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MOVING WORDS Series I

The Story Begins

The story begins with a word or a world:
roses, an old man carrying a bouquet
rushing down a cobblestone street in the rain
and a younger woman in red carrying a chandelier
down another street to a repair store,
or crystals in the rain, a worn tweed coat, hope,
a scherzo of rain and wind, a bouquet of glass,
rain bouncing off a red raincoat,
what was not said long ago at a dining room table,
a corner at which two people will meet.

Susan Grafeld Long

My Eyes Slide East Toward Monet

Sunlight splashes the trees
with veneer. Persimmons.
Poplars. Pomegranates.
Enchanted dogwood and sycamore.
Sailboats dot this harbor.
It’s not hard to imagine
scattering them with our breath.

Richard Peabody

A Man, A Woman and a Chair

It is man’s nature to rail at inanimate fate.
Woman looks for a closer culprit.
He, stubbing a toe in the dark, with blame
The wooden hardness of the chair.
Encountering the same, she will exclaim:
“Who left the @!#?&! chair there?”

Hilary Tham

For more poems by Hilary Tham...

About the Series I Poets:

Susan Grafeld Long teaches English and Journalism at Marymount University. She is a former journalist and speechwriter, and has published poems in literary journals throughout the nation.

Richard Peabody is the author of four books of poetry, most recently Bouyancy & Other Myths (Gut Punch Press, 1995). He is also the author of a book of fiction, Paraffin Days (Cumberland Press, 1995), and editor of six anthologies, including A Different Beat: Writings by Women of the Beat Generation (Serpent’s Tail, 1997). He is the founding editor of Gargoyle magazine.

Hilary Tham is the author of four books of poetry, most recently Men & Other Strange Myths (Three Continents Press, 1994), and a memoir, Lane With No Name (Lynne Rienner Pub., 1997). She is a poet-in-the-schools in Virginia, and on the Board of Directors of Words Works Press.

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