Our second poet on the blog!

Beat Until Smooth

I am in the middle of discussing my recipe

for caramel nut brownies with Janet,

the woman seated next to me on the flight home

when there is a loud popping noise

and the plane starts losing altitude fast.

I can hardly breathe.

I can hardly believe this is happening.

This plane is really going down;

we’re really going to die.

It occurs to me that

when I hugged my wife

goodbye at the airport,

I only kissed her on the cheek,

and not on the lips like I should have.

It also occurs to me

that an airliner’s rapid descent from the sky

goes by way too fast for anyone

to be able to get their prayers organized

in any sort of way that would make sense to God.

So listen, I say to Janet,

we really don’t have a lot of time,

but, as I was saying, you only want to use

the black walnuts from Diamond for this recipe

because the other kinds of walnuts

always seem to come out tasting weird

when you take them out of the oven!

Bio:

A past member of five national poetry slam teams (Worcester, Mass. (x2), Washington, D.C., Wilmington, Del. and Albuquerque, N.M.), Rich has published four chapbooks of poetry and for seven years hosted an open reading and slam in Newark, Delaware. Since moving to Albuquerque in March of 2008, Rich has been performing and writing steadily in the Duke City, and is a regular contributor/editor at localpoetsguild.wordpress.com. He is also an educator, adventurer and desert compound prophet. Rich’s poems have appeared in Adobe Walls: An Anthology of New Mexico Poetry, Fickle Muses, The Rag, Menagerie, Clutching at Straws, Shot Glass Journal, Mutant Root, The Mas Tequila Review, and The Legendary.

Our First Poet

Congratulations to Kenneth and his poem Summer Home. The first poetry post. I enjoyed reading all work submitted for April, here's hoping May will bring me equal pleasure.

Summer Home

We all suddenly disappear from time to time.

It is not intentional, even when the thought

is as plain as the hands on a clock face.

It is the path that leads into the woods

or the rails that the hobos ride

or the long American ribbon of highway.

And even though all paths and roads and rails

eventually lead to the banks of the Acheron

that is farther than anyone I know

will travel today—a Saturday in April

with blooms bursting forth from trees

and all the colorful tulips tall in the garden.

I own a house upon the Acheron’s near shore

and rent the spare room upstairs

to the dark angel who glows white light

that illuminates the river and far bank—

that tunnel feeling, that warm grip of wood

as oars stoke the river’s water.

But my house is not where you disappeared

when you vanished last Wednesday

somewhere between George R. R. Martin

and J. R. R. Tolkien at the local library.

Your fantastical search continues

in its attempt to locate the thirteenth century

in the Allegheny Mountains

long before the white men arrived

with their cutting tools

that harvest both trees and rock.

-Kenneth P. Gurney -

bio: Kenneth P. Gurney lives in Albuquerque, NM, USA. He edits the New Mexico Poetry anthology Adobe Walls. His poems appear regularly in print and on the web. For complete publishing credits and available books visit http://www.kpgurney.me/Poet/Welcome.html.

April is the Cruelest Month

Two weeks until this months successful poet is announced and posted!

It's always hard to choose who goes in first but who ever doesn't make it, remember you can submit for each month.

Keep the submissions coming!

To Submit!

Submissions Guidelines:

Poetry - 1-5 poems (please send in the body of the email)

Artwork - Send as a (jpg) file or link to online portfolio.

Please send submissions or queries to robertatherton18@gmail.com