Tag Archives: Massachusetts poets

A soon-to-be published poetry book by Melissa Varnavas

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I met Melissa Varnavas when she came to work at the Beverly Citizen newspaper back in the late 1990s. She became a great friend, joining the North Shore Poets’ Forum and sharing with fellow Forum members much that she was learning in her Master of Fine Arts program.

She then reached out to others in the poetry community of the North Shore, including the Tin Box Poets and the Salem Writers Group. She was full of joy and information and talent. She died much too soon, in August 2022, from cancer, at the very young age of 48.

With her husband Chris Terrell and Tin Box poets Javy Awan and Margaret Eckman, I helped select some of her marvelous poems for a book that will be off to the printer soon. We know her family, friends, fellow poets and others she met through the years will enjoy this upcoming book of Melissa’s poems. Until that is available, however, I hope the attached interview with Reach Arts member Agatha Morrell, with remind you of how charming, talented and wonderful she was.

The Ides of March Meeting

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The North Shore Poets’ Forum is meeting on March 15 in the Barnet Gallery of the Beverly Public Library at 11 a.m. We obviously weren’t thinking about Julius Caesar or Brutus when we chose the date! However, I expect no one will be in a murderous mood, since Spring is definitely in the air. (Or am I delusional?)

If you are at all like me, you are finding the politics today a bit overwhelming. So, I found a neat website that invites writers of all sorts to submit work on politics and society. Here’s a quick summary:

“Writers for Democratic Action is thrilled to announce our … new online publication (which) is an opportunity to submit your writing on politics, society, and the world. We welcome and encourage diverse perspectives from across the US and abroad. No minimum publications or experience–we want powerful writing relevant to our time.”

Check it out and submit something of your own, perhaps.

March isn’t just about traitors and murder. It also celebrates the Irish, and I will bring a few poems. If you choose, please bring a favorite poem either about the Irish or Spring, which is really, per the Farmers’ Almanac, on the way. Also, bring a poem of your own to share at the meeting for gentle critique.

I usually end with a poem for you to peruse, but I am finding the changes to WordPress too hard. I just can’t figure out how to format a poem, since there is no poetry format. Sorry! So, I’ll leave with good wishes for a nice spring and an invitation to join the Poets’ Forum.

Meeting in the not-quite-spooky time

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The North Shore Poets’ Forum will meet Saturday, Oct. 19, in the Barnet Gallery of the Beverly Public Library at 11 a.m.

The group last month decided to return to the 11 a.m. start time, which had been in effect for a kagillion years. They decided it would give everyone an extra half hour to wipe the sleepies from our eyes and gather a poem or two for gentle critique.

In addition, Cathryn gave away many of her poetry magazines which had been bursting off her book shelves. She may bring a few more this month.

She hopes on Saturday to share the origins of the American Halloween — with spooky monsters and ghouls, dress-ups, and lots of candy. Most of us know it has to do with the Christian ceremonies of All Saints Day, November 1, and All Souls Day, Nov. 2. But why candy? Why Trick or Treat?

To set the tone, here’s a poem for the season.

The Black Cock

By Ishmael Reed
 for Jim Hendrix, hoodoo from his natural born

He frightens all the witches and the dragons in their lair
He cues the clear blue daylight and He gives the night its dare
He flaps His wings for warning and He struts atop a mare
for when He crows they quiver and when He comes they flee

In His coal black plumage and His bright red crown
and His golden beaked fury and His calculated frown
in His webbed footed glory He sends Jehovah down
for when He crows they quiver and when He comes they flee

O they dance around the fire and they boil the gall of wolves
and they sing their strange crude melodies and play their
weirder tunes and the villagers close their windows and the grave-
yard starts to heave and the cross wont help their victims and
the screaming fills the night and the young girls die with
open eyes and the skies are lavender light
but when He crows they quiver and when He comes they flee

Well the sheriff is getting desperate as they go their nature’s way
killing cattle smothering infants slaughtering those who block their way
and the countryside swarms with numbness as their magic circle grows
but when He crows they tremble and when He comes they flee

Posting hex-signs on their wagons simple worried farmers pray
passing laws and faking justice only feed the witches brew
violet stones are rendered helpless drunken priests are helpless too
but when He crows they quiver and when He comes they flee

We have seen them in their ritual we have catalogued their crimes

we are weary of their torture but we cannot bring them down
their ancient hoodoo enemy who does the work, the trick,
strikes peril in their dead fiend’s hearts and pecks their flesh to quick
love Him feed Him He will never let you down
for when He crows they quiver and when He comes they frown

 

 

Happy New Year at the Poets Forum

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The North Shore Poet’s Forum will meet Saturday, Sept. 28, at 10:30 a.m., in the Sohier Room of the Beverly Public Library. This is a bit unusual since we normally meet on the 3rd Saturday of the month, but I couldn’t make it last week, and members voted to postpone one week. You may bring food, but be discreet, as usual.

I had no great ideas for a program this month, but I do have lots of poetry magazines that I decided to give to any of you who may want them. They include Poetry, Rattle, Ploughshares, Alaska Quarterly Review (one copy….I don’t know why I have it), and The Sun. There may be more. I have too, too many. And, I thought, it might be fun to read a few and vote on whether we would have chosen to publish them. I think that would be a refreshing and heartening exercise. Oh, I also get The New Yorker, and we all know how many great poets have had work published there. I’m not that impressed with many these days, but it could be because I’m not that smart.

It’s Autumn! Today! First day! So, I’ll leave you with a Fall poem, by Robert Gibb, For the Chipmunk in My Backyard. I like this one so much, I might look up more of his poems.

For the Chipmunk in My Backyard


I think he knows I’m alive, having come down
The three steps of the back porch
And given me a good once over. All afternoon
He’s been moving back and forth,
Gathering odd bits of walnut shells and twigs,
While all about him the great fields tumble
To the blades of the thresher. He’s lucky
To be where he is, wild with all that happens.
He’s lucky he’s not one of the shadows
Living in the blond heart of the wheat.
This autumn when trees bolt, dark with the fires
Of starlight, he’ll curl among their roots,
Wanting nothing but the slow burn of matter
On which he fastens like a small, brown flame.

Spring dreams

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North Shore Poets’ Forum members gathered at the Beverly Public Library on March 16, an almost-spring day, for our first meeting since last year. Susan Hathaway presented information about self-publishing her lovely children’s book, “Who will Speak for the River,” focused on the Ipswich River.

The Ipswich River has been recognized as the eighth most endangered river in the US, serving as the water supply for 14 North Shore communities and as a very popular recreation area for canoeing, fishing, picnicking, hiking. Susan is a member of the Middleton Stream Team and knows the issues — too little water for too many people to rely on for day-to-day living. She hoped to garner more attention to the need for conservation with the book and to inspire children to cherish and care about this precious resource.

Actually, she has two version of the same book, one in English and Spanish, the other in English and Vietnamese. She found a high schooler, Molly, and a seventh grader, Jack, to draw colorful and graceful pictures that capture the beauty of the river and environs.

Susan is now learning how to market the book. As a first step, you are invited to email her at schmwl02@yahoo.com. Put your interest in the subject line. Cost is $13.95 plus shipping. Profits will go toward conservation of the river.

After much discussion, we then read our poems for gentle critique. Our next meeting is Saturday, April 20, 10:30 to 12:30, in the Will Barnet Gallery of the Beverly Public Library. Sandy Hokanson will give a presentation, topic to be determined.

A new season begins

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The North Sore Poets’ Forum will meet on Sat., March 16, in the Barnet Gallery, Beverly Public Library, from 10:30 to 12:30.

Susan Hathaway will give a presentation on self publishing, with which she has experience. We will discuss future meetings, a possible Round Robin, and share a bit of Irish poetry, since St. Patrick’s Day is the next day.

Spring is on our doorstep, and even though it was a pretty easy winter, Spring is always a welcome respite from cold and dreary landscapes. I hope you all bring good cheer and  your poems — with copies — for gentle critique.

Until then, here’s a poem by John Hewitt

The Ram’s Horn

I have turned to the landscape because men disappoint me:
the trunk of a tree is proud; when the woodmen fell it,
it still has a contained Ionic solemnity:
it is a rounded event without the need to tell it.

I have never been compelled to turn away from the dawn
because it carries treason behind its wakened face:
even the horned ram, glowering over the bog-hole,
though symbol of evil, will step through the blown grass with grace.

Animal, plant, or insect, stone or water
are, every minute, themselves; they behave by law.
I am not required to discover motives for them,
or strip my heart to forgive the rat in the straw.

I live my best in the landscape, being at ease there;
the only trouble I find I have brought in my hand.
See, I let it fall with a rustle of stems in the nettles,
and never for a moment suppose that they understand.

May meeting: a Spring treat

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The Noth Shore Poets’ Forum met on May 15 in the Sohier Room of the Beverly Public Library, with 8 of us in attendance: Cathryn O’Hare (me), Jennifer Revill, Sandy Hokanson, Mary Miceli, Ellie Nelson, Beverly Barnes, Susan Picole, and Nancy Pantano.

Susan introduced us to the extraordinarily poignant poetry of Warsan Shire, born in 1988 in Kenya to Somali parents. She was brought to England as a one year old and grew up there. She now lives in the U.S.

Shire focuses on abuse, love, war, and more. Susan read a number of Shire’s poems, including “Home.”

I found this You Tube clip of Shire reading that poem.

Shire has published three volumes of poetry to date, and her poems have appeared in many journals. Here’s a fun fact: her poems were adapted to music for Beyonce’s album Lemonade. Quite a resume for this 25 year old!

After this wonderful introduction to such a proficient poet, we then shared our own poems for gentle critique.

We also decided to have a summer outing. However, the Mass State Poetry Society is meeting on June 17 at the Beverly Public Library, which some of us forgot (me). Therefore, if there is enough enthusiasm, we would have to choose a different date. Please let me know your thoughts.

Cheers!

Come to the meeting

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Join the North Shore Poets’ Forum meeting on Saturday, March 18, 11 a.m., in the Barnet Room of the Beverly Public Library for a happy St. Patrick’s Day (late) and a welcome to Spring (coming soon) gathering. I will be presiding, something I haven’t done in a few years because of taking a Saturday job. I’ve quit that. Many thanks to Jeanette Maes and Roberta Hung for calling you together periodically — until Covid scuttled all sorts of plans. We’ve been free of the constant Covid worry for a while now, so here’s to a great new year of poetry.

I will present a short program on Eavan Boland, 1944-2020, an Irish poet who taught at many universities both in Ireland and the United States. We will then take some time for gentle critiquing of our own poems.

Below is a poem by Boland that I hope you will enjoy. I look forward to seeing you Saturday.

Quarantine

Eavan Boland – 1944-2020

In the worst hour of the worst season
    of the worst year of a whole people
a man set out from the workhouse with his wife.
He was walking—they were both walking—north.

She was sick with famine fever and could not keep up.
     He lifted her and put her on his back.
He walked like that west and west and north.
Until at nightfall under freezing stars they arrived.

In the morning they were both found dead.
    Of cold. Of hunger. Of the toxins of a whole history.
But her feet were held against his breastbone.
The last heat of his flesh was his last gift to her.

Let no love poem ever come to this threshold.
     There is no place here for the inexact
praise of the easy graces and sensuality of the body.
There is only time for this merciless inventory:

Their death together in the winter of 1847.
      Also what they suffered. How they lived.
And what there is between a man and woman.
And in which darkness it can best be proved.

From New Collected Poems by Eavan Boland. Copyright © 2008 by Eavan Boland. Reprinted by permission of W.W. Norton. All rights reserved.

A New Year at the Poets’ Forum

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Happpy New Year! I have booked the Beverly Public Library for the Poets’ Forum meetings on the third Saturday of seven different months, as follows: 

March 18; April 15 (National Poetry Month); May 20; September 16; Oct. 21; Nov. 18; Dec. 16. The March and April meetings are in the Barnet Room; all others are in the Sohier Room. 

The library has allotted us from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. for our meetings. We will go back to our 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. time for the March meeting, since most of us are used to it. The library is allowing us to bring our inidivduals lunches, which is very nice since food is usually forbidden. We can discuss at the meeting whether we would rather meet from 10 to 12 or 12 to 2. We can also decide if we want a summer outing, which we’ve enjoyed in the past.

It has been a while since we met regularly. The Covid virus was a big culprit. And, someone getting a job on Saturdays (i.e., me, the former and now current Forum director), set things back a bit. Both Jeanette Maes, Mass State Poetry Society President, and Roberta Hung, her right-hand woman, did their best to add the Forum to their busy lives, but each sighed with relief when I quit my Saturday job and offered my services again.

We have in the past presented programs on different poets or poetric forms or periods. I will think of something for March 18th — perhaps an Irish poet. I’ll let you know closer to the date. Other members are encouraged to make presentions. We will also politely critique one another’s poems. Sharpen your pencils and start writing your fabulous poems. And, if they aren’t quite fabulous, we’ll help you get there!

Note, that the Mass State Poetry Society has regular meetings. Check them out at https://mastatepoetrysociety.tripod.com.

Now for some inspiration. You probably know that Pulizer Prize winner and US Poet Laureat Charles Simic died this month. He immigrated from Siberia as a teenager and taught at the University of New Hampshire for more than 30 years. But, I am bringing you a poem by David Slavitt, since it is about death and mourning. Also, it is set in Boston, on Arch Street, near the old Filenes. I was charmed. I hope you like it.