Willawaw Journal Spring 2019 Issue 6

In Memory of Peter Sears

      (1937-2017) Poet, teacher, friend–
       I believe that when I hear a poem,
       I hear the silences between the words.
                                             —Peter Sears 

Auden said, “The death of the poet was kept
from his poems.” But he was wrong. When poets die,
their poems know and they grieve.

For Peter, there came the time when time had run
its course, when every breath he tried to take
was broken and he had no more distance left in him.
His poems knew he was dying. He kept no secrets
from his poems. The honesty of his poetry
had given them the strength to know the truth.

When Peter stepped from this life into his next,
his poems understood.  He had prepared them well
to be poems in a world without the poet.
They grieved, oh, they grieved, but did so
only in the silences between the words.

 

Doug Stone has written two poetry collections, The Season of Distress and Clarity and The Moon’s Soul Shimmering on the Water. His poems have been published in numerous journals and in the anthology, A Ritual To Read Together: Poems in Conversation with William Stafford. He lives in Albany, Oregon. 

Then

I am sorry for climbing the gray branches
of the bent fig, and for slamming the screen
door with the spring too heavy for my hands
on my way in or out to the green slatted bench,
its white cement sides stamped into the earth,
where we sat with our grape or orange sodas
in white spiraled wire planted into the ground
where you pulled a few weeds or patted dirt
around seedlings while we watched my father
climb up with spiked shoes and a rope
to saw limbs that needed pruned, or waited
for the boys to finish tilling a new patch
for the garden of tomatoes and string beans tied
to posts, radishes and peppers, three or four kinds,
where bees circle camellias whose scent was so wild
that I am sneezing even now and my eyes water
because I am so sorry I will cry thinking about
bringing salt out to the hot cherry tomatoes
we pulled straight off the vine and also of
the dark ivy that grew up to the first branches
around the front yard’s crab apple that ultimately failed
and that now, like all the rest, is good and gone.

 

Laura Lee Washburn,  Director of Creative Writing at Pittsburg State University, is the author of This Good Warm Place (March Street) and Watching the Contortionists (Palanquin Chapbook Prize).  Her poetry has appeared in such journals as Cavalier Literary Couture, Carolina Quarterly, 9th Letter, The Sun, Red Rock Review, and Valparaiso Review.

How Trauma Dresses at Daybreak

I woke this morning in parts,
making coffee with crossed wires
and crying coconut milk.
Washed my body in two minds;
one mine, one a critical mother,
blood weeping from cracks in her breast bone.
A broken mirror watches
as clothes are chosen with baggy fit for comfort,
pulled on with careful movements,
for the world cannot know
of the war I wear in my chest
when I am missing whole pieces of woman.

 

Rosalind Weaver is a poet and spoken word performer from the North of England. She has been published in a number of journals and zines, including most recently with Yellow Arrow Journal, Paper and Ink, and Dear Damsels, as well as in three anthologies. In 2018, her work was displayed at the annual Rape Crisis UK Conference, as well being displayed and performed at two further exhibitions in London – “The Sunlight Project” and “Testimony.”

 

Too Far Out

Like Stevie’s young man,
I was too far out 
much too far out
and not waving
I didn’t want the attention
waving would draw
to my foolishness
or precociousness
or my stubbornness
when I’d gone too far,
wouldn’t want to be judged
on my waywardness.
But I wasn’t drowning.
I floundered a bit
frantically
before
I found I could float,
go with the flow
for a while
and then kick off against the current
in my own direction.
Sometimes I reached the safety
of the shore
and stayed close for a while
but only for a while,
only for a while
I stayed
too far out all my life
but not waving or drowning.

 

Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She was shortlisted in the Theatre Cloud ‘War Poetry for Today’ competition and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and a Rhysling Award. Her poetry has appeared in many publications including: Apogee, Firewords, Vagabond Press, Light Journal and So It Goes Journal. Find Lynn at LynnWhitePoetry.com

 

Darrell Urban Black was born in Brooklyn and grew up in Far Rockaway, New York. In June 1969, as America fulfilled J. F. Kennedy’s dream to put the American Stars and Stripes onto the dusty surface of the moon, Darrell became fascinated with spaceships. As a child, he made spaceship models, eventually channeling his artistic visions to drawings on paper. In high school, he excelled in science with an affinity for outer space where his drawings of phantasmal spaceships eventually led him to a unique wonderland of strange forms and colors.

In 1982, Darrell joined the National Guard. In 1988, he joined the army and served another four years. He earned his B.S. in the Science of Criminal Justice Administration at the University of Phoenix. During this time his drawings were lost – but not his passion for his art.  In April 2001, he was nominated by the German government as Candidate of the Year Prize for Promising Young Artists. His work was represented in the exhibit, “The Zeppelin in Art, Design, and Advertisement,” in the summer of 2000, at the Frankfurt International Airport. He has participated in many local, national and international group shows. His artwork is permanently displayed in a number of art galleries and museums in America and Germany, including Veteran Art Shows.

He currently lives in Frankfurt, Germany and is a member of the Veteran Artist Program abroad (EuroVAP). See DarrellBlack.com for more information.