Monday, October 15, 2007

If there was ever an appropriate time for a barbaric YAWP....


...it is now.

I just found out that a poem I wrote called "Sugar" has been accepted for publication in Pathways: A Journal of Literature & Art, a smaller publication put out by those fine folks at The Berkshire Writers Room, who publish the annual Berkshire Review.

Sugar


We rise in the bleak half hours

of early March

and cocoon in layers

—Carharts, boots, hats—

thankfully drawn outside into the snow or mud and sugar maples.

We peer into the sky, read the clouds

for signs of snow or rain,

watch for buds in the trees:

their beginning and our sweet end.


Soon the fire crackles in the arch’s warm womb,

its oily black paint bubbling and flaking,

and sweet steam billows up

from the steel streak of the narrow boiling pan.

It won’t be long before we lean into it

for the first whiffs.


All day we feed the flame,

chop and stack wood,

pour clear sap into the golden roil.

Check the galvanized buckets again after the day warms,

peer at the dripping tin tongues with wrinkled foreheads,

and listen for the hollow plunk or splash.

We breathe quick parched prayers

patience, thanks, strength

into the wind.

And ladle more sap into the frothy boil.


We stomp cold, sore feet.

We wait, patient.

Even into the starry, howling morning hours,

sticky and smoky,

we wait.

Such slow hours pass in this glad, weary rhythm.


HMMooreNiver

7 comments:

Unknown said...

Yay! Congratulations. :) Lovely poem.

Anonymous said...

Wonderful! I can taste the maple syrup and pear liquor! Congrats

Anonymous said...

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!

ageratum said...

Fantastic! You are a very talented girl!! Congrats on your 'publication'!! :) Donna

Unknown said...

thank you for posting the poem. I could imagine myself there with you, so clearly.

the redhead said...

Thank you for your kind comments, everyone! :) I'm very enthused & excited!

Anonymous said...

"And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing."

--William Shakespeare

Looking for MORE of this from you!!