Shy Poet Reading in a Sunroom

Follow the link for a sample reading from Muse in a Suitcase:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YdZjc8r-J2o4Mn2lwI7_pbFmH0DMleKQ/view?usp=sharing

Book Release

This is the part where the author announces her book release, and lets you know how much she values poetry in print, on paper. Some of the poems for Muse in a Suitcase were originally shared on this blog, and I have removed them to honor their life as a themed collection. It's ironic (or not) that during a global pandemic this collection of poetry is based in travel, expatriate living, heritage, migration, wishful thinking, presence of place and culture. We begin in Israel, move through places such as France, Panama, India, Italy, Morocco, and back to my home in the United States.  

If you'd like to take that journey with me, the chapbook is available from Amazon as well as directly from the publisher:

A rare selfie, with proof copy

https://kelsaybooks.com/products/muse-in-a-suitcase

Warm wishes,
Charise

"Study Break"

 Study Break

  

spring       like another

when the future       spreads out 
wide       as a field
first times       for such       and such 
seemingly       far       looming soon

 

outside the classroom       books set 
aside       the dandelions       call       
my name       

 

plentiful yellow       deigning    
to pop up       as I bellyflop       to them       
knot their stems       

round round       for a tiara       
to wear       the rest of       an afternoon

Photo by Natalia Luchanko

~LCMH

 

 

 

"Not a Lone Wolf"

 Not a Lone Wolf

                        after Monica Hesse

 

I do not need to hear 

that he “snapped,” or “had a bad day” 

 

I do not need to hear 

that he was heartbroken 

 

I do not need to hear 

that he was a churchgoer

 

I do not need to hear 

how he struggled with “temptation”

 

Don’t even need to know his name, really

 

Don’t need to hear thoughts and prayers

 

Don’t need to read excerpts of a weird manifesto

 

I want to hear about systems that helped build
the shooter

 

––things he saw celebrated, things he saw excused 

 

people who he was taught have value,
people who he was taught have none. 

 

 

Extracts from Monica Hesse’s article “Things I do not ever need to hear or read about a shooter again,” The Washington Post March 19, 2021

 

"Art in an Age of Uncertainty"

Among the many cancellations due to the pandemic, an annual arts festival in Mathias, West Virginia––where I was scheduled to have a poetry table––has led to an interesting turn of events. 

Joshua Miller, who hosts the event on his property, commissioned a poem on the subject of art in uncertain times. I am indebted to him for inspiring the creation of a poem that has found a literary home at High Shelf Press. 

The photos are from my contributor copy. You can view the entire March issue on their website at: https://www.highshelfpress.com/issuexxviii

To inspire others is such a gift. 

Warm wishes, 
Charise

New Book Coming Soon...!

How I love to showcase art––and here is the book cover for my new publication, coming in April from Kelsay Books. Sandra Guiloff is the cover artist, supremely gifted in her intuitive artistic vision. Look forward to sharing this collection of poems with you! 

 

Warm wishes,
Charise

"For Whomsoever"

 For Whomsoever 

 

I hope you have the chance to do nothing. 

You can stop here, heed no further. 

 

Or nestle between beginnings/endings 

of wording: there         there         there

 

It’s the way an elder consoles the hurt child. 

There, there, there. 

 

Bringing him close, bringing her close, 

into the nexus of an us:

 

us understanding, us having been there. 

There, there. It will get better. 

 

When you’re grown, making a living, 

I hope you have the chance to do nothing. 

 

To take it in, the medicine of air.

To feel held by the air. 

 

~ LCMH

"Poetry is not a luxury"

 Let's bask in the words of Audre Lorde:

"Poetry is not a luxury. It is a vital necessity of our existence. It forms the quality of the light within which we predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change, first made into language, then into idea, then into more tangible action. Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought. The farthest horizons of our hopes and fears are cobbled by our poems, carved from the rock experiences of our daily lives."