L.L. Barkat is a writer, editor, poet, columnist, speaker and entrepreneur. She is the author of Stone Crossings: Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places, God in the Yard: Spiritual Practice for the Rest of Us, and InsideOut: Poems. Barkat is Managing Editor at The High Calling and staff writer for International Arts Movement’s The Curator. She’s also a co-editor here at TweetSpeak Poetry.

This poem is taken from InsideOut: Poems, published in 2009 by International Arts Movement.

Foyer

Who looks
at the new straw
hat, remembering
Grandma,

how she beat
brazen rays each
day by sneaking
under a brim

like that. And who
notices the wrought
iron roses now
hung askew

on our cherry
coat rack; she
wrung pits
out of red fruit

too, swatted flies,
rolled tart sweet
flesh, juice into
crust, but that is

another story;
I am asking you
about the roses
broken, and a

missing screw,
but you are busy
arranging tailored
black wool on

a cool hook worn
brass blue, we’re
just in the hall,
after all, we’re just

passing through.

I met L.L. Barkat because I had a bike crash and broke several ribs. It took a few days to figure out that I had broken bones (and a partially collapsed lung), and leaving a few nights later for the emergency room, I grabbed Stone Crossings: Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places from my “to read” pile so I’d have something to do while I was in the ER. I got to spend the night in the hospital (first time in 35 years) and, hospitals being what they are, stayed awake and read the book straight through. It was a great reason to lose sleep. When I got home, I checked L.L.’s blog and left a comment, and today we’re co-editors of this TweetSpeak space with Eric Swalberg.

And then there’s her poety. She published InsideOut: Poems in January, and I am a fan. They’re simple yet deep, containing unexpected layers of meaning and evoking unexpected layers of thoughts. Or you can read them for the sheer beauty of the words.

***Poetry Giveaway***

We did a poetry giveaway here in February, one a random drawing and one an editor’s pick for the best 100-word answer to “Why is poetry important?” For National Poetry Month, I’m doing another giveaway for InsideOut. Just leave a comment (your name or a simple “hello” will be sufficient) in the comment section between now and next Monday evening (April 19 at midnight eastern time). We’ll pick a name at random – and that person will get a copy of InsideOut.

For National Poetry Month, here are three poems by L.L. Barkat, from her InsideOut: Poems.

Evening Prayer

Alone tonight, beside
an open window.
I hear trees moving,
whispering to wind.

Would that in my dark
places, I could lean in,
let you tender move and
make me whisper too.

You

move me
with
your sorrow, I
open my mouth
and it is like
the promise of apples,
honey fragrant
on air,
a barely there
wish. I swallow
emptiness.

In Lieu of the
New York Times

If words were
clovers,
I’d pluck mine
and lay them
at your doorstep,
retreat to shade
of oak,
watch you become
a child again,
poke past purple
spikes, nip tender
white tips with
teeth, freely sip
raw sugar, lick
your lip.

Related: The International Arts Movement continues its celebration of National Poetry Month by posting L.L. Barkat’s poem “Porch” from InsideOut.

Postings and News Updates:

The Poem a Day from the Academy of American Poets fopr Tuesday was “December Moon” by Brenda Hillman.

See “Steingraber the Poet” by Maureen Doallas, about author and ecologist Sandra Steingraber.

Read “The slave soul” by Justinian at Delight and Glory and Oddity and Light.

“All the Real Dudes” – one of poetry’s fastest growing movements looks for new friends. Article by Paul Constant for the Poetry Foundation.

“How to Write a Sonnet” by poet John Lavan.

Bruce Bond’s “Wake,” new post at How a Poem Happens.

Actress Tyne Daly read W.H. Auden’s “But I Can’t” for Poets & Writers Magazine.

Here’s contribution #6 on “Why Poetry Matters” that was submitted for the poetry and wine giveaway last month. The randomly chosen commenter received a copy of L.L. Barkat’s InsideOut: Poems, and the winner of the 100-word statements on what poetry matters received a copy of the poems and a bottle of Sineann wine.

This is from Monica at Know-Love-Obey God.

When Poetry Speaks

When poetry speaks (whether I am writing or reading) . . .

. . . colors are brighter, my vision is clearer, and I hear sounds I would not have heard.

. . . I read the Bible more carefully, more thoughtfully.

. . . my emotions have an outlet, and I do not explode.

. . . communities build.

. . . writer and reader make connection.

. . . I am more sensitive to and considerate of others.

********
Related (where I mention other benefits of poetry): Scientists Are Poets, Too!

Here’s another contribution on “Why Poetry Matters” that was submitted for the poetry and wine giveaway last month. The randomly chosen commenter received a copy of L.L. Barkat’s InsideOut: Poems, and the winner of the 100-word statements on what poetry matters received a copy of the poems and a bottle of Sineann wine (and a big thanks to nAncY, aka @PoemsPrayers for the donation of the wine).

This one is from Lorrie at Grow Up Deep.

How I Came to Love Poetry

I think that poetry came to love me.

I came into this world disgruntled at having to be here. I know that sounds weird and I thought it probably was weird until I read Henry Vaughan’s poem “The Retreat.”

I was validated by those fantastic poetic words.

Poetry came to me as a gift. Not a gift in the sense of it being a talent but a gift because it allows me to feel a connection to something I feel painfully separated from. It is personal. It is a relationship and the things that are whispered to me alone…

In case you missed the live performance, there’s a replay available of L.L. Barkat’s poetry reading with Brooke Campbell’s singing at an International Arts Movement program last night in New York City.

The replay can be found here. L.L. is reading selections from her InsideOut: Poems.

The replay offers you a chance to listen to the real deal. And you still have this weekend to order InsideOut at the January special price of $6.03.

Joy at Memoria Arts talks about her response to last night’s webcast: A time for…

A couple of weeks ago, I asked if anyone who’d been reading InsideOut: Poems by L.L. Barkat had any favorites they’d like to talk about. And the answer to that question was – a definite yes.

The poems are organized by season, and Maureen Doallas likes the winter section best. “Within that section,” she wrote, “are poems I’ve read again and again.” She cites “Senility,” for example, “which conveys beautifully in just 15 lines the poet’s poignant watching of her self being disappeared as aunt, mother, and grandmother suffer ‘forgetfulness…encroaching:’”

I remember
when I existed
in more than just a
scrap of your mind…

Maureen also likes “In Your Dream” (“wonderful sing-song quality, like a beloved nursery rhyme”); “Disappearance” (“a perfect evocation of loss”); “Hibernate” (“the understanding that we have to go through darkness, the long nights of winter, to emerge into light, into day, into grace”); and “Instructions” (“which conveys all the ordinariness of life, which goes on, must go on, even as death pulls you up short and knocks the breath out of you”).

“Throughout InsideOut,” Maureen says, “it is the sparseness of the poems – the few words used in each – that is so striking when contrasted with the emotional punch you feel when you’ve reached the last lines. There is nothing studied about the poems; they are rich with every-day details of life but the life is not just observed and described; it’s turned over, re-imagined, and re-experienced…and so pulls us in.”

Reading Maureen’s comments are like reading poetry.

Nancy’s comment was short and sweet – she simply wrote her favorite:

If sunflowers
touched us lightly
as a pollen on a
blue day, would we not
care again, dream.

Laura Boggess, who earlier this week wrote an article on InsideOut for HighCallingBlogs, said: “So many I am enjoying. I haven’t quite finished caressing my way through. I recognize some, and I greet them like old friends – they, all the more special for their familiarity. These words, from ‘Verse,” breathe softly in my ear today:

I guess it must
be marks on tender
skin, bearers of sin,
cool cups of rain
and bottles of tears
collected on midnight
trains from the eyes
of old men, old women…

And Lorrie wrote: “I have little torn pieces of paper marking favorites throughout my first read. They are ‘Disappearance’ – pg. 57; ‘The Watching’ – page 73; and untitled on page 83:

Curry leaf
floats, curls
‘midst black onion
seeds, brown sauce,
and I taste
your love.

And finally, Lorrie says, “and none the least,” she likes “In Lieu of the New York Times” (pg. 84).

Here are some additional resources and links about InsideOut: Poems:

Laura’s article at HighCallingBlogs
My review at Amazon.com
InsideOut’s web page
“Poetry and Wine – A Giveaway,” the chance for a free copy through Jan. 21

International Arts Movement also has a page on InsideOut here.

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I like InsideOut: Poems by L.L. Barkat. (Disclosure: she’s a friend, but I like the poems anyway.) (:)) If you’ve been reading InsideOut, have you seen/experienced/felt/been impressed by/had your socks blown off by/ any particular poem?

If you have, leave a comment here, along with any thoughts you might have about that particular poem, and we’ll put together a summary (or perhaps a series of summaries) as an official post.

I’ve read InsideOut twice, and I have several “favorites.” Actually, if truth be told, they’re all personal favorites. One is “Foyer,” and it starts this way:

Who looks
at the new straw
hat, remembering
grandma,…

And why is this a favorite for me? Because my paternal grandmother, who died in 1984 at the age of 95 and whom I dearly loved, wore a straw hat when she worked outside in the garden. The poem catapulted me back to childhood, when I would spend a week with her each summer, just the two of us. The poem opened up a flood of good memories.

So – do you have a favorite yet? And why?

L.L. Barkat is a writer, a poet, a managing editor at the High Calling Blogs, an artist, a mother and a wife, among a lot of other things. She’s the author of Stone Crossings: Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places. Every other Friday, L.L. publishes a “Random Act of Poetry” in which she highlights the work of various writers and poets. She’s also one of the three founders of TweetSpeakPoetry.

A few days ago, we learned that her poems would be published by the International Arts Movement in a collection entitled InsideOut. This poem, “When Morning Comes,” is one of the poems that will be included in that collection.

L.L.Barkat

http://www.twitter.com/llbarkat

http://seedlingsinstone.blogspot.com/

http://insideoutpoems.blogspot.com/

When Morning Comes

I open my mouth and breathe the day,
wish for a kiss like the one this golden
trumpet of jewelweed is getting full
on the mouth. Furry bumblebee embraces

her like there’s no tomorrow. And I remember
to hold the moment because it’s true, there may not
be a morning after. And this is why I pause when
rusty shovel unearths rotted pit, peach long gone,

her hope for progeny emptied but now home to
red ants, tiny thousands pouring forth like honey,
spilling onto cocoa shells newly lain beneath
the hyssop, soft pink and pungent. Now I trouble

the bronze-suited honeybee who is fumbling Russian
Sage, tickling her purply-blue tongues, riding her
shining silver leaves that curl in rainbowed mist.
Shall I forget the three-leafed maple fragment red

upon the stair, its green seeds like outstretched arms
now blushing dusty rose? Let me not forget these
seeds, nor the catbird who delights to echo each
whine of my clipping shears, nor the Bible leaf

relieved of yellow flower but fragrant still when I
break a spear and press it to my face. Let me not forget
the white carnation, purple aster, and the stars who
shut their eyes and sleep when morning comes.

Copyright 2009 L.L. Barkat. All Rights Reserved. Used with Permission.