After retiring from teaching, Carol Milkuhn has concentrated on her interest in creative writing. A member of the Mad River Poets, and former Vice President of The Poetry Society of Vermont, she contributed to Pebbles from the Stream, a collection of poems published five years ago. Her poems have also appeared in Lyric magazine, Vermont Literary Review, Green Mountain Trading Post, Bloodroot, and the 1929 Anthology of Vermont Writers published by The League of Vermont Writers. In addition to writing poetry, she is at work on a novel, The Rebel Pawn. Her agent will be seeking publication for this book in the Spring of 2009.
JANE AUSTEN, REVISITED
Sense and Sensibility
begins with Marianne at the piano, coaxing chords
to resonate in a vaulted, eighteenth century chamber –
a miracle before
radios and records, Sony cassettes and modern CDs,
before Hayden’s harmonies are routinely downloaded,
and Beethoven is reinvented in surround sound –
long before music is easy,
Marianne quickens the tempo, exploring restive rhythms
and passionate preludes – all the while unaware of Brandon,
middle-aged, lonely Brandon,
who is listening outside her door, so transfixed by a
silence-breaking sonata, so undone by rash,
romantic overtones
that he falls famously in love –
for so can moments unexpected, unwired, and unrehearsed
electrify,
like quarter notes that quiver, linger in mid air.
© Carol Milkuhn
All Rights Reserved. Not For Duplication Without Permission.
| Emily Loretta Robinson has taught Creative Writing at the State University of New York at Purchase. She has published poems in Literary Adagio, Second Wave, and Silver Boomers. She recently received an Honorable Mention for her poem, "Shadow People" about the after hours haunts in the French Quarter of New Orleans which kept the spirit of the City alive post-Katrina, from New Millennium Writings. She has given many Featured Readings at New York venues including The Cornelia Street Café, The Knitting Factory, and Café Reggio. She lives with her husband in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village.
CAJUN FIDDLER
Vanilla bread pudding swimmin' in brandy, bananas moist in caramel twirl
Miss Lacey’s pulled pork spittin' on the grill, and night soon cozies
the Fiddler with the fiddle
Zippin' crackin' Cotton-eyed Joe
Strummin' and strokin' One-legged Stu
Blowin on the hornpipe Blu-jean Jake
Ever'one actin' as if a clam bake
Horny old dudes jumpin' and wavin' (some in the back thumpin' and cravin')
Tourist folks tappin'
Tappin' and clappin'
While Ego-totin' showoffs dancin' wide—
Two-step rounds as the old bows slide
Dippin' below what the law should allow⎯
Courtin' those ladies from the mean Old South
Whistlin' Wooin' Whippin' to the Beat
Our own sweet language speakin' liberty
Own sweet language speakin' liberty . . .
© Emily Loretta Robinson
All Rights Reserved. Not For Duplication Without Permission.
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The author of "My Father on a Bicycle" and "North of Wondering," Patricia Clark teaches at Grand Valley State University, where she is also the university’s poet-in-residence. Her work has appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, Slate, Poetry, and many other places. "She Walks Into the Sea," a new collection of poems, will be out in 2009 as well as "Given the Trees," a chapbook.
KOAN: TOWARD PEACE
The slightest vocalizing of the wind, or perhaps just the lungs
sighing out or in, then a faint birdwing’s brushstroke,
feather caressing a windowpane, one leaf touching the rib
of another six-lobed oak leaf, a ripple just rising over a rock,
mossy, in the stream before warbling back down.
More audible, a few individual voices now standing out—
here is the dark chocolate of cello, the plucked strings of the open
ebony black piano, the kettle drum’s soft thrum and beat,
the flute’s whole notes like pebbles shining at tideline,
and the hairs on your arms stand up—electric charge tingling.
Rising sounds clash and clang, your ribs vibrating now,
pressure mounting, ears open and jangling, the faces of those
playing now clenching, fiercely staring, wrists and forearms active,
fast and faster movement, bow scrape, frantic, piercing, loud,
the notes verging on hurt, up, up and still up to a forced peak.
The conductor raises fingers to count minutes, players’ eyes
flick to him and away, back into a dream of mind as sound
blends, treetops bending now, thrashing, the broken branch
plunging down to stab soft ground, the crash of two deer
through dry brush away from the screen door, the black dog.
Heartbeats slow, a tension ungrips itself, soothes, there is a flexing
ease and meander, a rippling flow, no more standing on edge,
and mouths relax into a smile here, there, now the group gives in again
to being people, not friend against friend in war or hate, a giving up
of dissonance. Before us, they lay down their carved instruments.
© Patricia Clark
All Rights Reserved. Not For Duplication Without Permission.
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