Inklings Journal

Planting the Meadow - Mary Makofske

2010-07-27T00:55:00.000-07:00

I leave the formal garden of schedules
where hours hedge me, clip the errant sprigs
of thought, and day after day, a boxwood
topiary hunt chases a green fox
never caught. No voice calls me to order
as I enter a dream of meadow, kneel
to earth and, moving east to west, second
the motion only of the sun. I plant
frail seedlings in the unplowed field, trusting
the wildness hidden in their hearts. Spring light
sprawls across false indigo and hyssop,
daisies, flax. Clouds form, dissolve, withhold
or promise rain. In time, outside of time,
the unkempt afternoons fill up with flowers.

The Suitor- Jane Kenyon

2010-07-19T23:51:00.000-07:00

We lie back to back. Curtains

lift and fall,

like the chest of someone sleeping.

Wind moves the leaves of the box elder;

they show their light undersides,

turning all at once

like a school of fish.

Suddenly I understand that I am happy.

For months this feeling

has been coming closer, stopping

for short visits, like a timid suitor.

The Socks- Jane Kenyon

2010-07-19T23:50:00.000-07:00

While you were away

I matched your socks

and rolled them into balls.

Then I filled your drawer

with tight dark fists.

Fool Me Good -- Billy Collins

2010-07-12T23:55:00.000-07:00

I am under the covers
waiting for the heat to come up
with a gurgle and hiss
and the banging of the water hammer
that will frighten the cold out of the room.

And I am listening to a blues singer
named Precious Bryant
singing a song called "Fool Me Good."

If you don't love me baby, she sings,
would you please try to fool me good?

I am also stroking the dog's head
and writing down these words,
which means that I am calmly flying
in the face of the Buddhist advice
to do only one thing at a time.

Just pour the tea,
just look into the eye of the flower,
just sing the song --
one thing at a time

and you will achieve serenity
which is what I would love to do
as the fan-blades of the morning begin to turn.

If you don't love me, baby,
she sings
as a day-moon fades in the window
and the hands circle the clock,
would you please try to fool me good?

Yes, Precious, I reply.
I will fool you as good as I can,
but first I have to learn to listen to you
with my whole heart,
and not until you have finished

will I put on my slippers,
squeeze out some toothpaste,
and make a big foamy face in the mirror,

freshly dedicated to doing one thing at a time --
one note at a time for you, darling,
one tooth at a time for me.

The Livin' is Easy - Letter from the Editors

2010-07-05T23:55:00.001-07:00

Dear Inklers,

Summer is here and if you're anything like us you're spending those warm summer nights on the patio with a book and an Anchor Steam. We just want to wish you a relaxing summer filled with good writing, and if you happen to stumble upon anything breathtaking, be sure to send it our way!

Your sunkissed editors,
Megan & Katy

Home from College - Patricia McMillen

2010-07-05T23:55:00.000-07:00

"He died," she says-- like that, as if it's just
another word. Then that long sigh, long
slow ride down Willow Road, landfill one side,
wet baseball field the other. I won't cry

in front of her. The road bucks up, car floats
over the bridge; then a flash of neon
shocks my stoned eyes: sunset on the strange-
ly calm half-timbered storefronts of childhood.

Stopped for the crosswalk, Mom still doesn't
look at me. "Drugs," she says at last. Suicide,
foul play-- she can't, won't, guess. All she knows
is what the cops told her: his body of the floor,

an unmade bed, my letter on his desk. I had
not wanted to marry him anyway. Next day
I take the car, drive past his house, but I can't
knock. I spend July writing on steno pads,

trying to get it right: that flash of light and how,
last time we talked, he'd seemed relieved rather
than hurt. Mom begs, but I can't snap out of it:
I write and write, as if I could revise.

This poem was originally published in After Hours, the 10th Anniversary Issue, along with poems by our very own Katy Renz.

You Reading This, Be Ready-- William Stafford

2010-06-28T23:40:00.000-07:00

Starting here, what do you want to remember?
How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?
What scent of old wood hovers, what softened
sound from outside fills the air?

Will you ever bring a better gift for the world
than the breathing respect that you carry
wherever you go right now? Are you waiting
for time to show you some better thoughts?

When you turn around, starting here, lift this
new glimpse that you found; carry into evening
all that you want from this day. This interval you spent
reading or hearing this, keep it for life -

What can anyone give you greater than now,
starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?

Submitted by Haley S.

who knows if the moon's - e e cummings

2010-06-22T10:04:00.000-07:00

who knows if the moon's
a balloon,coming out of a keen city
in the sky--filled with pretty people?
(and if you and i should

get into it,if they
should take me and take you into their balloon,
why then
we'd go up higher with all the pretty people

than houses and steeples and clouds:
go sailing
away and away sailing into a keen
city which nobody's ever visited,where

always
it's
Spring)and everyone's
in love and flowers pick themselves

An Old Story - Bob Hicok

2010-06-22T10:02:00.000-07:00

It’s hard being in love
with fireflies. I have to do
all the pots and pans.
When asked to parties
they always wear the same
color dress. I work days,
they punch in at dusk.
With the radio and a beer
I sit up doing bills,
jealous of men who’ve fallen
for the homebody stars.
When things are bad
they shake their asses
all over town, when good
my lips glow.

Personal - Tony Hoagland

2010-06-15T00:53:00.000-07:00

Don’t take it personal, they said;

but I did, I took it all quite personal—

the breeze and the river and the color of the fields;

the price of grapefruit and stamps,

the wet hair of women in the rain—

And I cursed what hurt me

and I praised what gave me joy,

the most simple-minded of possible responses.

The government reminded me of my father,

with its deafness and its laws,

and the weather reminded me of my mom,

with her tropical squalls.

Enjoy it while you can, they said of Happiness

Think first, they said of Talk

Get over it, they said

at the School of Broken Hearts

but I couldn’t and I didn’t and I don’t

believe in the clean break;

I believe in the compound fracture

served with a sauce of dirty regret,

I believe in saying it all

and taking it all back

and saying it again for good measure

while the air fills up with I’m-Sorries

like wheeling birds

and the trees look seasick in the wind.

Oh life! Can you blame me

for making a scene?

You were that yellow caboose, the moon

disappearing over a ridge of cloud.

I was the dog, chained in some fool’s backyard;

barking and barking:

trying to convince everything else

to take it personal too.

Perhaps the World Ends Here- Joy Harjo

2010-06-07T23:55:00.000-07:00

The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.

The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.

We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.

It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

The Red Son- Carl Sandburg

2010-05-24T23:55:00.000-07:00

I love your faces I saw the many years
I drank your milk and filled my mouth
With your home talk, slept in your house
And was one of you.
But a fire burns in my heart.
Under the ribs where pulses thud
And flitting between bones of skull
Is the push, the endless mysterious command,
Saying:
"I leave you behind--
You for the little hills and the years all alike,
You with your patient cows and old houses
Protected from the rain,
I am going away and I never come back to you;
Crags and high rough places call me,
Great places of death
Where men go empty handed
And pass over smiling
To the star-drift on the horizon rim.
My last whisper shall be alone, unknown;
I shall go to the city and fight against it,
And make it give me passwords
Of luck and love, women worth dying for,
And money.
I go where you wist not of
Nor I nor any man nor woman.
I only know I go to storms
Grappling against things wet and naked."
There is no pity of it and no blame.
None of us is in the wrong.
After all it is only this:
You for the little hills and I go away.

Sunset - Nathan B.

2010-05-17T23:55:00.000-07:00

His eyes were lost
in the distance.
He did not see her
before him,
her form a silhouette
in the grandeur of
the flames of the setting sun.
It set the sky
on fire. It made
the oceanblack,
burning the sky down,
’til all was burnt black
in the fire of the sun.

There was light beyond her,
bursting forth
from the horizon,
powerful and pure.

His eyes fixated upon the vision,
’til she dissolved into oblivion.
Stepping through her, he
dissolved into the vision:

All became one,
a focused unit,
the illumined sky,
the black ocean,
the blazing sun,
himself,
the sun igniting the sky,
the ocean drinking in the sun,
the sky enveloping the flame,
his sight filling with vision.

In - Andrew Hudgins

2010-05-10T22:55:00.000-07:00

When we first heard from blocks away

the fog truck’s blustery roar,

we dropped our toys, leapt from our meals,

and scrambled out the door

into an evening briefly fuzzy.

We yearned to be transformed—

translated past confining flesh

to disembodied spirit. We swarmed

in thick smoke, taking human form

before we blurred again,

turned vague and then invisible,

in temporary heaven.

Freed of bodies by the fog,

we laughed, we sang, we shouted.

We were our voices, nothing else.

Voice was all we wanted.

The white clouds tumbled down our streets

pursued by spellbound children

who chased the most distorting clouds,

ecstatic in the poison.

A Letter - Kathryn H.

2010-05-03T22:38:00.000-07:00

Cold, I am cold, cold
straining for the sun
old, I feel old, old
tired and undone.

Talk to me of happy things:
the shift of smells that autumn brings
beaches, dunes, and whispered sands
swans and gulls and sunny lands.

Though why I ache is not quite clear
I feel much better with you near
I'm not alone when in my ear
your optimism sounds

I eagerly await the day
When all earth is in heaven's sway
and friends will never go away
and life is without bounds

But Emmy dear, it's rather clear
though nigher draws this higher day
and though I'd love to fly away
and see you where you are,

we must each take the life we make
and form it to its finest shape;
I only hope that when I wake
that love won't feel so far,
that love won't feel so far.

[as freedom is a breakfastfood] - e. e. cummings

2010-04-26T23:43:00.000-07:00

as freedom is a breakfastfood

or truth can live with right and wrong

or molehills are from mountains made

—long enough and just so long

will being pay the rent of seem

and genius please the talentgang

and water most encourage flame

as hatracks into peachtrees grow

or hopes dance best on bald men’s hair

and every finger is a toe

and any courage is a fear

—long enough and just so long

will the impure think all things pure

and hornets wail by children stung

or as the seeing are the blind

and robins never welcome spring

nor flatfolk prove their world is round

nor dingsters die at break of dong

and common’s rare and millstones float

—long enough and just so long

tomorrow will not be too late

worms are the words but joy’s the voice

down shall go which and up come who

breasts will be breasts thighs will be thighs

deeds cannot dream what dreams can do

—time is a tree(this life one leaf)

but love is the sky and i am for you

just so long and long enough

Joyce Sutphen on Poetry

2010-04-19T23:55:00.000-07:00

Poet Joyce Sutphen told Contemporary Authors: "Here's what happens when I sit down to write a poem. I think that I will say something about this, but I end up writing about that. I have a catch in my heart (lump in my throat? whatever it is that Robert Frost says gets the poem going), and I am thinking about my brothers and sisters and all of the musical instruments they can play. My mind is filled with trombones, saxophones, trumpets, and drums. The brass glints, the black and white piano keys appear, and I begin caressing words: embouchure, vibrato, andante, and resin. I think of fingerings and positions, of tonguing and sustaining the last sweet note. I never realized how much music is like sex—how the technical aspects of music and sex share a vocabulary. I have a different poem in mind now from the one I was going to write, but to be honest I probably wouldn't have gotten this far.

"I don't always come away with a poem. Sometimes all I have is a notebook filled with starts, a few lines here, lots of crossed out lines there, a space and another couple of lines. In the last year or so my pages are filled with the funny marks I use to keep track of the poem's meter. Sometimes—but only rarely—there are columns of rhyming or slant rhyming words down the side of a page. Other times there are phone numbers, names of songs I heard on the radio, directions to a party in double-lined boxes. 'This is not a poem!' the boxes say, 'this is a reminder,' but sometimes when I go back to read them, they have become more like poems.

"Sometimes I go back to thinking that it's all nothing but what the preacher called it: vanity, vanity. These thoughts dissolve quickly when I remember what life was like without poetry, when all I had was the holy hush of ancient sacrifice. Poetry makes the world real for me.

"Two reasons keep me coming to the empty page: the desire to make a place for the glinting shard, the divine detail, and the hope that this caressing, this pressing against the visible will reveal the invisible. In the end, it isn't hard: when I sit down to write a poem, one thing just leads to another."

Annabel Lee - Edgar Allen Poe

2010-04-12T23:55:00.000-07:00

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea,
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
I and my Annabel Lee—
With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsmen came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
Went envying her and me—
Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above
Nor the demons down under the sea
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

To My Son's Girlfriend- Michael Milburn

2010-04-07T23:23:00.000-07:00

I'm tempted to ask
what you see in him.
Although you probably
see the good that I see
I wonder if you realize
how much he is my handiwork,
or which of the qualities
you daydream about in class
are the ones that I take pride in,
his cordiality, for example,
or love of silliness.

It's uncomfortable for me
to think of anyone else
loving him the way I do,
possessing him in a way
that only his mother and I
have ever possessed him,
and I can't deny being jealous,
not so much reluctant
to share or relinquish him
as resolved to remind you
that he's been around
longer than your love,
under construction if you will,
and that each cute trait
or whatever occurs to you
when you hear his name
I feel proprietary about,
like a woodworker
who makes a table
intending to sell it
but prays that no buyer
will recognize its worth.

VLOG - Inklings in Pajamas!

2010-03-28T13:05:00.001-07:00

This is our first attempt at making a video of a true-to-life Inklings meeting... mostly. Please excuse the rough editing, we are poetry editors, not video editors. Megan reads the poem we've posted this week, and Katy keeps it real.

The Queen or La Reina - Pablo Neruda

2010-03-28T12:16:00.001-07:00

I have named you queen.
There are taller ones than you, taller.
There are purer ones than you, purer.
There are lovelier than you, lovelier.

But you are the queen.

When you go through the streets
no one recognizes you.
No one sees your crystal crown, no one looks
at the carpet of red gold
that you tread as you pass,
the nonexistent carpet.

And when you appear
all the rivers sound
in my body, bells
shake the sky,
and a hymn fills the world.

Only you and I,
only you and I, my love,
listen to it.

____

Yo te he nombrado reina.

Hay más altas que tú, más altas.

Hay más puras que tú, más puras.

Hay más bellas que tú, hay más bellas.

Pero tú eres la reina.

Cuando vas por las calles

nadie te reconoce.

Nadie ve tu corona de cristal, nadie mira

la alfombra de oro rojo

que pisas cuando pasas,

la alfombra que no existe.

Y cuando asomas

suenan todos los ríos

en mi cuerpo, sacuden

el cielo las campanas,

y un himno llena el mundo.

Sólo tú y yo,

sólo tú y yo, amor mío,

lo escuchamos.

The Rain Poured Down - Dan Gerber

2010-03-23T23:55:00.000-07:00

My mother weeping
in the dark hallway, in the arms of a man,
not my father,
as I sat at the top of the stairs unnoticed—
my mother weeping and pleading for what I didn't know
then and can still only imagine—
for things to be somehow other than they were,
not knowing what I would change,
for, or to, or why,
only that my mother was weeping
in the arms of a man not me,
and the rain brought down the winter sky
and hid me in the walls that looked on,
indifferent to my mother's weeping,
or mine,
in the rain that brought down the dark afternoon.

Windy City- Stuart Dybeck

2010-03-15T23:56:00.000-07:00

The garments worn in flying dreams
were fashioned there—
overcoats that swooped like kites,
scarves streaming like vapor trails,
gowns ballooning into spinnakers.

In a city like that one might sail
through life led by a runaway hat.
The young scattered in whatever directions
their wild hair pointed, and gusting
into one another, fell in love.

At night, wind rippled saxophones
that hung like windchimes in pawnshop
windows, hooting through each horn
so that the streets seemed haunted
not by nighthawks, but by doves.

Pinwheels whirled from steeples
in place of crosses. At the pinnacles
of public buildings, snagged underclothes—
the only flag—flapped majestically.

And when it came time to disappear

one simply chose a thoroughfare

devoid of memories, raised a collar,

and turned his back on the wind.

I closed my eyes and stepped

into a swirl of scuttling leaves.

Lullaby for the Broken - Katy R.

2010-03-08T23:59:00.000-08:00

So leave your bottles on the counter

say goodnight

say it to the bed, to the chair

to the man across the street

sitting on his front step

smoking a dim cigarette that

sparks like fireflies into the dusk

And your daughter

that unborn one with hair the color of corn

say goodnight to her as well

and your mother who died too soon

and your father

whose tears never dried

who shrivels in his polyester husk

Until he’s so empty his skin

folds like an envelope around his bones, and you

put him in the crook of your arm,

carry him to the places he needs to go

because there was a time he carried you

because there comes a time we will all carry and be carried

even the fathers, strong as they once were

Even the daughters with hair the color of silt

who never thought they’d be here

but they are, and we are

so say goodnight

goodnight, goodnight

the moon is fragile but bright

the lights flicker but it’s all right

all right now,

all right.

Celebrating Six Months of Inklings!

2010-03-03T22:23:00.001-08:00

Dear Inklers,

This is a special week for Inklings because we hit the 6 months mark! Thanks to you all for continuing to follow, submit, comment, discuss, and generally be so much fun to work with.

One of our facebook followers, Julie Johnson, said the other day of Inklings:

"All I know is that I LOVE Inklings Journal and I love that people can put words together and cause me to think, feel, and imagine!"

Hopefully you share Julie's sentiment on some level. We both love spending time every week (and we really do!) with writing that makes us think, feel, imagine, and we love that you all continue to share this project with us.

Here's to another six months!

Your co-editors,
Katy and Megan

P.S. Be sure to check out Kathryn's latest fantastic poem below.

If Only I Could Love Mathematics as You Do - Kathryn H.

2010-03-03T22:23:00.000-08:00

from those starry heights you

call back to me

if only i had your lungs

i could see your view

so expansive, so pristine

untainted by ignorance

or oxygen

Poem from "Without"- Donald Hall

2010-02-22T23:51:00.000-08:00

Katy: I first heard Donald Hall read a poem from "Without" on the radio, while sitting at my desk at work one day. I went out that afternoon and bought the book, then rode the El home that night, weeping. "Without" sits on my shelf as one of those books I can't read, because if I don't, maybe it's not real. Maybe grief doesn't exist, maybe pain isn't our lot, maybe those we've lost are just standing outside a door somewhere, waiting to come back in. If anyone can capture beauty in such terrible pain, it's Donald Hall, and the poem below is a wonderful example of that.

   Alone together a moment
on the twenty-second anniversary
   of their wedding,
he clasped her as she stood
   at the sink, pressing
into her backside, rubbing his cheek
   against the stubble
of her skull. He gave her a ring
   of pink tourmaline
with nine small diamonds around it.
   She put it on her finger
and immediately named it Please Don't Die.
   They kissed and Jane
whispered, "Timor mortis conturbat me."

Asperges Me - Timothy Murphy

2010-02-15T23:55:00.000-08:00

Cleanse me of my iniquity
and wash away my sins.
Laugh, Lord, at my obliquity.
In you laughter begins.

Regard this little steeple.
You gave to the High Plains
a flock of sheep, the people
who drink deep when it rains.

I shall number all the stones
Assyria had laid low.
I shall number all my bones
as David did long ago.

Oh, what a troubled route man took,
descending from the trees:
cave paintings and the printed book
made on his bended knee.

Lord, the broken spirit,
the sorrows in my heart
are much, much to inherit
and hard, hard to impart.

You Who Never Arrived - Rainer Maria Rilke

2010-02-08T23:09:00.000-08:00

You who never arrived
in my arms, Beloved, who were lost
from the start,
I don't even know what songs
would please you. I have given up trying
to recognize you in the surging wave of the next
moment. All the immense
images in me-- the far-off, deeply-felt landscape,
cities, towers, and bridges, and unsuspected
turns in the path,
and those powerful lands that were once
pulsing with the life of the gods-
all rise within me to mean
you, who forever elude me.

You, Beloved, who are all
the gardens I have ever gazed at,
longing. An open window
in a country house--, and you almost
stepped out, pensive, to meet me.
Streets that I chanced upon,--
you had just walked down them and vanished.
And sometimes, in a shop, the mirrors
were still dizzy with your presence and, startled,
gave back my too-sudden image. Who knows?
perhaps the same bird echoed through both of us
yesterday, separate, in the evening...

Translated by Stephen Mitchell

Apples and Oranges - Megan H.

2010-02-02T15:00:00.000-08:00

Like Apples and Oranges
love their trees,
we'll mean to leave gently
but gravity, gravity.

Love their trees,
like a mother and child,
But gravity, gravity,
we say it can't be helped.

Like a mother and child
slowly grow old and apart,
We say it can't be helped,
like apples and oranges.

Sorrows - Lucille Clifton

2010-02-02T14:55:00.000-08:00

who would believe them winged
who would believe they could be

beautiful    who would believe
they could fall so in love with mortals

that they would attach themselves
as scars attach and ride the skin

sometimes we hear them in our dreams
rattling their skulls    clicking

their bony fingers
they have heard me beseeching

as i whispered into my own
cupped hands    enough    not me again

but who can distinguish
one human voice

amid such choruses
of desire

Let's Talk Over Smokes - Mike S.

2010-01-25T23:59:00.000-08:00

let's talk about crossing
seas; let’s talk about lost

fire; let’s talk about smoke in the eyes—blink
to get it out; let’s talk about ones we knew,

fallen under wind and rain, wanderers
who endure pain

no longer; don’t shut
up yet; let’s talk about short

days, not the ones in summer;
let’s return to warm blankets of snow and stiff

cups of joe; I need a break
from August blackberry brambles, scavenged

by every bird;
let’s pause—

let winter
keep us.

Yellow Bowl - Rachel Contreni Flynn

2010-01-18T23:59:00.000-08:00

If light pours like water
into the kitchen where I sway
with my tired children,

if the rug beneath us
is woven with tough flowers,
and the yellow bowl on the table

rests with the sweet heft 
of fruit, the sun-warmed plums, 
if my body curves over the babies, 

and if I am singing,
then loneliness has lost its shape,
and this quiet is only quiet.

Blue or Green - James Galvin

2010-01-18T23:55:00.000-08:00

We don't belong to each other.
We belong together.
Some poems
belong together to prove the intentionality of subatomic particles.
Some poems eat with scissors.
Some poems are like kissing a
porcupine.
God, by the way, is disappointed in some of your recent choices.
Some poems swoop.
When she said my eyes were
definitely blue, I said, How can you see that in the dark?
How can
you not? she said, and that was like some poems.
Some poems are
blinded three times.
Some poems go like death before dishonor. Some poems go like the time she brought cherries to the movies;
later a heedless picnic in her bed.
Never revered I crumbs so
highly.
Some poems have perfect posture, as if hanging by
filaments from the sky.
Those poems walk like dancers,
noiselessly.
All poems are love poems.
Some poems are better off
dead.
Right now I want something I don't believe in.

Letter from the Editors

2010-01-12T01:00:00.000-08:00

Dear Inklers,

A while back we promised a New Years poem, and we are aware that many of you are anxiously awaiting this post. We also are aware that it is quite a bit past New Years, so hold tight and someday soon we will have it for you. Until then, keep enjoying these awesome poems that we keep finding in the strangest of places.

Your dawdling co-editors,

Megan and Katy

How to Read a Poem: A Beginner's Manual - Pamela Spiro Wagner

2010-01-11T23:55:00.001-08:00

First, forget everything you have learned,
that poetry is difficult,
that it cannot be appreciated by the likes of you,
with your high school equivalency diploma,
your steel-tipped boots,
or your white-collar misunderstandings.

Do not assume meanings hidden from you:
the best poems mean what they say and say it.

To read poetry requires only courage
enough to leap from the edge
and trust.

Treat a poem like dirt,
humus rich and heavy from the garden.
Later it will become the fat tomatoes
and golden squash piled high upon your kitchen table.

Poetry demands surrender,
language saying what is true,
doing holy things to the ordinary.

Read just one poem a day.
Someday a book of poems may open in your hands
like a daffodil offering its cup
to the sun.

When you can name five poets
without including Bob Dylan,
when you exceed your quota
and don't even notice,
close this manual.

Congratulations.
You can now read poetry.

Burning the Old Year - Naomi Shihab Nye

2010-01-04T23:59:00.000-08:00

Letters swallow themselves in seconds.

Notes friends tied to the doorknob,

transparent scarlet paper,

sizzle like moth wings,

marry the air.

So much of any year is flammable,

lists of vegetables, partial poems.

Orange swirling flame of days,

so little is a stone.

Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,

an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.

I begin again with the smallest numbers.

Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,

only the things I didn’t do

crackle after the blazing dies

New Years' Letter from the Editors

2009-12-29T00:13:00.000-08:00

Dear Readers,

We hope that you are all having a very warm holiday season. We are approaching the time of year when many people reflect on what has passed and make decisions for the year to come. At Inklings, this means we continue our pursuit of new ways to connect through creative ventures.

We know that many of you make resolutions, so we thought it would be a fun project to compile your New Years' resolutions into a poem. It's quick and painless for you:

Step 1: Send in your resolution by Friday, January 1 (either as a comment in the blog or an e-mail to Inklingsjournal@gmail.com)

Step 2: Check back next week to see the poem we come up with. (Good, bad, or just plain entertaining, you'll want to read it, trust us.)

No matter how mundane, ridiculous, or serious your resolution, we want to hear from you--otherwise the poem we write will be incredibly boring.

As always, we love to see your original creations in the Inklings in-box (it brings joy to our hearts). Let this be the year that your New Years' resolution is to submit your work to Inklings. We think that's a pretty great resolution!

Your doting co-editors,
Katy & Megan

from Ulysses - Alfred, Lord Tennyson

2009-12-29T00:12:00.000-08:00

Come, my friends,
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Submitted by Therese R.

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-21T23:37:00.001-08:00

The Feast of Snow - G.K. Chesterton

2009-12-21T23:37:00.000-08:00

There is heard a hymn when the panes are dim,
And never before or again,
When the nights are strong with a darkness long,
And the dark is alive with rain.

Never we know but in sleet and snow
The place where the great fires are,
That the midst of earth is a raging mirth,
And the heart of the earth a star.

And at night we win to the ancient inn,
Where the Child in the frost is furled,
We follow the feet where all souls meet,
At the inn at the end of the world.

The gods lie dead where the leaves lie red,
For the flame of the sun is flown;
The gods lie cold where the leaves are gold,
And a Child comes forth alone.

Sparks and Fires - Erik Jo.

2009-12-14T20:15:00.000-08:00

   We were down the hill behind our house, three little boys and the makings of one little tree fort. We had my father’s tools and what scrap we could drag behind us, down the trails we’d cut by trampling thimbleberry bushes the summer before.
   I’m sure I was the one carrying the hammer. As the older brother I liked it when Brice carried the nails, or wood that was weighted awkwardly. We had a friend over too, Kenny Macanally from downtown. He carried some board ends, which we hoped to make into a ladder.
   The jumble of board ends, bent nails, cracked and flimsy plywood. Our first complication came when we tried to climb our ladder, and discovered that the nails we’d used weren’t long enough to pierce both the wood blocks and the tree’s trunk. Our second complication was that I couldn’t convince Brice to bring me a sheet of plywood from our pile. We argued; Kenny wandered around the brush.
   When Kenny put his foot through the fallen wasp nest, Brice wanted to use the hammer, and I was trying to tell him that he should get me that box of nails instead—I’d already carried the plywood over myself—because look, we could make it a race, and I’d time him. Kenny watched the wasps rise around his shoulders, felt the first bites, and screamed.
   Fear was instantly contagious. Brice and I dropped our tools and ran before we knew why, but the mud on the trail was slick, and we could hear the wasps catching up. We pulled at roots and they came out in our hands. We tore our knees on rocks. My steps slid me backwards into the swarm exactly like they do in dreams. Sparks and fires in my mind. I was bitten, twice, in the fleshy part of my thigh.
   Brice and I reached the top alone. We were sure Kenny was dead.
   That was the first time adrenaline got the better of me. The second, in college, came after a sleepless week of papers, when I wrestled my dorm-mates after dinner more and more frantically, until I threw an opponent against the wall with my fist back to hit him. I was yelling nonsense. I left the room, barefoot, and ran the school’s red gravel track by moonlight for an hour and a half, and felt no fatigue, no pain.
   When Brice and I burst into the room where our mother was taking coffee, I was irrationally terrified. I pitched and rolled on the ground, screamed about dying, bawled. My nose ran and my snot mixed with my tears, and our mother stripped us to our baggy white briefs to loose the trapped wasps. My shoulder blades dug into the carpet, and I watched my legs twitch and jump. When Mom came with the baking soda they still shook.
   Running, running, running.

A New Poet - Linda Pastan

2009-12-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

Finding a new poet
is like finding a new wildflower
out in the woods. You don't see

its name in the flower books, and
nobody you tell believes
in its odd color or the way

its leaves grow in splayed rows
down the whole length of the page. In fact
the very page smells of spilled

red wine and the mustiness of the sea
on a foggy day - the odor of truth
and of lying.

And the words are so familiar,
so strangely new, words
you almost wrote yourself, if only

in your dreams there had been a pencil
or a pen or even a paintbrush,
if only there had been a flower.

Haiku - Mrs. Racklyeft's Class

2009-12-07T22:17:00.000-08:00

Mrs. Racklyeft teaches at a small school in Detroit. These poems were written by her students, who, despite their age and situation, have created these stunning, vivid portraits. (Mrs. Racklyeft's comments are in parentheses below).

A city of peace
with golden sidewalks and poles
and diamond light bulbs.

-Daniel, age 10 (whose neighborhood is not like this poem at all)

Leaves are falling down.
When you walk on them they crunch.
Then they blow away.

-Jamison, age 7

The playground is filled
With so many kids playing
Jumping together.

-Belicia, age 10 (the truth is our playground is a parking lot next to an abandoned building, with a small strip of adjacent green space.)

The bunny stalks me
in the deep forest today,
follows me home.

-Gillian, age 10

The golden flower
falls from the stem into the grass
and I pick it up.

-Gillian

A red balloon flew.
It shines like a cardinal,
a stripe on my flag

-Simone, age 8

Con Fuse - Erik J.

2009-12-01T00:05:00.000-08:00

The day the candle went to Mexico
He spoke the truth, yet did not know
His lack of Spanish, disregard of proper use
Caused him to utter sheepishly: yo soy con fuse

Inflamed by local Mexican cuisine
He soon got shorter, causing quite a scene
The liquid wax, one ugly truth it bore
Our candle was con fuse no more

since feeling- e. e. cummings

2009-12-01T00:03:00.000-08:00

since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world

my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
—the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says

we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis

Dear Mr. Robinson - Kathryn H.

2009-11-24T01:07:00.001-08:00

Dear Mr. Robinson,

I hope you will forgive me for my unusual behavior and strange clothes.
I did not purposefully intend to disrupt your day.
When you told me to leave, I tried.
I really did.

I am always trying to leave to the world where the moon sings my name
and the rich secrets of the earth pulse through my body.
Last evening,
when the sky was smote with pink and purple bruises,
I thought I had found a way to get there.
My war-drum heart shouted:
Home at last!
We found the pulse!
Run to the sun!
So I did.
In the land of truly alive things it does not matter if you are wearing
bedroom slippers and a raincoat.
I realize now that you might have found that strange.

When you found me on your roof I was trying to dissolve sideways.
That's as best as I can figure out how to get there.
Dissolve sideways, the wind said.
We will catch you.
But my atoms would not let me,
and when the world went gray
I was
nothing more
than a silly girl in her bedroom slippers and a raincoat,
trapped on the roof of a stranger.

I wanted to be off of that roof as much as you wanted me off of it, of that I promise you.
I'm sorry for all the fuss you had to go through to get me removed safely.
If we ever find ourselves in the flipped situation,
I will be sure to try and reciprocate.

I am writing this letter because I realize you probably thought I was crazy and
I wanted to clear things up.
If I had succeeded in dissolving sideways, neither of us would be in this
awkward situation.
But I could not dissolve sideways.
I hope you understand.

Sincerely,
Laura

God's Grandeur - Gerard Manly Hopkins

2009-11-24T01:07:00.000-08:00

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.

It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;

It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil

Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?

Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;

And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;

And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil

Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;

There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;

And though the last lights off the black West went

Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Redwood - Katy R.

2009-11-16T22:37:00.000-08:00

She stands
chin to the sky
stretching
her arms
like Redwoods,
plunging one
into damp soil
fingers curling
like roots,
cradling the earth.
The other she
stretches
through the clouds,
her thin
fingernails like
half moons
stoop to kiss
the stars goodnight.

She stands whisper still.

After a few years
her skin
toughens like bark,
her eyelashes turn
to leaves,
her purple skirt
blooms Lilacs
around her ankles.

And the mothers wonder—
whatever happened to that little girl,
the one whose family drove away one day
blowing kisses from behind bags
Just a short trip father said
Don’t break my stuff brother said
We’ll miss you terribly mother said.

With one hand
she holds onto
the crumbling earth,
but with the other
she stretches
just a little more
each day
reaching limb
after lonely limb
into the sky,
hoping to see
her father, her brother
stretching
to hear her mother say-

Oh, we’ve missed you terribly,
Yes, so terribly.

Victoria Market - Francis Brabazon

2009-11-16T09:57:00.000-08:00

I said to my companion, this is walking
I said to my companion, how my heart goes
out to all lovers.

The darkness was still warm
but the fields were freshening beautifully
in the winter rain;
the market was full of little lights
and I remarked the ear of a sack
sleeping on top of a tyre like a cat
on the curbstone

I said to my friend stop falling on your knees
I have to keep pulling you on to your feet again-
then the dawn came down silently between
the rows of vegetables
and we passed out into the white star
rejoicing companionless in our love

As I crossed the square on my way home
the highest spires were ablaze with the movement
of feet.

Submitted by Chrissie M.

Foolish Coyote- Kathryn H.

2009-11-09T21:08:00.001-08:00

Coyote crouched, watching her as she crafted her

careful mosaic on the blackberry cloth of the night

This is slow work

Her hands glowed from the warmth of the stars

Before she could stop him, he flung the remaining

stars out into the night spilling them in a wild

disarray

What have you done, you foolish coyote

Never knowing the confusion that would always

dwell among them

Dream Song 14- John Berryman

2009-11-09T21:08:00.000-08:00

Life, friends, is boring. We must not say so.
After all, the sky flashes, the great sea yearns,
we ourselves flash and yearn,
and moreover my mother told me as a boy
(repeatingly) "Ever to confess you're bored
means you have no

Inner Resources." I conclude now I have no
inner resources, because I am heavy bored.
Peoples bore me,
literature bores me, especially great literature,
Henry bores me, with his plights & gripes
as bad as Achilles,

who loves people and valiant art, which bores me.
And the tranquil hills, & gin, look like a drag
and somehow a dog
has taken itself & its tail considerably away
into the mountains or sea or sky, leaving
behind: me, wag.

Two Months of Inklings!

2009-11-02T23:48:00.000-08:00

Dear Inklings' Loyal Followers:

This week marks the 2 month anniversary of Inklings! We are so excited to have had the opportunity to hear from so many different people sharing a variety of poems that they've written or just love. What a fun couple of months for us. You are constantly challenging us to become better readers and writers. We enjoy getting together every week (usually at your local Modesto Starbucks, though lately we've been teleconferencing between Modesto and San Fran--talk about professional!) and spending some quality time with your words. In case there was any doubt, we really do spend at least a couple hours each week with the submissions we get, discussing what we like, what we think could be improved, and how we have such brilliant friends. That's you, people.

So where do we go from here? We have some ideas in mind--collaborations, special holiday editions, themed submissions--but it all hinges on you continuing to send us your favorite and original work! Also, if you ever have any suggestions for how we can improve our little journal, we'd love to hear them because, really, it is your journal too. On that note, we'd just like to remind you that while we have a lot of fun discussing the poetry with each other, we want you to be in the conversation with us. So for you noble souls who dare to click outside their RSS feed and leave a comment for the Inkler(s) of the Week, keep it up!

Signing off from spinning chair in the valley and a desk at a hotel near SF,

Katy & Megan

cold- Melissa J.

2009-11-02T23:41:00.001-08:00

escaping the sky it falls cold
and lands on my earth in winter
although the truth is, it's merely water
there is something wonderful about rain
the way it invades, overtakes my hair
makes me miss christmas and home

last december i braved the weather to come home
somehow i seem to have forgotten the cold
my red nose, numb hands, mist in my hair
the calendar and the tv said it was winter
but it didn't seem real until the rain
and my life was overtaken--flooded with water

starving, i head to a restaurant, drink water.
scanning the menu, my mind wanders to home
and thoughts of you and the last time it rained
when we stood outside for hours never feeling cold
it must be that time, it has to be winter
here i am, lonely again, twirling my hair

let me run my fingers through your hair
your eyes are deep and grey like water
like the ocean in the middle of winter
i do not like this being apart, you at home
and me holding photos and feeling cold
maybe i'm not lonely, it's just the rain

i have always wanted to kiss someone in the rain
with the little droplets sliding down my hair
i stood in the rain today and only got cold
i wanted to cry but there was already enough water
my house was empty and not really a home
i always think about homeless people in winter

christmas comes to the world every winter
and here, it's always joined by the rain
they hold hands and sit above the lighted cheery homes
filled with babies and old men with no hair
the gutters fill with icy dirty murky water
it's not this weather that makes me cold

each day i walk home, take the pins from my hair
open the faucet, heat rains down, over my body, water
that washes away the proof of winter's cold

(please see posted comments for the editors' comments)

November Night - Adelaide Crapsey

2009-11-02T23:41:00.000-08:00

Listen. .

With faint dry sound,

Like steps of passing ghosts,

The leaves, frost-crisp'd, break from the trees

And fall.

Happy Halloween from Inklings!

2009-10-31T17:43:00.000-07:00

More "Howloween" Photos :)

"The Dreaded Veggie" - David H.

2009-10-31T17:41:00.000-07:00

Dinner time comes, I fear I'll see

the dreaded veggie, a small green pea

That bitter pill will ne'er touch my palate

lest it's mixed with bacon and smashed with a mallet

boiled in water, mixed to a goop

then seasoned just so. Ah! split pea soup!

"Creators" - Megan H.

2009-10-26T23:58:00.000-07:00

"The next person I cried for

is that man who used to be

different; that one who prayed

for me," she said like a call

to her mother on Sunday.

"That man over there is next,"

She said again with bigger

gestures, "I've been talking too,

God--I can't sleep anymore."

Curved steam streams poured up from cups

and saucers which glided on

kid-calloused, carafe-shaped hands.

"Decaf, not regular, now,"

said the Matron in reply,

"How's Act IV? Kill off that scum

guy, yet?"

"I can't sleep but cry;

I can't breathe but die," six plates

near slipped from her no-break arms,

she read on,"I once was lost,

now found.'" Her play: diff'rent,

and changed from loud first instinct--

those changes from present tense;

drew swipes like bleeding paper

demanding sweat revision.

The Matron broke in, like friends

out to drink coffee, not serve,

"That man over there, you think

he's like your Act IV, you can't

rewrite men, make them Romeo."

Busied to separate tables,

she poured swift hot confidence,

"He's the next person for me,

we made eye contact last round

the next person I cried for,

the one who makes me write poems,

reminds me that I have eyes."

"I have been talking to God,"

she said again, the problems

with change and divine design.

"The next person I cried for

is him!"

"Why?"

"Look!"

"What?"

"Gone."

"Good.

good tipper..."

"But he's gone now,"

she sighed, looked and cleaned the glass

waiting for him to return.

I (Katy) love this poem because I feel like I have just wiped the dirt off a window and am watching this little piece of life happen. The characters feel real and relatable and there is a certain urgency and longing, all of which is created by strong verbage and dialogue. I also think it shows skill that though this could have turned into a short story, Megan maintains control with a syllabic form and concise, tight images that lead to this beautiful poem.

* Please also check last week's poem by Kathryn H. for a comment from the editors as well.

"Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" - Robert Frost

2009-10-26T23:43:00.000-07:00

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Submitted by Martin J.

"For Your Birthday"- Kathryn H.

2009-10-19T23:33:00.000-07:00

I'd like to give
   the sound of rain,
   a fleet of ships,
   a Brio train,
   the smell of grass,
   a diamond ring,
   a wisp of smoke,
   an insect's wing,
   a golden hall
   of feasts and light,
   the cool of day,
   the heat of night,
   a shining star
   to guard your sleep,
   or anything
   as grand and deep
as how I feel when I'm with you--
I'm broke, so verse will have to do.

* Our apologies to Katie, to whom we neglected to give our feedback. We enjoyed the particularity of this poem; that even though it's written for a specific person, it still is interesting for the general reader. It is light and fun, but gives also a window into the depth of the relationship, which shows restraint and mastery.

"In Michael Robin's class minus one"- Bob Hicok

2009-10-19T23:32:00.000-07:00

At the desk where the boy sat, he sees the Chicago River.

It raises its hand.

It asks if a metaphor should burn.

He says fire is the basis for all forms of the mouth.

He asks, why did you fill the boy with your going?

I didn't know a boy had been added to me, the river says.

Would you have given him back if you knew?

I think so, the river says, I have so many boys in me,

I'm worn out stroking eyes looking up at the day.

Have you written a poem for us? he asks the river,

and the river reads its poem,

and the other students tell the river

it sounds like a poem the boy would have written,

that they smell the boy's cigarettes

in the poem, they feel his teeth

biting the page.

And the river asks, did this boy dream of horses?

because I suddenly dream of horses, I suddenly dream.

They're in a circle and the river says, I've never understood

round things, why would leaving come back

to itself?

And a girl makes a kiss with her mouth and leans it

against the river, and the kiss flows away

but the river wants it back, the river makes sounds

to go after the kiss.

And they all make sounds for the river to carry to the boy.

And the river promises to never surrender the boy's shape

to the ocean.

Submitted by Haley S.

"My Own Heart Let Me More Have Pity On" - Gerard Manly Hopkins

2009-10-13T08:55:00.000-07:00

My own heart let me more have pity on; let

Me live to my sad self hereafter kind,

Charitable; not live this tormented mind

With this tormented mind tormenting yet.

I cast for comfort I can no more get

By groping round my comfortless, than blind

Eyes in their dark can day or thirst can find

Thirst's all-in-all in all a world of wet.

Soul, self; come, poor Jackself, I do advise

You, jaded, let be; call off thoughts awhile

Elsewhere; leave comfort root-room; let joy size

At God knows when to God knows what; whose smile's

not wrung, see you; unforeseen times rather - as skies

Betweenpie mountains - lights a lovely mile.

(Submitted by Ben B.)

"Touch Me" - Stanley Kunitz

2009-10-13T08:54:00.000-07:00

Summer is late, my heart.

Words plucked out of the air

some forty years ago

when I was wild with love

and torn almost in two

scatter like leaves this night

of whistling wind and rain.

It is my heart that’s late,

it is my song that’s flown.

Outdoors all afternoon

under a gunmetal sky

staking my garden down,

I kneeled to the crickets trilling

underfoot as if about

to burst from their crusty shells;

and like a child again

marveled to hear so clear

and brave a music pour

from such a small machine.

What makes the engine go?

Desire, desire, desire.

The longing for the dance

stirs in the buried life.

One season only,

and it’s done.

So let the battered old willow

thrash against the windowpanes

and the house timbers creak.

Darling, do you remember

the man you married? Touch me,

remind me who I am.

(Submitted by Katy R.)

Chicago Sestina - Brian Maloney

2009-10-06T10:02:00.000-07:00

I am surprised by the streets of Chicago
when the palm of winter grips them with snow
as if to forgive the city’s mistakes
and give it a canvas that’s new, white, and clean–
its fingers, the branches on all of the trees
kneading the air that blows in from the lake.

I’ve never lived next to the pulse of the lake
(until I set foot down the side of Chicago)
breathing in through the streets and out through the trees
welcoming the cool of the wet, numbing snow.
It lets my mind slip into thinking it’s clean
as if to personally forgive my mistakes

“But what have you done to forgive your mistakes?
Did I ask this? Or is that the voice of the lake?
Some days, not even does it appear clean,
worn down from its tall standing neighbor, Chicago.
It scrapes at the sky, asking it for more snow
to stick to and freeze the trunks of the trees.

If I were a branch on one of these trees
incapable of making a single mistake,
I’d grab at the sky as it shook out the snow
and grow my roots thick till they tasted the lake.
But I wouldn’t bend to the force of Chicago
that’s constantly keeping me from being clean.

And what does it mean to try to be clean?
I don’t understand the stillness of the trees
when they’re being attacked by the size of Chicago
as if to glorify the city’s mistakes
that glisten like stars at night on the lake
before it all froze and was covered with snow.

Ah! To imagine how long there’s been snow.
How can something this old still feel so clean
and dance through the wind that swoops in from the lake?
Is it the kneading by the spiny branches on trees
trusting that there will be no more mistakes
that leaves these the only pure thing in Chicago?

Here comes the snow that seeks out the trees
Am I now clean? Where are my mistakes?
Chicago belongs where it lay with the lake.

(Thanks to Chrissie M. for this submission)

Editor's Note

2009-10-06T09:12:00.000-07:00

If you are interested, check Martin's poem, "God is in the Details" to view a (new) brief comment from the editors.

Enjoy!

"Poetry" - Katy R.

2009-10-06T09:05:00.000-07:00

We ink our paper madly,

Splotching and staining our way

To art! To brilliance! To something

More than these brittle words

Curling and uncurling like lace

On the paper, like flower stems

Twirling up wooden stakes

And fences, or sidewalk grates

Reaching for something greater

Than dirt, roots, sun

Blooming, always blooming—

Poetic little things.

____________________

I (Megan) loved this poem from Katy. Anyone who has spent time trying "splotching and staining" their way to poetry will understand this poetic little thing. And doesn't Katy choose nice words?

"Win, Oh Lord, My Heart" - Josh H.

2009-09-29T10:05:00.001-07:00

Anxious thoughts befuddled,

Huddled beneath layers of cruff.

Stuff that is loved and hated

Created by love fogotten,

Rotten in apathy and suppression,

Aggression, foul, lust.

Must I live forever,

Wherever, wandering without thought

Caught in muck and mire.

Aspire to the world

Curled in activity,

Brevity of faith shown

Sewn in body and soul.

Coal, the color of sin.

Win, oh Lord, my heart,

Part the dark abyss,

Kiss the mess,

Confess the death

Breath of life

Strife removed,

Moved beyond words

Towards light and hope.

**Editors' Note**- From now on (we will return to Martin's poem as well), to promote feedback from ourselves and our readers, we are going to write what we liked about a poem after every original work we post. Feel free to chime in with any feedback- positive or constructive- so we can all learn from this process!

We enjoyed Josh's poem because we think it shows a mastery of language--specifically that he showed restraint and creativity in his form and structure (the rhyming especially) while building vulnerable content within that restraint.

Sonnet 116 - William Shakespeare

2009-09-28T21:25:00.000-07:00

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

(Thanks to Bekah O. for this submission)

"God is in the Details" - Martin J. (With Commentary)

2009-09-23T10:26:00.000-07:00

You killed me with your books
and your scientific looks
silenced me to mute
and added philosophical dilute
to all the things I've done
and all the hearts I've won
you played out my part
and tore out my heart

Although my name is written
in every single line
of this complicated life
you made yourself a shrine

Has your wisdom whizzled you
has your ego become an ism
will you ever learn
that I'm the cure for schism

Where is the love I gave you
what did you do with it all?
Where's the man that was you,
did he make you fall?

Evermore I seek you
but you tend to shy away
from all the things I have to offer
you try to run away
and I don't know what else to do
to get your attention
to break through to you
and show you my affection

Hear my cry of love
and see the stains of blood
see the outstretched arms
of an everloving God

_____________________
Martin's poem demonstrates a consistent voice which we found creative
and endearing. Like Josh's poem, Martin used language to his
advantage, creating his own alliteration with "whizzled." His first paragraph is particularly strong, with the punchy first line. We liked that smart sarcastic tone, and then how that tone slowly morphs into vulnerable sadness by the end of the poem.

Letter of Thanks

2009-09-22T16:48:00.001-07:00

Greetings!

We are really excited because this week Inklings Journal received a handful of great submissions, including both original and known poetry. Please keep submitting your "inklings" and remember that even though we have been focused on poetry so far, we welcome fiction and creative non-fiction as well (and can be flexible with the word count).

We are waiting to hear back on one of the submissions, and we will post it soon. Until then, enjoy this Mark Strand poem.

Looking forward to hearing from you,
Megan & Katy

"Eating Poetry" - Mark Strand

2009-09-15T11:17:00.001-07:00

Ink runs from the corners of my mouth.
There is no happiness like mine.
I have been eating poetry.

The librarian does not believe what she sees.
Her eyes are sad
and she walks with her hands in her dress.

The poems are gone.
The light is dim.
The dogs are on the basement stairs and coming up.

Their eyeballs roll,
their blond legs burn like brush.
The poor librarian begins to stamp her feet and weep.

She does not understand.
When I get on my knees and lick her hand,
she screams.

I am a new man,
I snarl at her and bark,
I romp with joy in the bookish dark.

(Thanks to Melissa J. for this lovely submission)

Letter from the Editors

2009-09-14T22:33:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends,

We are very excited for the reception Inklings Journal received two weeks ago for its debut. We have 16 blogspot follows and a fan page on Facebook that is growing! We also have a design brewing to pumpkin-spice-latte up the visual aspect of this blog (how excited is everyone for Starbucks' holiday drinks?!)

However (in bad paragraph starting form), we have had fewer submissions than expected! Some of you are brilliant writers and we know because we have seen proof of it (whether you are willing to agree or not). This blog is a bit of a stretch for us too (especially Katy), but through sharing we all become better and more confident writers. Katy and I are already benefiting from this by workshopping our old poems together and we'd love for you to be a part of that too.

If you are worried about posting something here that you may want to publish formally elsewhere in the future (because often publications require unpublished work, including online) we would like to publicly state that while we are looking for serious work, our ultimate goal is to share, test, and workshop poetry rather than to publish it. Basically, we're not going to retain any rights to your submissions--they will be yours as yours can be. So if that was holding you back, no need to be concerned anymore!

Also as a reminder, we would love if you would send in your favorite poems (known, unknown, whoever) so we can post them during the week. We are both really enjoying the way this blog is causing us to read more, find more wonderful lines and have a place to share them with each other and with you. The more people involved in that, the better!

All submissions go to inklingsjournal@gmail.com :)

Katy & Megan

P.S. Yes, we are long-winded; that is who we are (and we like parentheses)! Don't forget to read Donald Hall's beautiful poem below.

"Gold" - Donald Hall

2009-09-14T22:16:00.000-07:00

Pale gold of the walls, gold
of the centers of daisies, yellow roses
pressing from a clear bowl. All day
we lay on the bed, my hand
stroking the deep
gold of your thighs and your back.
We slept and woke
entering the golden room together,
lay down in it breathing
quickly, then
slowly again,
caressing and dozing, your hand sleepily
touching my hair now.

We made in those days
tiny identical rooms inside our bodies
which the men who uncover our graves
will find in a thousand years
shining and whole.

"Stone-Old" - Katy R.

2009-09-08T06:33:00.000-07:00

That day she found stairs
That were stone-old.

She could tell because they were folded
Into the hillside, and the wild grass
Stretched through the cracks
With surprising familiarity,
The way a daughter slips
Through the crevice
Of her father’s bent arm.

There was nothing left to do
But climb. As she rose
She counted each step.

On number twenty-two
She imagined that at the top
Lived an elderly couple
So in love they
Hadn’t come down in years.

On step eighty-nine
She knew at the peak
She would find a monastery,
Aged and forgotten, beautiful
Like the tip of a sea shell barely exposed.

The steps climbed higher, reaching straight into the sun.
It felt like climbing into a dream, really.

Standing there,
It was if she could see for the first time,
And everything was so orange—
Like the Popsicle that nobody wants,
Unwrapped and melting away in space.

"Take Heart" - Megan H.

2009-09-08T06:32:00.000-07:00

She was always telling people to "take heart" and never thought to wonder what it meant until the day she slipped off into a willowy wood and found herself floating among purple flowers and saw a glistening lily pad drift by holding a dragonfly that was lying motionless with it's blue body bent up like a pile of pick-up sticks. Silently she gasped for air and went under and stayed.

"She walks in beauty" - Lord Byron

2009-09-01T21:44:00.000-07:00

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!

Greetings and Guidelines

2009-09-01T16:56:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Inklings Journal. We are excited you have found us, and look forward to your submissions and comments. Please check every Tuesday for new entries showing work from known and unknown writers alike :)

Inklings Journal is made up of regular people, mostly idealistic post-grads, who love writing and want to grow in our skills as we build a community of writers. That said, we invite your participation in this altruistic, exclusively online, free journal.

Guidelines for submission:

We accept original and favorite (and cited) poetry, fiction and creative non-fiction works, up to 500 words (negotiable if fantastic).
Submit by e-mail (inklingsjournal@gmail.com) in the body of the e-mail, please. No snail mail yet.
Please only send up to 3 poems, and 1 short fiction/non-fiction per week.
We will post submissions based on what fits with the heart of a journal, not necessarily what is most technically impressive. We will give feedback if your submission doesn't fit our purpose (please see Inklings Journal's "about me").
We're looking for work that is accessible, authentic, and demonstrates a love of language and an appreciation for beauty.
We don't like restrictions for writing, but have prepared a short presentation of what we don't want:

If you'd like to be in our clique
Here's a helpful limerick:
Metered rhyme is always fine
Hallmark greetings cross the line
If you hate your leaders, that's ok
But say it in a care-full way!
Be real, be true, say what you will,
But meaningful language gives a thrill
We're so excited to read your stuff
As long as it's not a bunch of fluff!

We hope you enjoy our Inklings!

Sincerely,
Co-Editors and Founders Katy and Megan