Sol Magazine
www.sol-magazine.org
April 2004 Edition
 © 2004 Sol Magazine


Sol Magazine, A Poetry Journal:    An international organization of Members and Volunteers interested in the education of poets.  E-mail us at Sol.Magazine@prodigy.net .  For Submission Requirements and Membership information, visit: http://www.sol-magazine.org.
 
 

SPONSORS:
SOL MAGAZINE

JUDGES:
CRAIG TIGERMAN
ROY SCHWARTZMAN


DEDICATION: In National Poetry Month, we honor all who celebrate and participate in the creation or appreciation of poetry, and we give thanks for all who raise a voice, share work, or are part of something bigger.  Learn.  Teach.  Share. 

FEATURED ARTICLES - April
Note: These links are on separate web pages and will exit you from the current edition.
  • Poet Laureate Edition
  • Poetry +: Malcolm Brodwick & Julio Marquina
  • Grammar Rules!: "Compliment Versus Complement"
  • CONTENTS of this page:


    LETTERS FROM POET LAUREATE PARTICIPANTS- 
    Letters may be edited for length and relevant content.
    FROM -- SuzAnne C. Cole, Houston, TX, USA – My heart is full this morning after reading that I have been selected as Sol's 2004 Poet Laureate. What a honor! I am very proud and happy.  The description of my poetry is superb—and very helpful to me!  Thank you for your personal support and the support of Sol Magazine—not only for me, but also for many, many poets.  Love, SuzAnne.
    FROM -- Shannon Riggs, Victoria, BC, CAN – Thank you so much!  This has been such an honor.  Please pass my thanks along to the judges.  Shannon Riggs.  (Second Place Winner of the 2004 Poet Laureate competition.)
    FROM -- Avonne Griffin, Greer, SC, USA – I am delighted to have been asked to participate in this year's Poet Laureate Competition. The competition was incredible, and to have placed third is thrilling. I have read and enjoyed each of the poets in Sol contests this year, and I have to say, it is an honor to be among such talent. And here's something else. They all seem to have soft clay and diversity. What is that magic ingredient? Perhaps some of it is creative energy and an eagerness to grow. But there's something more, and I am happy to have found this group of fine poets to stretch and grow with. Thank you and all the judges and staff at Sol Magazine.  You are doing more for the art and craft of poetry than you will ever know... Thank you for your consistance and diligence, and thank you for the creative and inspiring challenges, and for keeping the standard high. That starts with you. Sincerely, Avonne Griffin. 
    FROM -- Kathy Kehrli, Factoryville, PA, USA – I wanted to thank you and the rest of the Poet Laureate volunteers for all the hard work you put into this competition and the Website as a whole. It is always an honor to be included among such distinguished company. Sol is such a warm and welcoming place; it truly lives up to its namesake!  Kathy.
    FROM -- Claiborne Schley Walsh, Montrose, AL, USA – My hardiest congratulations to the finalist in the 2004 Poet Laureate competition!  I was pleased to have earned Honorable Mention and see I am in very good company!  Well done one and all!  Sincerely, Claiborne Walsh.
    FROM --Terrie Leigh Relf, San Diego, CA, USA –  Congratulations to all the winners--and to the judges, too, of course!  Great job.  I'll be reading these {Poet Laureate poems} over and over again.  Inspired?  Yes, I am.  Terrie.


    EDITOR'S CHOICE

    EDITOR'S CHOICE

    how to write a poem

    find a pasture fence that sags with honeysuckle
    breathe deeply   hold the sweet scent in your
    lungs   exhale   breathe the way you do
    when the doctor listens to your heart
    with a stethoscope   linger by the roadside
    until sunset    once home take pen and paper
    breathe in   exhale   your breath will be poetry

    Carol Cotten, Galveston, TX, USA

    COMMENTS:  The microscopic focus on a single experience of inhaling honeysuckle captures how writers often overcomplicate the literary process.  Effective contrast between the clinical medical process and intuitive inspiration.  Creative approach, vivid portrayal, echoing sounds throughout.  The brevity of this poem holds so much that it almost overflows with poetic essence, and indeed, does breathe.  A memorable jewel of a poem with such interesting imagery, it immediately captures the imagination and demands another reading.  So very well done.  Brava, poet!

    Each month, Sol Magazine's editors choose one favorite poem from that month's winners for the honor of EDITOR'S CHOICE.  Each EDITOR'S CHOICE will be automatically entered in the FAVORITE POEM OF THE YEAR 2004 competition, voted on by Sol Magazine Members at the end of the year.

    Back to contents


    WORKING WITH ?
    JUDGE:  CRAIG TIGERMAN
    SPONSOR:  SOL MAGAZINE

    In "Shoveling Snow with Buddha," a poem from Sailing Alone Around the Room, Billy Collins used 48 lines and ten stanzas to develop the idea of creating a situation where a famous person was his work mate. We asked our members to use a similar idea.  All of the entries were wonderfully done, and well worth publishing, but only the single winner appears here.
    ==========
    FIRST PLACE
    WINNER OF A $15.00 ELECTRONIC BOOK GIFT CERTIFICATE

    Gardening with Van Gogh

    Wonderfully warm, sunny day.  Halfway to May and
    Too late to plant potatoes, we work the garden:
    Me; a Dutch child named Van Gogh.  He chooses fat
    Flat squash seeds to press into a mound of earth, tossing
    The empty packet of seeds among the weeds we
    Pulled and stacked inside the compost bin.  It takes
    A meeting of the minds to decide

    Where to plant the cucumbers.
    Everything must have its season ­ even genius and
    Gerbera daisies.  Or tiny turnip seeds that are
    Smaller than peppercorns.  Or Bluelake Beans --
    Long and lean ­ unlike the Chinese
    Radish seeds he spilled in hodgepodges
    Of abstract abandon

    Tomatoes overlook lima beans overlooking lettuces
    Bereft of form or furrows ­ a plot undisciplined
    Where flowers adorn vegetables like
    Crows adorn cornstalks or
    Squash bugs embellish zucchini.  Where
    Color and contrast have more import than
    Rigor or flavor

    Today
    Only sunflowers remain ­ bear
    Testament to April/May transactions.
    Our masterpiece of elbow grease and
    Dedication played out, as gardens must …
    Dead plants among the
    Dust that once was fertile as

    A Dutch child’s imagination.
    Van Gogh sketches the raised black
    Of a thousand-seeded eye whose
    Golden mane fans out like flames
    Around its heavy head --
    Number 2 scribblings in a
    Big Chief sketchpad

    Satisfied, he takes a box of rainbow-hued
    Crayolas, then colors outside the lines

    SJ Baldock, Lancaster, TX, USA

    COMMENTS:  This poem is both entertaining and well-written, built upon a delicious string of internal rhymes and alliterations couched in pleasing rhythms.  All the while the reader feels planted in that garden, observing as the poet and the young child/old artist craft their masterpiece.  Lovely use of very particular language, with phrasings that lift their petals to the readers ear and eye:  "A thousand-seeded eye," "Dead plants among the dust," "bugs embellish zucchini," "hodgepodges / Of abstract abandon."  At first read, each stanza seems carelessly tossed onto the fertile ground of the reader's imagination, but a second read shows the linking of the carefully developed enchanting metaphor of gardening and color that represents the two gardeners themselves.  Delightful!  It manages to perfectly capture the absolute "abstract abandon" that so characterized Van Gogh's work, and one imagines, his life as well.  Beautiful word choices, imagery, and closing lines - truly a winner.
     

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    I WRITE
    JUDGE:  ROY SCHWARTZMAN
    SPONSOR:  SOL MAGAZINE

    FIRST PLACE
    WINNER OF A $15.00 ELECTRONIC BOOK GIFT CERTIFICATE

    how to write a poem

    find a pasture fence that sags with honeysuckle
    breathe deeply   hold the sweet scent in your
    lungs   exhale   breathe the way you do
    when the doctor listens to your heart
    with a stethoscope   linger by the roadside
    until sunset    once home take pen and paper
    breathe in   exhale   your breath will be poetry

    Carol Cotten, Galveston, TX, USA

    COMMENTS:  The microscopic focus on a single experience of inhaling honeysuckle captures how writers often overcomplicate the literary process.  Effective contrast between the clinical medical process and intuitive inspiration.  Creative approach, vivid portrayal, echoing sounds throughout.  The brevity of this poem which holds so much that it almost overflows with poetic essence, and indeed, does breathe.  A memorable jewel of a poem with such interesting imagery, it immediately captures the imagination and demands another reading.  So very well done.  Brava, poet!
    ==========
    SECOND PLACE
    Words Fail Me

    I dream words snapping like sheets in March winds;
    I write words sagging like linen in August.
    I dream words dazzling readers blind;
    I write a bare-wire strand of 25-watt bulbs.
    I dream words clinging to sense as wisteria to a tree;
    I write the deaf signing to the blind.
    I dream what I cannot write. . . .
    and yet still I write.

    SuzAnne C. Cole, Houston, TX, USA

    COMMENTS:  Excellent use of sharp antitheses through vivid metaphors and similes. The stark contrasts build to the fundamental opposition between dreams and reality.  The quick alternation between "dream" and "write" is so like the process of writing where a poet almost dreams an image then almost looses it in translation into words.  How apt are the three ending lines!
    EDITOR'S NOTE:  SuzAnne C. Cole is Sol Magazine's 2004 Poet Laureate.
    ==========
    THIRD PLACE
    On the Defensive

    Of all the weapons in the war against worry,
    I find words the most effective,
    not mental words,
    aimed (usually to little result)
    at negotiating a settlement based on reason,
    but written words on screen or paper,
    weapons that either lure the enemy into the open
    or ignore it to death.

    Katherine Swarts, Houston, TX, USA

    COMMENTS:  The brevity of this poem reinforces the surprising conclusion that the absence of words sometimes speaks loudest.
    ==========
    HONORABLE MENTION
    Caldera

    I write
    Like volcanoes vomit
    Activity seems abnormal
    Sputtering spewing and producing little
    On rare occasions
    plumes arching fire fan the darkness
    Collapsing into dormancy I wonder
    How did I do that

    Neil Crenshaw, Marietta, GA, USA

    COMMENTS:  The disturbing alliterative image of the erratic volcano illustrates the uneasy relationship between writers and their own writing.  The literary volcano is beautiful, dangerous, yet ultimately mysterious.
    ==========
    HONORABLE MENTION
    Berry Picking

    My fingers are stained blue from picking
    berries all morning. There's a knack to it though:
    If one is too teal it will tart the tongue,
    too dark and it will mush. Powder-blue berries
    taste best. These are what I search for, push
    leaves and twigs aside for. I love to hear the plunk
    in my white bucket. I smile with blue teeth
    and lips. Lazy bees love me. We hum. We hum.

    Maryann Hazen Stearns, Ellenville, NY, USA

    COMMENTS:  Vivid visual imagery is enhanced by onomatopoeia: mush, plunk. The conclusion completes the analogy between berry selection and word choice: a symphony of sound.  This use of a nature metaphor to explain the writing experience without actually mentioning writing is quite subtle, but wonderfully refreshing.
    ==========
    OTHER POEMS COMMENTED UPON BY OUR JUDGE AND/OUR EDITORS
    ==========
    Hocus Focus

    With such charms my days are filled:
    Watch me turn lead into gold.
    With each door opened and closed,
    This key grows ever more prized.
    A wooden bridge, battered boards:
    My chewed pencil splinters words.
    Call me wizard, of a kind,
    For this is my magic wand.

    Elizabeth Barrette, Charleston, IL, USA
    COMMENTS: The metaphoric image of the pencil as wand links the magical components that otherwise would have little in common: charms, magic keys.  Excellent use of alliteration and assonance in lines five and six.  The phrase, "wooden bridge, battered boards" evokes a fine image and its sound is wonderful as it moves the mouth and tongue.  This poem simply must be read aloud.
    ==========
    I love the sound of words on pulp

    that cling and curve with a rise and a fall;
    My eyes have a feast and my nerves do jump
    to the 'drama', the writer's call.
    Words tease and tickle, the play of grass and the sickle,
    they cut through; Now my emotions are aloud.
    Tears and rains are soon, after the thundering cloud.

    Aparna Belapurkar, Feltham, EG, GBR
    COMMENTS:  The lilting rhythm captures the rise and fall of productivity as well as the emotional highs and lows of writers' experiences.
    ==========
    Hearing Burns

    Ayrshire's early childhood days
    hearing what the teacher says,
    then Burns Suppers every year,
    served to fashion poetry's ear.
    Sitting here many years later
    putting poetry's pen to paper.
    Writing little poems of mine.
    Really got to make them rhyme.

    Colin William Campbell, Kunming, YP, CHN
    COMMENTS:  Interesting interior dialogue of the poet captured as a summary of the poet's literary training. The poet questions while illustrating the relationship between literary discipline and formulaic strangulation.
    ==========
    Keepers

    I never leave my hive
    Without pen and paper in my pockets
    To collect phrases that flow
    Across pages like golden nectar
    Future industrious workers
    May comb through my harvest
    To cross pollinate their poesies
    Perpetuating word-keepers

    Lois Lay Castiglioni, Galveston, TX USA
    COMMENTS:   Unusual metaphoric angle here uses the "queen bee" concept but not as readers are accustomed to encountering it.  In this poem, the readers become the workers, a fascinating spin on reader response and the theories of literary criticism.
    =============
    Writing on the Block

    Let me just put down my pen
    and the voices begin,
    pulling me here, pulling me there,
    showing me visions
    in every pool of light.
    But let me take up my pen again,
    and the voices are stilled
    in perfect silence.

    Lynne Craig, Terrell, TX, USA
    COMMENTS:  This poet provides a succinct description of writer's block: the paradox that inspiration and productivity rarely work in tandem.
    =========
    Night Write

    night
    I write
    by candlelight
    casting shadows and giving sight
    reveal a clearer form of sight
    break through the night
    my light
    write

    Betty Dobson, Halifax, NS, CAN
    COMMENTS:  The symmetry of this poem's construction enacts the writing cycle itself, building and the waning in intensity. A tantalizing ambiguity: should readers consider final two lines a gentle homage or a desperate command?
    =========
    Taming the Page

    Thoughts swirl wildly,
    A fog of ideas,
    spiral out, then tighten back in.
    Taking shape as characters form,
    ideas take root.
    Stories spring to life.
    Taking a bit of me,
    into each and every one.

    Jennifer Galvin, Stafford, VA USA
    COMMENTS:  The metaphor of sense emerging from the fog of ideas shows how the writer's fundamental task is to order chaos.  Well done.
    =========
    a matter of degrees

    not nearly so difficult
    as reading
    easy to follow
    like a favorite recipe
    a matter of degrees
    not the result
    of obedience
    to prescriptive rules

    Neil Greenberg, Rockville, MD, USA
    COMMENTS:  This poet insists that forms need not be formulaic, that the mark of originality is disciplined creativity.
    =========
    Come With Me

    If I could find the perfect sound
    to share the rush of sight within
    this swirling tide of inspiration,
    I might pen a flawless verse
    to capture all your senses
    and lead you to my heart.
    Come with me, inhale the light,
    discover my camellias.

    Avonne Griffin, Greer, SC, USA
    COMMENTS:  The Synesthesia of inhaling light and communicating inner sight via audible sound add depth to what on the surface appear to be conventional metaphors.
    ===========
    Getting It Right

    Counting syllables on fingers
    too many, not enough.
    Now to my thesaurus, precious tool
    but it’s only a poem in the rough.
    A metaphor or simile
    devices of artistic craft
    upon the page in gel-pen ink
    small boat afloat on sea, bereft.

    Jeanette Oestermyer, Roswell, NM, USA
    COMMENTS:  This sparse yet accurate description of the "tools of the trade" gives a concrete idea of how humbling writing can be. Amid our high-tech world of wonder, writers still count on fingers, prowl paper pages, and inventory poetic devices.
    ==========
    To Escape The Dark

    This word insomnia will not let me sleep;
    the words mumble in my mind, search
    for a way out - paper to be expressed
    upon, a place to be remembered.  I try
    to hold them in until morning, but they
    will not quiet.  I rollover, click on the light,
    fumble for my fine point and a page,
    to escape the dark I write.

    Kathy Paupore, Kingsford, MI, USA
    COMMENTS:  The first line is striking: the very word for sleeplessness prevents sleep, and unspoken words seem to scream.
    ==========
    This Writing

    Even if nothing ever comes
    of This - this Writing, I will
    have experienced that
    astonishing moment when
    words arrive from whatever
    cosmic place - and a poem
    begins to write itself
    unbidden.

    John E. Rice, Houston, TX, USA
    COMMENTS:  Readers are re–reminded that the important part of writing is the process itself, regardless of the outcome or rewards.
    ==========
    ink and morning

    the savage steps
    as I question my soul
    the pen an enemy
    cutting harsh lines
    in brusquely lettered failures
    that bloom to flowers
    beneath my tears as ink
    and morning fade away

    James M. Thompson, Baytown, TX, USA
    COMMENTS: Sharp metaphoric contrasts preserve the tension and kinship between agony and artistry.

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    Questions?  E-mail Mary Margaret Carlisle, Managing Editor: Sol.Editor@prodigy.net

    SOL MAGAZINE'S 2004 VOLUNTEER STAFF

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    Phone number:  281-316-2255
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    SPONSORSHIP

    We hate to ask, but providing prizes for our winning poets is an non-ending task.  Over the years we've offered many locking diaries, hundreds of book gift certificates and bookmarks, uncounted books and chapbooks, and even a few picnic baskets!  Only about one-fourth of our prizes come from Sponsors, and the rest are donated by co-founders Leo F. Waltz and Mary Margaret Carlisle.  Please consider adding your name to the list.  Become a Sol Sponsor.  Write to Sol.Editor@prodigy.net for more information.