Saturday Poetry – ‘Heart to Heart’ by Rita Dove This week’s Saturday Poetry brings you the soul-stirring poem titled ‘Heart to Heart’ by Rita Dove. The author of numerous collections of poetry, Rita Dove served as the US Poet Laureate from 1993 to 1995 and as a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets from 2005 to 2011. “How to find words for the human heart and all the emotions we ascribe to it? The path is a veritable minefield of clichés—those well-intentioned, once-fresh expressions whose very popularity has rendered them useless, even laughable. I decided to take these tired metaphors and deconstruct their camouflage, until all that remains is the…

Saturday Poetry – ‘Good Bones’ – Maggie Smith This week’s Saturday Poetry brings you the soul-stirring poem titled ‘Good Bones’ by Maggie Smith. For this edition of Saturday Poetry, we have paired Smith’s emotive words with mobile art by the talented @leoleoparis with the captivating artwork untitled complementing the poem’s essence beautifully, creating a symphony of emotions. Maggie Smith is the author of Good Bones (Tupelo Press, 2017), The Well Speaks of Its Own Poison (Tupelo Press, 2015), and Lamp of the Body (Red Hen Press, 2005) To view the others we have published in this section, go here. via Poets.org ‘Good Bones’ by Maggie Smith Life is short, though I keep this from my…

Saturday Poetry – ‘Proof’ – Tiana Clark This week’s Saturday Poetry brings you the soul-stirring poem titled ‘Proof’ by Tiana Clark. For this edition of Saturday Poetry, we have paired Santana’s emotive words with mobile art by the talented @darkkosmou with the captivating artwork titled ‘Randomly layered emotions’ complementing the poem’s essence beautifully, creating a symphony of emotions. Tiana Clark holds a BA from Tennessee State University and an MFA from Vanderbilt University. Clark is the author of I Can’t Talk About the Trees Without the Blood (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018), winner of the 2017 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize and the 2020 Kate Tufts Discovery Award. She is the recipient of…

This week’s Saturday Poetry brings you the soul-stirring poem titled ‘apocalyptic lyric’ by Cintia Santana. For this edition of Saturday Poetry, we have paired Santana’s emotive words with mobile art by the talented @beyond_1st_light – Jane Schultz. The captivating artwork titled ‘To bee or not to bee’ complements the poem’s essence beautifully, creating a symphony of emotions. Cintia Santana is a Latinx poet and interdisciplinary artist living in the Bay Area on unceded Muwekma Ohlone territory. The recipient of fellowships from Djerassi and CantoMundo, she is the author of The Disordered Alphabet, forthcoming in 2023 from Four Way Books. She teaches fiction and poetry workshops in Spanish, as well as…

This week’s Saturday Poetry brings you the soul-stirring poem titled ‘Enough’ by the talented Andru Defeye. His poetic prowess has garnered recognition, with Sacramento Magazine listing him as one of the city’s hundred business leaders in 2021. Moreover, California State University, Sacramento, has nominated him to receive an honorary doctorate, a testament to his impact on the artistic community. Defeye’s contributions extend beyond his poetry; he served as the director of communications for Sol Collective from 2009 to 2020. He is also the visionary behind Zero Forbidden Goals, a support system dedicated to fostering arts equity, experiences, and education among creatives. In a remarkable achievement, Defeye was honored as the…

Saturday Poetry – ‘Crossing the Line’ by E. Ethelbert Miller This week’s Saturday Poetry matched with mobile photography/art is entitled ‘Crossing the Line’ by E. Ethelbert Miller. “I wrote this poem at The Line Hotel in Washington, D.C. It’s an outgrowth of a meeting with my friend Maria Otero who was born in Bolivia. In the first stanza, there is a reference to miners. We all struggle to mine love in our relationships. The poem focuses on the commitment required to maintain a friendship over decades. It’s about aging and acknowledging another person’s beauty and how it changes, but is forever eternal. What holds the poem together is the ritual…

Saturday Poetry – ‘To the Sea’ by Anis Mojgani This week’s Saturday Poetry matched with mobile photography/art is entitled ‘To the Sea’ by Anis Mojgani. “This poem comes from how things in ourselves we are sometimes self-conscious about are often things in us that others love, and also speaks to the humanness of wanting to be known by and to know others. A person in my life whom I love often says she is rambling when she seemingly starts to ramble, and, between her being a quiet person and me loving the sound of her voice, I take little issue with this. One evening on a drive, this very thing…

Saturday Poetry – ‘To the Sea’ by Anis Mojgani This week’s Saturday Poetry matched with mobile photography/art is entitled ‘To the Sea’ by Anis Mojgani. “This poem comes from how things in ourselves we are sometimes self-conscious about are often things in us that others love, and also speaks to the humanness of wanting to be known by and to know others. A person in my life whom I love often says she is rambling when she seemingly starts to ramble, and, between her being a quiet person and me loving the sound of her voice, I take little issue with this. One evening on a drive, this very thing…

Saturday Poetry – ‘Morning in the Burbs’ by Marcus Wicker This week’s Saturday Poetry matched with mobile photography/art is entitled ‘Morning in the Burbs’ by Marcus Wicker. He is the author of Silencer (Mariner Books, 2017) and Maybe the Saddest Thing (Harper Perennial, 2012), which won the National Poetry Series and was a finalist for an NAACP Image Award. He has received fellowships from Cave Canem, the Fine Arts Work Center, and the Poetry Foundation. Wicker is the poetry editor of Southern Indiana Review, and he teaches at the University of Memphis. I have matched mobile art by @hereinmyownskin_365 with this image untitled.  If you would like to be featured in our Saturday…

Saturday Poetry – ‘Untitled for a Reason’ by Tara Betts This week’s Saturday Poetry matched with mobile photography/art is entitled ‘Self-Care Is a Psy-Op’ by Jameka Williams.  I have matched mobile art by @1000worte with this image entitled ‘Winter Noon’. “So, when I was writing this poem, I was talking to someone who I knew there was no way I could ever be within the way that I had hoped. Even though it was clear, it reminded me that my heart had not shrunk and that having those aspirations for love was still possible for me. So, what does it mean to write about a love unrequited yet still imagined?…