The Poppies by Jaanika Talts (watermarked image, all rights reserved by the artist)

“The Universe said, ‘let me show your soul something beautiful.’”…

Poets (left to right): the late great Gerald Chan Sieg, Lee Alexander, and the late Captain Richard Vernon.  (archive photo from the Georgia Guardian)

Presented on Creative Thinkers International in honor of World Poetry Day 2013:…

             Cover of the award-winning poetry collection THE ESSENTIAL ETHERIDGE KNIGHT.

“We each have lessons to learn and to teach, and healing is something we all do together.”—David Bedrick (Talking Back to Dr.…

From ELEMENTAL The Power of Illuminated Love





You are the man newly arriving

at history’s worm-ravaged door,

the woman whose shadows are salves

upon the bleeding breasts of the earth,…

“There is movement in the shadow of a sun that is old now. There, just there. Coming from the rim of the world.”

Toni Morrison, Family and History





The black and white photo shows you seated

in a wooden chair on the porch of a cabin

built likely by slaves, later inhabited by you:

Black American Woman Elsie Mary Bell Griffin.

One side of the image is shadowed

like the…

(photo of "Could This Be Love," the painting by Kerry James Marshall featured on the cover of Body of Life by Elizabeth Alexander, courtesy of VivaUltra on Flickr.com)







Those of us––whether writers, editors, or production personnel––who long ago cast our professional lot with the publishing industry, know that it can be as volatile and unpredictable as any other. Unless you are sitting on a stack of raving reviews for a…

Coming in 2009: Collected Visions of a Skylark Dressed in Black









EVERY HOUR HENCEFORTH





I know blackness as taught by my father:

“You are my joy and my genius,” he often said.

I know blackness as taught by my mother:

“Your smile is my robe of honor, your peace my earned grace.”



Once a year we were pilgrims driving from Atlanta

to Waycross where my brother and…

(Artwork by brothers Greg and Tim Hildebrandt)









1.

B.C.: With his brother’s blood wet on his hands,

Cain ran vomiting future sorrows of man.



Petals of gold cloud

swirled bright eternal letters

too soon forgotten.



2575-2467 B.C.: Immersed in themes of an unfolding story,

Egypt’s Fourth Dynasty blazed pyramids of glory.



Before time or space,…

(Archangel: artist unknown)



Poem From ELEMENTAL The Power of Illuminated Love





Gliding above the ruins of the world’s broken soul

destruction and mutation speak in parables of the

ignoble…

The shape of something uncaring and

perversely cold stands up inside a man

and he finds himself completely deceived.

Believing this world’s anguish is something

different from the love he keeps holding back.



There Is a story…

(Soulful art by Kahlil Gibran)





The world’s abundant treasury of art and literature would likely be a lot less abundant if not for those famed, or sometimes secret, patrons of the arts who assisted many of our most celebrated creative artists at crucial points in their lives––and sometimes throughout their lives. For visual artist Pablo Picasso, author and patron Gertrude Stein played a major role helping to launch his unparalleled…

One arm is a crystal-blue saxophone,

the other a platinum-feathered keyboard—

yours is the music that colors our dreams.



Sunday afternoon and the jazz angel cometh

tap-dancing philosophies of the drum-roll

over a…

Poet Aime Cesaire



Along with the former president of Senegal, Leopold Senghor, and French Guianian Leon Damas, Aimé Césaire during the 1930s and 1940s was one of the founding fathers of the worldwide cultural, spiritual, and political movement knows as Negritude. Césaire, a celebrated poet-playwright, was born in French Martinique June 26, 1913, and died April 17, 2008, on the first official Poem in Your Pocket Day. In addition to his…

Often they open my eyes and shut down my fears.



Sometimes eat lunch naked on the White House lawn.



Build gigabyte nests in my heart like virtual swans.



Will not give you an STD or murder your grandparents.



Will not hack your heartbeat or…

Having no clue regarding what the future held for the late actor Heath Ledger, I wrote the following review of one of his last movies, CANDY, a year ago this week:



I watched the movie "Candy" because the description on back of the DVD made me think it might have something significant to say about how poets manage to cultivate their creative gifts in the face of the world's harsh and often unforgiving realities. It was…

("Good Morning Lord" artwork by Ernest Varner)







Such are these places

where lovers of bliss behold

the angel of peace:



Above the burning,

and below the cold of all

the sad killing fields;…

Jazz Harlem Renaissance Babydoll

does the music mold your face

like a mask of mink desires

and rainbow butterfly wings

or does…

Rockets of blind faith

sputter and crackle dead dreams––

like time bleeding stars.





Through soft painted moans

a man watches his life drown

in waves of glass bones.





Celestial winds

blow chilled screams for love’s…

"Black Eyes Crying in the Cosmos" artwork by Barbara Hilal.

Lyrics as sung by Ruzahn in Christmas When Music Almost Killed the World…

The great Sufi poet Jelalludin Rumi––whom some consider a saint­­––for the past two decades has often been described as “the most popular poet in the United States.” For some, following September 11, 2001, that popularity stirred feelings of political ambivalence while for others it provided much-needed spiritual comfort. Author and Jungian therapist Connie Zweig presents us with a…