Dragging Virginia Woolf’s Body Out of the Ouse detail by Christy Sanford
“Dragging Virginia Woolf’s Body Out of the Ouse (detail),” by Christy Sanford ____________________ Share your response to this work, in any form, here Christy Sheffield Sanford Artist Statement: Christy Sheffield Sanford, born in Atlanta, now lives in Northeast Florida. She has won a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry. She holds a masters degree in Creative Writing and Interarts...
Elegy to a Woman Writer, A Friend by Barbara Rockman
“Elegy to a Woman Writer, A Friend” by Barbara Rockman Walking, I think about luck, death and spring . . . Do two black cats crossing in front of a black clad walker cancel bad luck? Does the crimson yarrow delete the blue egg’s gluey smear? Does one daughter’s peace shadow or highlight her sister’s grief? My friend died this...
Writing the Dress by Barbara Rockman
“Writing the Dress” by Barbara Rockman “I have written up and down my sleeves,” she cried. “It begins at my wrist, saddens at the elbow, but the upper arm is where rain lifts and,” she sang out from the far end of the hall, “At the shoulder, birds flock from the island, the lighthouse lit to make wings whiten and silver. Across the collar, she and the birds and the drove of bleating...
The Beginner by Janet Fitch
“The Beginner” by Janet Fitch She pulled her chair up to the table and sat. She piled her chips by her elbow. She played Noir. She played Rouge. She put a stack on 9 and lost. The table was hot. The table went cold. She anted. She passed. She called. She held pairs. She lay down with a flourish a grand royal flush. She played games she didn’t know the rules for, where things shook and jingled and smacked down...
How will you begin? by Barbara Rockman
“How will you begin?” by Barbara Rockman ____________________ Share your response to this work, in any form, here Barbara Rockman Artist Statement: Barbara Rockman teaches poetry at Santa Fe Community College and in private workshops in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She is workshop director for Wingspan Poetry Project offering classes for women who are victims of domestic violence. Her poems...
Woman of Myriad Seeds by Margaret Stetler
“Woman of Myriad Seeds” by Margaret Stetler She has seeds she has given away that are worth nothing. She says they are wild and rare. She has seeds and doesn’t know what flower they came from. She says they are...
Adie by Jay Merill
“Adie” by Jay Merill I was staring at this peach on the fruit stall but not because I wanted to eat it. Well, maybe I did a little bit but I never had any money on me at the time. I felt in my pockets and as usual, they were empty. You know something, I’ve never eaten a peach before in my life. How sad is that? Makes me feel like a fool. But I should be saying who I am. My name’s Adie and I live,...
The Potential of Yellow Roses by Susan J. Erickson
“The Potential of Yellow Roses” by Susan J. Erickson I spent my formative years leading fish to water. I heard my mother thinking, You are not living up to your potential. Then I was struck by static electricity...
Selkie by Sandra Cross
“Selkie” by Sandra Cross To earn my way to the beach I have to make it through the back yard past nodding buds of sour-grass their white corms underground waiting to be next spring’s weeds. Past the choking pepper tree its bark sliced by narrow wire golden sap marking a slow trail down its trunk, past the Azalea. smothered by sweet woodruff. Past a gopher proof hole waiting to be dug for the lavender...
There Was a Door by Leatha Kendrick
“There Was a Door” by Leatha Kendrick There was a door and her hand on its lever. In too many clothes – her coat’s wide cape collar, her high button shoes, a bonnet heavy and huge whose beruffled lining frames a thin face. Enough to smother a watcher. For more than a century she’s stood, not going through. Was she leaving or coming...
Rebuilding the ’63 Beetle by Nancy Krim
“Rebuilding the ’63 Beetle” by Nancy Krim The engine needs rebuilding he said and she said I’ll do it. But what about the camshaft? She said I can see it slipping there, sliding against the pulley I can see where the problem is. He said you’ll never get it down off the blocks to tow it, you won’t know where to order parts, how to disassemble— I know all about dissembling, she said. I’ve done it all my life....
On the Need to Re-establish Sovereignty Over My Own Heart by Trina Porte
“On the Need to Re-establish Sovereignty Over My Own Heart” by Trina Porte because the city machines hum even if they do not sing because the heart is actually made of muscle because the silver in my hair will one day be spent because the sun will rise on the day i am no longer married just as it will each day after ____________________ Share your response to this work, in any form, here ...
The Last I Saw Mitsou by Karin Cecile Davidson
“The Last I Saw Mitsou” by Karin Cecile Davidson The last time I saw Mitsou, she was crying into an embroidered handkerchief that belonged to my mother. Mother believed in things that lasted. Linen, perfume, clothbound books. Newlyweds, Mitsou and I lived in the fifth-floor walkup. Small rooms with enormous views. Below us, the courtyard, mottled with pale brown stones. Our windows faced the pianist,...
Sleeping Under Snow by Susan Austin
“Sleeping Under Snow” by Susan Austin The gate is open so do what you may. All I ask: leave what remains wild wild. Be kind to the thistle. Of all the lotus flowers raining upon the Buddha that day, all the bodhisattvas– there must have been a weed or two. I feel 10,000 years old. I give back all your wars. As for mine, it was futile trying to out-swim a tsunami. Virginia, I put riverstones in my coat...
Patience by Mary Elise Bailey
“Patience” by Mary Elise Bailey from “Songs for Spring” I curl around the bulb of a strange blue flower, its nascent lines, in darker blues, delphic and hidden, like a cross between a wish and a map no one can read. I wait for the leftover snow to melt, last year’s grass, still tinted green. I wait for the lines to reveal their intentions, to thicken, to ripen, as the ground slowly unfolds its...
Doors by Dawn Banghart
“Doors” by Dawn Banghart Each morning can start different or like this. Each morning can be an open door. Forget the coffee, forget the shower if you could forget responsibilities right now where would you go after tugging open the door? Nothing is needed, not even your shoes leave them, laces untied, lights off. Outdoors you will find a predawn sky a faint brightness in the east with one airplane coming or...
Women’s Work by Jude Rittenhouse
“Women’s Work” by Jude Rittenhouse I am ironing. Mother said that, when I was a baby, I watched her iron. Hour after hour. In the 1950’s, women pressed dresses, napkins, stacks of men’s white shirts, even sheets. My eyes followed her hands, back and forth, endlessly smoothing life’s wrinkles and creases. All of my adult life, I have hated ironing. Now, I am ironing. Another woman friend has learned: cancer....
Psalm of Fire and Water by Cristina Baptista
“Psalm of Fire and Water” by Cristina Baptista “[Christ’s] mother gave birth to him without ever having loved. She wasn’t a woman: she was a suitcase.”...
Call by Alla Bozarth
“Call” by Alla Bozarth Inspired by “Mountain Moving Day,” 1911, by the Japanese Feminist Poet, Yosano Akiko. There is a new sound of roaring voices in the deep and light-shattered rushes in the heavens. The mountains are coming alive, the fire-kindled mountains, moving again to reshape the earth. It is we sleeping women, waking up in a darkened world, cutting the chains from off our...
Stone Love by Joanna Clapps Herman
“Stone Love” by Joanna Clapps Herman I search the river bed Feeling for stones Use only my toes Curl my distal digits around Pick them up with these unhands Carry them with me A punishment For grief that, Unworded cannot find tears. This grief knows nothing Recognizes nothing Claims nothing Is mute I long for tears, but I am uncreatured A dull stone. ____________________ Share your response to this...
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a ping (or whalesong) Apr 25, 2025
