Leda
Is it consensual,
swan swooning
over the lady...
rushing her body
as she bathes?
He, a god, uses
trickery three times.
Once, to don the swan,
then to take her down,
last, to drop the act.
All those feathers
she’ll feel forever.
~CMH
In the spirit of celebration, and with my friend's suggestion to "toot your horn," let me share some exciting news. I'm a Pushcart Prize nominee. It feels odd to say so, a bit bewildering, and I'm honored. Thanks to the team at Kelsay Books for selecting "Almost" as one of your six nominations.
This poem from 2019 is included in the 2025 publication The Other Side of the Hill by the Capitol Hill Poetry Group, Pond Hill Press. It's as relevant now as before.
And, when something is committed to print, it takes on another life.
The Capitol Hill Poetry Group will be reading from our new collected work, The Other Side of the Hill, at the Hill Center (yes, all these hills converge) on November 2. The Hill Center is located at the former site of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where, ironically, my husband worked until it closed. We offer different medicine... through poems.
"Readings and Refreshments" November 2, 5:00-7:00 pm, 921 Pennsylvania Avenue, SE Washington, DC
The arts in DC are alive and well and getting work done!
The marvelous and greatly entertaining Grace Cavalieri emceed our event (look her up!), and put each poet on the spot with her personalized questions.
Grace: " How does being a dancer help you write poetry? "
Charise: " Ah, that could be a book. There's the movement of the poem, how the poem moves... how it takes shape, and even how it's spaced on the page.
There's also something ineffable about both of these arts, and that's where they meet."
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Celebrating Fifty years of the Capitol Hill Poetry Group |
Feels like you were there, right?
