Tornado Warning that thunder last night.that ceaseless lightening.3 am and the pup and I jolted, held each otherscared. I was scared.fears of my youth risinglike steam under my skin.that grating phone alarm: Warning! Take cover! and the opening scenefrom Twister blowsacross my mind, a fathersucked into the stomachof the spinning beast. I remember being hauledby frazzled teachers down marble… Continue reading POEM A DAY – April 15
POEM A DAY – April 14
the red thing the blue jays are screaming as if they are the voice of the red thing caged inside my ribsthe red thing battling through another rejection the red thingunstoppably impossibly doingthe job of keeping me alivewithout my permission, reallyI didn’t choose this red thingthe way it ambitions the wayit pursues the way it mattersbeyond its prison… Continue reading POEM A DAY – April 14
POEM A DAY – April 13
Two Submission Responses This Week anticipation, for weeks, two seeds burrowing in the bottom left temporal lobesprouted, embryos of hope hypocotyl-ing and also a memory: my mother in the yellow sun-faded kitchen on Moy. fisting the beige phone handle, the curled cord coiling into itself, the curve at the base, cracked, black wires in shadow.… Continue reading POEM A DAY – April 13
POEM A DAY – April 12
Sunday’s Poem there’s a poem blown in from the westsnagged on the clothesline, nestled in the fleeceI saw it, on its back, legs wide, surrendered I left it thereit looked so comfortableso happyso contained
VANESSA SHIELDS 