He will come like last leaf’s fall.
One night when the November wind
has flayed the trees to bone, and earth
wakes choking on the mould,
the soft shroud’s folding.
He will come like frost.
One morning when the shrinking earth
opens on mist, to find itself
arrested in the net
of alien, sword-set beauty.
He will come like dark.
One evening when the bursting red
December sun draws up the sheet
and penny-masks its eye to yield
the star-snowed fields of sky.
He will come, will come,
will come like crying in the night,
like blood, like breaking,
as the earth writhes to toss him free.
He will come like child.
Why did He choose a northern maid
From Nazareth, who had to trade
Her Galilee for Judah just
To get Messiah where He must
Be born? A strange and roundabout
Procedure for a God, no doubt,
Who values His efficiency
And rules the world from sea to sea!
Why not a girl from Bethlehem?
Well half the girls in town would stem
From David’s line. And carpenters
Aplenty there could bear the slurs
And gossip on a virgin got
with child, who blushed and said she’d not
Once kissed her man this whole year past.
Why not? Because God’s power is vast,
And in one little virgin birth
His sovereign joy and mighty mirth
In saving us from evil bent
Could never, never rest content.
Instead He turned and set His sight
To spangle Rome with all His might;
And took a girl from Galilee
To magnify His sovereignty.
And made the Roman king conspire
With God, to serve a purpose higher
Than he or any in the realm
Could see—a stroke to overwhelm
A few with faith and cause their heart
To know the truth, at least in part,
That, though God loves efficiency
And rules the world from sea to sea,
He does not go from here to there
By shortest routes to save His fare.
He’d rather start in Galilee,
Then pass a law in Rome, you see,
To get the child down south at length,
And magnify His sovereign strength.
God rules the flukes of history
To see that Micah’s prophecy
Comes true. Why did He choose a maid
From Nazareth? Perhaps she prayed
That endless mercy might abound
And take the longer way around.
The mighty mercy we adore
As we light advent candle four.
Last night Asheville hosted two great poetry readings.
Loretta’s Cafe featured the Flood Reading Series with poets DeWayne Barton, Gyorgyi Voros, and Landon Godfrey.
Malaprop’s featured readings by Evie Shockley and Luke Hankins.
Unfortunately, I missed both readings because I was on the road and didn’t return to my adopted hometown until after the readings. Anyone have a report to how the readings went? Please feel free to offer a review of the readings in the comments.
DeWayne Barton is a native of Asheville, N.C. who grew up in Washington, D.C. and is a Gulf War Veteran. He attended Norfolk State University from 1996-1999, majoring in Social Work. He is the author of a recent book of poetry, Urban Nightmare Silent Screams and has been involved in community improvement and youth development for over 15 years. He is both a co-founder and co-director of Asheville Green Opportunities, a job training program designed to prepare Asheville area youth and adults for “green-collar” careers. Both his sculpture art and his poetry reflect his commitment to environmental sustainability and social justice.
Gyorgyi Voros is the author of Unwavering. Conrad Aiken says of her poetry: “The music of Voros’s poetry is more than music. It’s the motion of life and lots of things in it thinking, changing one’s mind, forgetting and remembering.”
Voros is also the author of Notations of the Wild: Ecology in the poetry of Wallace Stevens, published by University of Iowa Press. She teaches poetry and creative writing at Virginia Tech, in Blacksburg Virginia.
Landon Godfrey has just been awarded a North Carolina Arts Council 2011-2012 Artist Fellowship. Her book, Second-Skin Rhinestone-Spangled Nude Soufflé Chiffon Gown, which was published in 2011 was selected by David St. John for the Cider Press Review Book Award.
The poet should speak to all men, for a moment, of that other life of theirs that they have smothered and forgotten.
Edith Sitwell (via nathanielstuart1)
NOTES: 1) nathanielstuart, June 7, 2011, (page no longer available, web site is still active, accessed April 27, 2024, https://www.tumblr.com/nathanielstuart)
In September 2010 an idea was born to hold a poetry reading under a full moon at the Roof Garden of the historic Battery Park Hotel. Three weeks after that September afternoon, sixty people attended an invite-only poetry reading, book-signing and jazz show on Friday, October 22, 2010. The event was publicized almost exclusively through Twitter, Facebook and word-of-mouth and featured Asheville, North Carolina poets Barbara Gravelle, myself (Matthew Mulder) and Brian Sneeden with special musical performance by Vendetta Creme and Aaron Price. And thus, Rooftop Poets was born in Asheville under a full moon.
Since the Roof Garden reading, the Rooftop Poets have been invited to read at various venues and interviewed for newspaper and television. Brian’s poem “The Temple” (included in Rooftop Poets poetry book) went on to be the Mountain Xpress’s first place winner in their 2011 poetry contest.
If you missed the memorable evening last October, there are still a few copies of the limited-edition, 64-page book. You may purchase copies at Malaprop’s.
Rooftop Poets is a limited-edition, 64-page book of poems featuring the work of three Asheville, North Carolina poets.
Barbara Gravelle, author of several poetry books including, Keepsake, Dancing the Naked Dance of Love, and her latest collection of poems, Poet on the Roof of the World.
Matthew Mulder, one of the original members of the Traveling Bonfires, his poetry and prose have appeared or are forthcoming in Crab Creek Review, Small Press Review, The Indie, H_NGM_N, and other publications.
Brian Sneeden has produced, designed or written for more than a hundred theatrical performances. He is the current director and MC of Asheville Vaudeville.
Diana Pinckney has published poetry and prose in such journals and magazines as Southern Poetry Review, Cream City Review, Tar River Poetry, Cave Wall, Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, Icarus International, Atlanta Review, Green Mountains Review, Main Street Rag, Kalliope, Iodine, Asheville Poetry Review, Calyx, RHINO, Charlotte Viewpoint… Magazine, The Pedestal Magazine.com, Creative Loafing and many others. Her chapbook, Fishing With Tall Women, won North Carolina’s 1996 Persephone Press Book Award and South Carolina’s Kinlock Rivers Memorial Chapbook Contest. Nightshade Press, Troy, Maine, published her second book of poems, White Linen, in 1998. Alchemy, the third collection was published by Main Street Rag Publishing Co. in 2004. The latest full-length book of poems concerns the many fascinations and mysteries of the sea, among other things. Green Daughters was released April 2011.
Barbara Gravelle, author of several poetry books including, Keepsake, Dancing the Naked Dance of Love, and her latest collection of poems, Poet on the Roof of the World. Barbara Gravelle began to publish poetry in the 1960s when she was in Detroit at Wayne State University. In 1970 she moved to Berkeley, California where her first book, Keepsake, was published by Two Windows Press. She worked with the San Francisco State NEA Poetry in the Schools program at Northern California schools. Concurrently she worked at Intersection Center for the Arts in North Beach directing the Women’ Reading Series and an experimental Feminist Writing Workshop. Dancing the Naked Dance of Love, her book of San Francisco poems was published during this time. In the mid 1980’s Barbara began to migrate to the island of Kythera in Southern Greece, while living there she wrote the poems for Poet on the Roof of the World.
Matthew Mulder has published poetry and prose in such journals and magazines as Crab Creek Review, H_NGM_N, The Indie, Rapid River Magazine, ISM Quarterly, Salamander, Wander, The Blotter, Southern Cross Review and others. He teaches poetry writing classes at Asheville bookstores and fine arts centers and is presently translating selected works of German poet Rolf Dieter Brinkmann. He is the author Late Night Writing (2004) and editor of A Body Turning (2010) and Tomorrow We Sweat Poetry (2009). His new poems are anthologized in Rooftop Poets (2010).
If you’re participating in the 30 poems in 30 days writing challenge, it’s day eleven. How are you doing with the challenge? This poem sketch was written yesterday, but I was offline so here’s poem 10 of 30.
Note: These poems are rough drafts and include typos, erroneous grammar and other literary warts. In this case, perfume is intentionally misspelled to represent a unique American accent.
Coffeehouse Junkie 