Donald Platt: “I write to shape into some cogent form the random experiences that life has afforded me. The story of passing my written doctoral exams while being handicapped by a weak bladder, only slightly exaggerated for comic effect, has been waiting for reincarnation in a poem for almost three decades. The anecdote of being so tired that I thought I was being questioned about ‘Barthes’ britches’ in my oral exam is, unfortunately, true. But this humorous material needed to discover a serious counterpart to make a true poem. Of course, that ballast was ‘prosopopoeia,’ the universal urge to talk with our dead again and have them reply to us. The turn to my dead brother Michael at the end of the poem came as a genuine surprise, but also—in retrospect—as an inevitability. To be given such an ending is to receive a kind of grace from some source outside the self, perhaps from the dead themselves.”
Garnet Juniper Nelson: “A century after publication, an image of the poem ‘When You Meet a Member of the Ku Klux Klan’ made waves on the internet. It was written by Robert L. Poston, one of the leaders of the Black nationalist Universal Negro Improvement Association alongside Marcus Garvey, and was originally published in the association’s weekly newspaper. The poem directly advocates for violence against KKK members. I have no qualms with the piece, but it made me curious how a contemporary poem might address issues of liberation involving my own community. So remember, if a man with a suspiciously manicured beard—or anyone else who purports to know it all—asks ‘What is a woman?’ the answer is simple: there are diverse paths to womanhood. I would also note that TERF is itself a contradiction in terms; there is no such thing as uninclusive feminism.” (web)
Alicia Rebecca Myers: “Reading about Trump’s proposed high tariffs made me reflect on the high stakes of this election. It still astounds me that what one person finds beautiful is at the root of another person’s fear.” (web)
Stephen Kessler: “When I started writing poems in earnest, as a teenager, I had no use for free verse, but the formal structures and rhythms of English poetry—especially that of Wordsworth, Shelley and Keats—provided the models for my own earliest efforts. In time I became more ‘contemporary’ in my approach to form, opening up to more unpredictable lyric structures, but my ear had been trained to hear rhythm and rhyme in a way that continues to serve me more than 40 years later. These sonnets were written during what could be called a cool-off lap after translating about 70 sonnets by Borges for his complete sonnets, to be published in 2010 by Penguin. While they are not formal sonnets in the strictest sense, I think they are close enough to give an illusion of sonnetude.” (web)
Eric Nelson: “The first poet I discovered on my own (by way of Simon and Garfunkel’s take on ‘Richard Cory’) was E.A. Robinson. I loved his piercing character sketches and his tight, restrained language. The first villanelle I ever read was probably Robinson’s ‘The House on the Hill.’ I didn’t know it was called a villanelle, but I was fascinated by the pattern of repetition and the irony of saying over and over again that ‘there is nothing more to say.’ I wasn’t consciously thinking of ‘The House on the Hill’ when I wrote ‘Louder,’ but it’s easy to see parallels. Such, I guess, is the enduring influence of early loves.” (web)
Image: “Zaubererturm” by Jennifer S. Lange. “In the Clearing” was written by Devon Balwit for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, October 2024, and selected as the Artist’s Choice.
Comment from the artist, Jennifer S. Lange: “I chose the poem ‘In the Clearing’ because, while it is like some other poems entered that use the tower as a person, this one spoke in first person and spoke well, seeing things from a tower’s perspective. I particularly liked the lines about the tower not being alone despite people assuming it to be, and the definition of grey being really mother of pearl—the ability to differ a great mass of small detail is a skill people seem to be losing, and I am glad about any reminder to look more closely. The most delightful however I found the last line, ‘I make a space for story,’ which to me as an illustrator is the best thing anybody can say about my images—weave a story, tell yourself what’s going on, interpret, play with it, it’s yours now.”
