Bloomsday in the Bogs

Year 23. 

Bloomsday In The Bogs

I search for your name in the clouds when all this time 

I should have returned to the bogs. To the cranberry bog 

where they rope the ripe berries into a red, pond-wide heart.

To the summer bog on Nantucket where I could have spread

your ashes in the Atlantic, on the North Shore: Quidnet Beach.

I could search for a bog here

 –the aiguamolls–

where I could later join you.

Around the bog thick poplars whisper and shake: a leafy hug.

Over the bog rises a silver mist: heat carrying away winter’s tears.

On the bog dragonflies hover and dip: listening.

In the bog science proceeds: time rethinks morning, math, eternity.

Under the bog the world wonders how it will all end.

Beyond the bog you wait for me: since the beginning.

Ways of Translating a Poem in The Somerville Times

I have a new poem in today's Lyrical Somerville.

Thank you, Doug Holder!

Ways of Translating a Poem

Also on dversepoets

Bloomsday Again

 21st Bloomsday

                for Pep

Today your death is

twenty-one years old.

An adult.

Today your death could

walk into a bar in Boston

and order a Sam Adams.

Today your death could

play blackjack at Encore

(which is only five, btw).

Today your death could

rent a car, adopt a child,

be a driver's ed instructor.

Today your death is

a college junior majoring

in grief management.

Today your death is

so big it would need

numeraled candles on its cake.

Today your death will

have just fifteen more

years to live.

One Ocean, Two Seas in Firth

I have a very special poem in the first issue of Firth, and I wanted an equally special spot to place the second contributor's copy that Firth urged us to leave "for someone to find, and hopefully to read and enjoy."

From Scotland to Barcelona, from Barcelona to Jamaica Plain. Bon voyage, Firth!!

Visit Firth on facebook.

For the record, the poem is for Keith.

Permit in My Pocket at SilverBirchPress

I wrote a poem for Silver Birch Press' Learning to Drive series, and they published it, along with a few photos, and the story behind the poem:

Permit in My Pocket by Kymm Coveney

The photo has nothing to do with the poem, but is part of a small anecdote.



Click on the title above or the photo to read it on their wonderful site, where there are plenty of other poems and stories to read.

Asea in Yellow Chair Review

I'm so pleased to debut in Yellow Chair Review with a poem inspired by a prompt about home. I'm also quite tickled to be opposite such a fantastic piece of artwork. There are a few online poetry friends in here as well, and lots of good reading.
My poem, Asea, is on page 131.

Stellwagen Bank

 

Grey sky meets gun-metal ocean. Due east, off the bow of the vessel, black mounds rise. We expect smooth rubber, but their backs are rough, edged in barnacles and swirls carved from oceanic ordeals. We hear the pop of beer bottles, but foam spurts instead from surfacing blowholes. Captured in the fog that embraces our boat, old sardines and fermented seaweed swamp nostrils ill-prepared for the stench of whales. A spout of fetid water arcs into the air. We laugh, cough in uncomfortable delight. They begin to sound. Suspended in our peculiar conceits, we wait for the slap of flukes.

 

100 words for the resurrected