

It dropped down unexpected from the Internet, like manna, from heaven.   Or like an invite, from The Found Poetry Review, to join their Pulitzer REMIX project going on during National Poetry Month.

What genre does your book fall under? 

Erasure poetry.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? 

Characters.  What an interesting idea.  I wonder if my book should have characters.  If I get around to discovering any characters in SO ber they will all be portrayed by Martin Sheen.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? 

The Found Poetry Review will be publishing the poems online.  Thirty of them.  Daily.  All during April.  Then, in 30 years, I expect Garrison Keillor's computer-generated voice will read the entire series to a colony that has been established on Pluto, that almost-planet my husband is so fond of.  We might hear them from our outpost on the back of the moon.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? 

Well, this is all so speculative, but I imagine in April I will say it took me ten weeks to complete.  I plan on starting yesterday.

What other books/poems would you compare this story to within your genre? 

The project really has no comparison, but it will be an erasure grounded in the book So Big by Edna Ferber.

Who or what inspired you to write this book? 

I have another bit of erasure I have worked on, a book-length project that has not been published to date, entitled Glass Poet.  That book is rooted in The Great Moon Hoax.  I thought it would be fun to give erasure another go.

What else about your book might pique the reader's interest? 

Nudity.  At this point the book has no cover.  It is completely bare. 

And now, for The Next Big Thing
Tagged by me: Clayton T. Michaels,

Finchy

Watching the birds, waiting for the bees.
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LoPoYo (The Eight)

Usually around this time of the year I post the top 20 or so poetry books that I've read during the year.   This year, I'm afraid, my poetry appetite has been a little diminished.  There are more choices than ever and less and less that I desire to read.   It's been, by all accounts, a personal Low Poetry Year.  So be it.  I read a few and I'll clue you in to what I found worthwhile, in chronological order, of course.

1.  Chromatic - H.L. Hix
2.  Diving Into the Wreck: Poems, 1971-1972 - Adrienne Rich
3.  Song of Myself - Walt Whitman
4.  The End of Beauty - Jorie Graham
5.  All of the Above - Jim Daniels
6.  The Coldest Winter on Earth - David Dodd Lee
7.  Show and Tell: New and Selected Poems - Jim Daniels
8.  Horses Where the Answers Should Have Been: New and Selected Poems - Chase Twichell

Snow-Viary

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The Sandhill Cranes

At Jasper-Pulaski Fish & Wildlife Area 

The sandhill crane migration is in full swing.

My friend Kathy snapped this great pic with her telephoto lens.

I'm a little jealous.

But I was still able to get a few shots of the birds coming in.

The weather was absolutely the best we've ever encountered.

That is to say, we stayed until sundown and still had feeling in our limbs.

If you have time and are local, this is a great time to go.