Wednesday, April 15, 2020

#165 Backstory of the Poem "Singing, Studying on Whiteness, This Penelope Strings" by Jeanne Larsen

Chris Rice Cooper 
caccoop@aol.com
https://www.facebook.com/car.cooper.7

*The images in this specific piece are granted copyright privilege by:  Public Domain, CCSAL, GNU Free Documentation Licenses, Fair Use Under The United States Copyright Law, or given copyright privilege by the copyright holder which is identified beneath the individual photo.

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*** The CRC Blog welcomes submissions from published and unpublished poets for BACKSTORY OF THE POEM series.  Contact CRC Blog via email at caccoop@aol.com or personal Facebook messaging at https://www.facebook.com/car.cooper.7

***Jeanne Larsen’s “Singing, Studying on Whiteness, This Penelope Strings” is #165 in the never-ending series called BACKSTORY OF THE POEM where the Chris Rice Cooper Blog (CRC) focuses on one specific poem and how the poet wrote that specific poem.  All BACKSTORY OF THE POEM links are at the end of this piece. 

Can you go through the step-by-step process of writing this poem from the moment the idea was first conceived in your brain until final form?


          Making this poem was, for me, a tasty mix of intellect & surprise: eventually, my unconscious broke it open, took a leap—after a fair amount of study & fiddling with line breaks & tapping syllables on my fingertips.
       It’s the fourth poem in my new book What Penelope Chooses, & the first in which Penelope herself appears. (Like ol’ man Homer in the Odyssey, I begin by calling on the muse—two muses in my case, the second being, alas, our history—and then a set-up shot: Penelope’s husband stranded far from home.)

Step 1: In July of 2014, I took part in an intensive weeklong seminar for college teachers at the Center for Hellenic Studies in DC. To prepare, I re-read the Odyssey (in two new-to-me translations) + a boatload of scholarly commentary. That fall, I taught a lit course built around the story of Odysseus’s travels home from Troy, & Penelope’s crafty endurance.
     
           So: I started with a fair amount of information + opinions + questions + cool vocabulary words. I made notes on 3x5 slips of paper—one of my key poem-making technologies. (Above Right)
      
Step 2: I tend to recycle my research. Starting in August, at the Millay Colony, & on stolen moments during the teaching year, I made a few poems responding to Homer, with the vague thought that they might turn into some kind of series. It was a long while before I thought, hey, maybe a book?


Step 3: Early in 2015, on a grey legal pad, I drafted a 41 line poem called “Singing, This Penelope Strings”. It leaned toward iambics but was not metrical; 3 to 5 beats per line, because I can’t not count them.
       In February ‘15, in my application to another colony, Byrdcliffe, I described the sequence-to-be as “multi-vocal, self-reflexive, gloomy, smart-ass, tentative. It explores what lyric poetry can’t shut up about (love, pain, sex, mortality, the divine) & our 21st-century monstrosities: words’ failures, idiotic wars, social injustices, the gut-wrench of seeing a world laid waste by greed & folly.”

Step 4: By the next winter (‘15-‘16), most of my “sassy lyrical footnotes to Homer” were poems in nine lines, with 7 to 9 beats per. I loved the energetic restriction of the form I’d stumbled into, but saw that the long lines wouldn’t publish well. What to do?

       I began changing the poems into unrhymed 14-liners in rough iambics. As the series grew, I stuck with this quasi-sonnet form, making poems of 14, 15, 28 lines, plus one that breaks off after 13, & a few that anyway could have fit into Tottel’s Miscellany (aka Songes and Sonettes), if they’d made the cut back in 1557. (Above Left)
       Maybe these poems’ most sonnet-y feature is the turns, which express themselves in line-skips, not always in the traditional places. Or maybe the sections those line-skips create do the work that rhyme schemes did for Will Shakespeare or John Keats or Gwendolyn Brooks or Marilyn Hacker or…

Step 5: By May of ‘16, the 41 line poem had become two of these busted-up sonnets. The old title & the first half formed the basis of the poem at hand.

Step 6: That July, the word “ivory” entered the poem. It gestures toward the understanding that dreams come from the underworld via one of two gates: one made of animal horn for the true visions, one of ivory for those that lie. (Below Left) This notion first shows up in the Odyssey, when Penelope is telling Odysseus-in-disguise about a dream she had.
      
          There’s a pun involved in the Greek word for “ivory”. It sounds like the word for “deception”: Penelope’s words to the supposed stranger may have double-meanings. Or: the very language lies, just as her husband does.
     Kinda like poems, eh? The image set up my unconscious for the next step, months later.  

Step 7: In March ’17, I realized I could underline one thread running through the book-to-be by invoking contemporary conversations around whiteness / colorism / privilege. I changed the poem’s title to its present one: “Singing, Studying on Whiteness, This Penelope Strings”. (Above Right: Statue of Penelope in the Vatican Museum.  Credit, Project Gutenberg)
      
          Felt like a breakthrough, that did: the moment when the true poem announces itself to the one who’s writing stuff down.


Step 8: September ’17, during a residency at Byrdcliffe, I reworked the book-like manuscript-ish thingie I’d accumulated—adding, compressing, rearranging. This particular poem’s last three lines got juggled & re-juggled as I sharpened the set-up for Odysseus-as-monstrous-would-be-colonizer of the Cyclopes’ island in a later poem.
       Soon after, I submitted the ms. to Cider Press Review, for their annual Book Award competition. In February ’18, good news came: publication of the book by CPR in about a year.


Step 9: In spring ‘18, as I was putting the accepted book ms. into final-final form for my patient editors at Cider Press Review, I decided this was the place to weave (ha!) in the duplicitous word “unhealing” (replacing a word I wanted to use elsewhere) & a phrase I’d had kicking around on a 3x5 slip for a couple years: “Her doing is undoing.”
       
         Those changes brought something, call it counterpoint, I’d been wanting for the poem. (Left: Islands Caldera)

Where were you when you started to actually write the poem? And please describe the place in great detail. In my sunlit living room. Grey-blue carpet, Grey-white walls. Window plants. Trees out front filtering the light. It would have been pre-breakfast, before the day’s classes / email /  meetings / student conferences.
       
          Picture me on a couch, books & slips of paper here & there, cat nearby. Across the room: a cabinet from 1930’s Shanghai (Above Right), via family friends. It has nothing to do with the Odyssey or Homeric times. But no—its varied & inviting landscape might be relevant, after all…
     Later, key work got done in a dark delightful attic on the top floor of Eastover, the 1905 house at Byrdcliffe where I wrote & revised & slept—with reading / thinking time on Eastover’s porch (Above Left) & in the dining nook.

What month and year did you start writing this poem? Jan. or Feb. 2015. I tossed out the handwritten drafts for this book a year ago. That’s where a lot of the action was, alas.

How many drafts of this poem did you write before going to the final? (And can you share a photograph of your rough drafts with pen markings on it?)  Probably 20. Or, like, a hundred, if you count every tweak-ette. Obsessive? Yep.
       The basics came together quickly, perhaps because much of this poem is a catalog. Others in the collection changed far more.
       The photo (Right) shows a polished version of the 41 line poem—see “Step 5” above—call it a fourth or tenth draft, after the initial one or two in longhand. (The second half became a separate poem, “Athene Occurs as a Sister, Fills Her”; it shows up 3 pages later in the book. I’ve never made two poems out of one before.)

Were there any lines in any of your rough drafts of this poem that were not in the final version?  And can you share them with us? I like the theory that what got cut from the version in the photo still comes through. I sharpened the bit about lying after I figured out that this poem resists a contemporary Big Lie as vicious as the falsehoods (Dulce et decorum est…, women-belong-to-men) that led to so many deaths at Troy.

What do you want readers to take from this poem? Well…. That enslaving people (as women of Troy were enslaved by the victorious Greeks) is bad? That this white woman scorns white supremacy, even though she knows she too is caught up in its web—or shroud? That the fracking wells we’re inflicting on our grandkids are as awful as throwing a baby from a cliff-top tower, which is what one of those glorious Greeks did to the probable heir to the throne of Troy?
      
          Also, for sure, that the terrible world depicted in the burial cloth Penelope weaves by day & secretly ravels at night is a world of visionary beauty, too: we can discern mythic meaning in the scattered stars, if we look. 
          And, that someone as hard-pressed as Penelope was in Odysseus’s absence can do a thing that matters when she sees patterns, & makes art.
     
           I’d be very glad if their minds are freshened, opened, by image & sound, in the deep way measured, focused language does that.

Which part of the poem was the most emotional for you to write and why? The late additions. I started with the woman trying to make something of assembled images from the war on Troy—the enemy city Homer makes us love even as he brings it down. Penelope declared herself dutiful to patriarchal ways, but she finds agency in subversion. She persists. By the poem’s end, she questions her husband’s, and her / my culture’s, lies.  So it began in celebrating Penelope as maker (Greek poiētḗs, Scots makar), which = seer (Latin: vates). The upwelling of the rest surprised me—and, yeah, I feel it.

     Has this poem been published before?  And if so where? In July ’18, it was published in the indomitable online magazine, Scoundrel Time. link to https://scoundreltime.com/two-poems-by-jeanne-larsen/   

The book, What Penelope Chooses, came out in March 19.

Amazon: https://www.
amazon.
com/s?k=jeanne+
larsen&i=
stripbooks&
ref=nb_sb_noss_1

















Indie Bound: https:

CPR:


 Anything you would like to add? Reader: by all means, go read the Odyssey. Robert Fagles’ translation or Emily Wilson’s, your pick. Then maybe Fitzgerald’s, or Lattimore’s. Also, well….I do love to do poetry readings, class visits, workshops…

Singing, Studying on Whiteness, This Penelope Strings

along suitors & the lyre-warp of her loom.

On last night’s unspun body bag, weaves pictures:
deployed youths, broken masts, horses’ heads
hacked. An infant prince flung from a tower
tall as a fracking well. She lights a lamp,
swears her maids to speechlessness, unpicks
the fabric. Looks skyward. Makes out smoggy threads
between stars. Calls them demigods, grotesques,
captives, tracks of what’s not. Come morning, depicts
with water-skeins, veiled eyes: Asia Minor
widows thralled in murderous beds. Her doing

is undoing. That burial wrapper signifies
unhealing rumors. Marvels. A liar’s name shouted
as rocks crash wet. Her ivory dream-talk, raveling.

          Biography of Jeanne Larsen: I’m a low-grade language geek, with an undergrad major called “Phenomenology of Religion” & a Ph.D., sigh, in Comp Lit: that makes me an officially sanctioned dabbler.
     
  I’ve just retired from teaching in the Jackson Center for Creative Writing at Hollins, & still live in the Roanoke Valley, in southwest Virginia, where the mountains are as darkly purple-blue as Homer’s sea.
www.jeannelarsen.com  

BACKSTORY OF THE POEM LINKS

001  December 29, 2017
Margo Berdeshevksy’s “12-24”
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2017/12/a-new-crc-blog-series-backstory-of-poem.html

002  January 08, 2018
Alexis Rhone Fancher’s “82 Miles From the Beach, We Order The Lobster At Clear Lake Café”
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/01/a-new-crc-blog-series-backstory-of-poem.html

003 January 12, 2018
Barbara Crooker’s “Orange”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/01/a-new-crc-blog-series-backstory-of-poem_12.html

004 January 22, 2018
Sonia Saikaley’s “Modern Matsushima”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/01/the-fourth-installment-of-new-crc-blog.html

005 January 29, 2018
Ellen Foos’s “Side Yard”
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/01/5-backstory-of-poem-sidewalk-by-ellen.html

006 February 03, 2018
Susan Sundwall’s “The Ringmaster”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/02/6-backstory-of-poem-susan-sundwalls.html

007 February 09, 2018
Leslea Newman’s “That Night”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/02/7-backstory-of-poem-that-night-by.html

008 February 17, 2018
Alexis Rhone Fancher “June Fairchild Isn’t Dead”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/02/8-backstory-of-poem-june-fairchild-isnt.html

009 February 24, 2018
Charles Clifford Brooks III “The Gift of the Year With Granny”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/02/9-backstory-of-poem-gift-of-year-with.html

010 March 03, 2018
Scott Thomas Outlar’s “The Natural Reflection of Your Palms”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/03/chris-ricecooper-caccoopaol.html

011 March 10, 2018
Anya Francesca Jenkins’s “After Diane Beatty’s Photograph “History Abandoned”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/03/11-backstory-of-poem-after-diane.html

012  March 17, 2018
Angela Narciso Torres’s “What I Learned This Week”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/03/12-backstory-of-poem-series-angela.html

013 March 24, 2018
Jan Steckel’s “Holiday On ICE”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/03/13-backstory-of-poem-jan-steckels.html

014 March 31, 2018
Ibrahim Honjo’s “Colors”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/03/14-backstory-of-poem-ibrahim-honjos.html

015 April 14, 2018
Marilyn Kallett’s “Ode to Disappointment”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/04/15-backstory-of-poem-ode-to_14.html

016  April 27, 2018
Beth Copeland’s “Reliquary”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/04/16-backstory-of-poem-reliquary-by-beth.html

017  May 12, 2018
Marlon L Fick’s “The Swallows of Barcelona”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/05/17-backstory-of-poem-swallows-of.html

018  May 25, 2018
Juliet Cook’s “ARTERIAL DISCOMBOBULATION”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/05/18-backstory-of-poem-arterial.html

019  June 09, 2018
Alexis Rhone Fancher’s “Stiletto Killer. . . A Surmise”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/06/19-backstory-of-poem-stiletto-killer.html

020 June 16, 2018
Charles Rammelkamp’s “At Last I Can Start Suffering”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/06/20-backstory-of-poem-at-least-i-can.html

021  July 05, 2018
Marla Shaw O’Neill’s “Wind Chimes”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/07/21-backstory-of-poem-wind-chimes-by.html

022 July 13, 2018
Julia Gordon-Bramer’s “Studying Ariel”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/07/22-backstory-of-poem-studying-ariel-by.html

023 July 20, 2018
Bill Yarrow’s “Jesus Zombie”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/07/23-backstory-of-poem-jesus-zombie-by.html

024  July 27, 2018
Telaina Eriksen’s “Brag 2016”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/07/24-backstory-of-poem-brag-2016-by.html

025  August 01, 2018
Seth Berg’s “It is only Yourself that Bends – so Wake up!”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/08/25-backstory-of-poem-it-is-only.html

026  August 07, 2018
David Herrle’s “Devil In the Details”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/08/26-backstory-of-poem-devil-in-details.html

027  August 13, 2018
Gloria Mindock’s “Carmen Polo, Lady Necklaces, 2017”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/08/27-backstory-of-poem-carmen-polo-lady.html

028  August 21, 2018
Connie Post’s “Two Deaths”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/08/28-backstory-of-poem-two-deaths-by.html

029  August 30, 2018
Mary Harwell Sayler’s “Faces in a Crowd”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/08/29-backstory-of-poem-faces-in-crowd-by.html

030 September 16, 2018
Larry Jaffe’s “The Risking Point”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/09/30-backstory-of-poem-risking-point-by.html

031  September 24, 2018
Mark Lee Webb’s “After We Drove”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/09/31-backstory-of-poem-after-we-drove-by.html

032  October 04, 2018
Melissa Studdard’s “Astral”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/10/32-backstory-of-poem-astral-by-melissa.html

033 October 13, 2018
Robert Craven’s “I Have A Bass Guitar Called Vanessa”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/10/33-backstory-of-poem-i-have-bass-guitar.html

034  October 17, 2018
David Sullivan’s “Paper Mache Peaches of Heaven”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/10/34-backstory-of-poem-paper-mache.html

035 October 23, 2018
Timothy Gager’s “Sobriety”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/10/35-backstory-of-poem-sobriety-by.html

036  October 30, 2018
Gary Glauber’s “The Second Breakfast”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/10/36-backstory-of-poem-second-breakfast.html

037  November 04, 2018
Heather Forbes-McKeon’s “Melania’s Deaf Tone Jacket”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/37-backstory-of-poem-melanias-deaf-tone.html

038 November 11, 2018
Andrena Zawinski’s “Women of the Fields”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/38-backstory-of-poem-women-of-fields-by.html

039  November 00, 2018
Gordon Hilger’s “Poe”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/39-backstory-of-poem-poe-by-gordon.html

040 November 16, 2018
Rita Quillen’s “My Children Question Me About Poetry” and “Deathbed Dreams”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/40-backstory-of-poems-my-children.html

041 November 20, 2018
Jonathan Kevin Rice’s “Dog Sitting”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/41-backstory-of-poem-dog-sitting-by.html

042 November 22, 2018
Haroldo Barbosa Filho’s “Mountain”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/42-backstory-of-poem-mountain-by.html

043  November 27, 2018
Megan Merchant’s “Grief Flowers”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/43-backstory-of-poem-grief-flowers-by.html

044 November 30, 2018
Jonathan P Taylor’s “This poem is too neat”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/44-backstory-of-poem-poem-is-too-neat.html

045  December 03, 2018
Ian Haight’s “Sungmyo for our Dead Father-in-Law”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/045-backstory-of-poem-sungmyo-for-our.html

046 December 06, 2018
Nancy Dafoe’s “Poem in the Throat”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/046-backstory-of-poem-poem-registering.html

047 December 11, 2018
Jeffrey Pearson’s “Memorial Day”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/47-backstory-of-poem-memorial-day-by.html

048  December 14, 2018
Frank Paino’s “Laika”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/48-backstory-of-poem-laika-by-frank.html

049  December 15, 2018
Jennifer Martelli’s “Anniversary”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/49-backstory-of-poem-anniversary-by.html

O50  December 19, 2018
Joseph Ross’s “For Gilberto Ramos, 15, Who Died in the Texas Desert, June 2014”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/50-backstory-of-poem-for-gilberto-ramos.html

051 December 23, 2018
“The Persistence of Music”
by Anatoly Molotkov
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/51-backstory-of-poem-persistence-of.html

052  December 27, 2018
“Under Surveillance”
by Michael Farry
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/52-backstory-of-poem-under-surveillance.html

053  December 28, 2018
“Grand Finale”
by Renuka Raghavan
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/53-backstory-of-poem-grand-finale-by.html

054  December 29, 2018
“Aftermath”
by Gene Barry
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/12/54-backstory-of-poem-aftermath-by-gene.html

055 January 2, 2019
“&”
by Larissa Shmailo
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/55-backstory-of-poem-by-larissa-shmailo.html

056  January 7, 2019
“The Seamstress:
by Len Kuntz
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/56-backstory-of-poem-seamstress-by-len_6.html

057  January 10, 2019
"Natural History"
by Camille T Dungy
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/57-backstory-of-poem-natural-history-by.html


058  January 11, 2019
“BLOCKADE”
by Brian Burmeister
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/58-backstory-of-poem-blockade-by-brian.html

059  January 12, 2019
“Lost”
by Clint Margrave
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/59-backstory-of-poem-lost-by-clint.html

060 January 14, 2019
“Menopause”
by Pat Durmon
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/60-backstory-of-poem-menopause-by-pat.html

061 January 19, 2019
“Neptune’s Choir”
by Linda Imbler
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/61-backstory-of-poem-neptunes-choir-by.html

062  January 22, 2019
“Views From the Driveway”
by Amy Barone
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/62-backstory-of-poem-views-from.html

063  January 25, 2019
“The heron leaves her haunts in the marsh”
by Gail Wronsky
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/63-backstory-of-poem-heron-leaves-her.html

064  January 30, 2019
“Shiprock”
by Terry Lucas
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/01/64-backstory-of-poem-shiprock-by-terry_29.html

065 February 02, 2019
“Summer 1970, The University of Virginia Opens to Women in the Fall”
by Alarie Tennille
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/65-backstory-of-poem-summer-1970.html

066 February 05, 2019
“At School They Learn Nouns”
by Patrick Bizzaro
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/66-backstory-of-poem-at-school-they.html

067  February 06, 2019
“I Must Not Breathe”
by Angela Jackson-Brown
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/67-backstory-of-poem-i-must-not-breathe.html

068 February 11, 2019
“Lunch on City Island, Early June”
by Christine Potter
 https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/068-backstory-of-poem-lunch-on-city.html

069 February 12, 2019
“Singing”
by Andrew McFadyen-Ketchum
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/69-backstory-of-poem-singing-by-andrew.html

070 February 14, 2019
“Daily Commute”
by Christopher P. Locke
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/70-backstory-of-poem-daily-commute-by.html

071 February 18, 2019
“How Silent The Trees”
by Wyn Cooper
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/71-backstory-of-poem-how-silent-trees.html


072 February 20, 2019
“A New Psalm of Montreal”
by Sheenagh Pugh
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/72-backstory-of-poem-new-psalm-of.html

073 February 23, 2019
“Make Me A Butterfly”
by Amy Barbera
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/73-backstory-of-poem-make-me-butterfly_23.html

074 February 26, 2019
“Anthem”
by Sandy Coomer
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/02/74-backstory-of-poem-anthem-by-sandy.html

075 March 4, 2019
“Shape of a Violin”
by Kelly Powell
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/75-backstory-of-poem-shape-of-violin-by.html

076 March 5, 2019
“Inward Oracle”
by J.P. Dancing Bear
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/76-backstory-of-poem-inward-oracle-by.html

077 March 7, 2019
“I Broke My Bust Of Jesus”
by Susan Sundwall
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/77-backstory-of-poem-i-broke-my-bust-of.html

078 March 9, 2019
“My Mother at 19”
by John Guzlowski
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/78-backstory-of-poem-my-mother-was-19.html

079 March 10, 2019
“Paddling”
by Chera Hammons Miller
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/79-backstory-of-poem-paddling-by-chera.html

080 March 12, 2019
“Of Water and Echo”
by Gillian Cummings
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/80-backstory-of-poem-of-water-and-echo.html

081   082   083    March 14, 2019
“Little Political Sense”   “Crossing Kansas with Jim
Morrison”  “The Land of Sky and Blue Waters”
by Dr. Lindsey Martin-Bowen
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/81-82-and-83-backstory-of-poems-by-dr.html

084 March 15, 2019
“A Tune To Remember”
by Anna Evans
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/84-backstory-of-poem-tune-to-remember.html

085 March 19, 2019
“At the End of Time (Wish You Were Here)
by Jeannine Hall Gailey
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/85-backstory-of-poem-at-end-of-time.html

086 March 20, 2019
“Garden of Gethsemane”
by Marletta Hemphill
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/86-backstory-of-poem-view-from.html

087 March 21, 2019
“Letters From a War”
by Chelsea Dingman
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/87-backstory-of-poem-letters-from-war.html

088 March 26, 2019
“HAT”
by Bob Heman
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/88-backstory-of-poem-hat-by-bob-heman.html

089 March 27, 2019
“Clay for the Potter”
by Belinda Bourgeois
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/89-backstory-of-poem-clay-for-potter-by.html

#090 March 30, 2019
“The Pose”
by John Hicks
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/03/90-backstory-of-poem-pose-by-john-hicks.html

#091 April 2, 2019
“Last Night at the Wursthaus”
by Doug Holder
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/91-backstory-of-poem-last-night-at.html

#092 April 4, 2019
“Original Sin”
by Diane Lockward
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/92-backstory-of-poem-original-sin-by.html

#093 April 5, 2019
“A Father Calls to his child on liveleak”
by Stephen Byrne
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/93-backstory-of-poem-father-calls-to.html

#094 April 8, 2019
“XX”
by Marc Zegans
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/94-backstory-of-poem-xx-by-marc-zegans.html

#095 April 12, 2019
“Landscape and Still Life”
by Marjorie Maddox
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/95-backstory-of-poem-landscape-and.html

#096 April 16, 2019
“Strawberries Have Been Growing Here for Hundreds of
Years”
by Mary Ellen Lough
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/096-backstory-of-poem-strawberries-have.html

#097 April 17, 2019
“The New Science of Slippery Surfaces”
by Donna Spruijt-Metz
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/97-backstory-of-poem-new-science-of.html

#098 April 19, 2019
“Tennessee Epithalamium”
by Alyse Knorr
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/098-backstory-of-poem-tennessee.html

#099 April 20, 2019
“Mermaid, 1969”
by Tameca L. Coleman
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/99-backstory-of-poem-mermaids-1969-by.html

#100 April 21, 2019
“How Do You Know?”
by Stephanie
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/100-backstory-of-poem-how-do-you-know.html

#101 April 23, 2019
“Rare Book and Reader”
by Ned Balbo
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/101-backstory-of-poem-rare-book-and.html

#102 April 26, 2019
“THUNDER”
by Jefferson Carter
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/102-backstory-of-poem-thunder-by.html

#103 May 01, 2019
“The sight of a million angels”
by Jenneth Graser
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/05/103-backstory-of-poem-sight-of-million.html

#104 May 09, 2019
“How to tell my dog I’m dying”
by Richard Fox
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/05/104-backstory-of-poem-how-to-tell-my.html

#105 May 17, 2019
“Promises Had Been Made”
by Sarah Sarai
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/05/105-backstory-of-poem-promises-had-been.html

#106 June 01, 2019
“i sold your car today”
by Pamela Twining
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/106-backstory-of-poem-i-sold-your-car.html

#107 June 02, 2019
“Abandoned Stable”
by Nancy Susanna Breen
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/107-backstory-of-poem-abandoned-stable.html

#108 June 05, 2019
“Cupcake”
by Julene Tripp Weaver
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/108-backstory-of-poem-cupcake-by-julene.html

#109 June 6, 2019
“Bobby’s Story”
by Jimmy Pappas
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/109-backstory-of-poem-bobbys-story-by.html

#110 June 10, 2019
“When You Ask Me to Tell You About My Father”
by Pauletta Hansel
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/110-backstory-of-poem-when-you-ask-me.html

#111 Backstory of the Poem’s
“Cemetery Mailbox”
by Jennifer Horne
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/111-backstory-of-poem-cemetery-mailbox.html

#112 Backstory of the Poem’s
“Relics”
by Kate Peper
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/112-backstory-of-poem-relics-by-kate.html

#113 Backstory of the Poem’s
“Q”
by Jennifer Johnson
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/113-backstory-of-poem-q-by-jennifer.html

#114 Backstory of the Poem’s
“Brushing My Hair”
by Tammika Dorsey Jones
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/114-backstory-of-poem-brushing-my-hair.html

#115 Backstory of the Poem
“Because the Birds Will Survive, Too”
by Katherine Riegel
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/06/115-backstory-of-poem-because-birds.html

#116 Backstory of the Poem
“DIVORCE”
by Joan Barasovska
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/07/116-backstory-of-poem-divorce-by-joan.html

#117 Backstory of the Poem
“NEW YEAR”S EVE 2016”
by Michael Meyerhofer
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/07/117-backstory-of-poem-new-years-eve.html

#118 Backstory of the Poem
“Dear the estranged,”
by Gina Tron
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/07/118-backstory-of-poem-dear-estranged-by.html

#119 Backstory of the Poem
“In Remembrance of Them”
by Janet Renee Cryer
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/07/119-backstory-of-poem-in-remembrance-of.html

#120 Backstory of the Poem
“Horse Fly Grade Card, Doesn’t Play Well With Others”
by David L. Harrison
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/08/120-backstory-of-poem-horse-fly-grade.html

#121 Backstory of the Poem
“My Mother’s Cookbook”
by Rachael Ikins
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/08/121-backstory-of-poem-my-mothers.html

#122 Backstory of the Poem
“Cousins I Never Met”
by Maureen Kadish Sherbondy
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/08/122-backstory-of-poem-cousins-i-never.html

#123 Backstory of the Poem
“To Those Who Were Our First Gods”
by Nickole Brown
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/09/123-backstory-of-poem-to-those-who-were.html

#124 Backstory of the Poem
“Looking For Sunsets (In the Early Morning)”
by Paul Levinson
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/09/124-backstory-of-poem-looking-for.html

#125 Backstory of the Poem
“Tracy”
by Tiff Holland
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/09/125-backstory-of-poem-tracy-by-tiff.html

#126 Backstory of the Poem
“Legs”
by Cindy Hochman
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/09/126-backstory-of-poem-legs-by-cindy.html

#127 Backstory of the Poem
“Anathema”
by Natasha Saje
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/09/127-backstory-of-poem-anathema-by.html

#128 Backstory of the Poem
“How to Explain Fertility When an Acquaintance Asks Casually”
by Allison Blevins
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/10/128-backstory-of-poem-how-to-explain.html

#129 Backstory of the Poem
“The Art of Meditation In Tennessee”
by Linda Parsons
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/10/129-backstory-of-poem-art-of-meditation.html

#130 Backstory of the Poem
“Schooling High, In Beslan”
by Satabdi Saha
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/10/130-backstory-of-poem-schooling-high-in.html

#131 Backstory of the Poem
““Baby Jacob survives the Oso Landslide, 2014”
by Amie Zimmerman
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/10/131-backstory-of-poem-baby-jacob.html

#132 Backstory of the Poem
“Our Age of Anxiety”
by Henry Israeli
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/10/132-backstory-of-poem-our-age-of.html

#133 Backstory of the Poem
“Earth Cries; Heaven Smiles”
by Ken Allan Dronsfield
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/10/133-backstory-of-poem-earth-cries.html

#134  Backstory of the Poem
“Eons”
by Janine Canan
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/134-backstory-of-poem-eons-by-janine.html

#135 Backstory of the Poem
“Sworn”
by Catherine Zickgraf
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/135-backstory-of-poem-sworn-by.html

#136 Backstory of the Poem
“Bushwick Blue”
by Susana H. Case
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/136-backstory-of-poem-bushwick-blue-by.html

#137 Backstory of the Poem
“Then She Was Forever”
by Paula Persoleo
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/137-backstory-of-poem-then-she-was.html

#138 Backstory of the Poem
“Enough”
by Kris Bigalk
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/138-backstory-of-poem-enough-by-kris.html

#139 Backstory of the Poem
“From Ghosts of the Upper Floor”
by Tony Trigilio
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/139-backstory-of-poem-from-ghosts-of.html

#140 Backstory of the Poem
“Cloud Audience”
by Wanita Zumbrunnen
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/140-backstory-of-poem-cloud-audience-by.html

#141 Backstory of the Poem
“Condition Center”
by Matthew Freeman
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/11/141-backstory-of-poem-condition-center.html

#142 Backstory of the Poem
“Adventuresome Woman”
by Cheryl Suchors
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/12/142-backstory-of-poem-adventuresome.html

#143 Backstory of the Poem
“The Way Back”
by Robert Walicki
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/12/143-backstory-of-poem-way-back-by.html

#144 Backstory of the Poem
“If I Had Three Lives”
by Sarah Russell
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/12/144-backstory-of-poem-if-i-had-three.html

#145 Backstory of the Poem
“Reservoir”
by Andrea Rexilius
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/12/145-backstory-of-poem-reservoir-by.html

#146 Backstory of the Poem
“The Night Before Our Dog Died”
by Melissa Fite Johnson
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/01/146-backstory-of-poem-night-before-our.html

#147 Backstory of the Poem
“Pileated”
by David Anthony Sam
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/01/147-backstory-of-poem-pileated-by-david_14.html

#148 Backstory of the Poem
“A Kitchen Argument”
by Matthew Gwathmey
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/01/148-backstory-of-poem-kitchen-argument.html

#149 Backstory of the Poem
“Insulation”
by Bruce Kauffman
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/01/149-backstory-of-poem-insulation-by.html

#150 Backstory of the Poem
“I Will Tell You Where I’ve Been”
by Justin Hamm
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/150-backstory-of-poem-i-will-tell-you.html

#151 Backstory of the Poem
“Comfort”
by Michael A Griffith
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/151-backstory-of-poem-comfort-by.html

#152 Backstory of the Poem
“VAN GOGH TO HIS MISTRESS”
by Margo Taft Stever
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/152
backstory-of-poem-van-gogh-to-his.html

#153 Backstory of the Poem
“1. Girl”
by Margaret Manuel
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/153-backstory-of-poem-1-girl-by_12.html

#154 Backstory of the Poem
“Trading Places”
by Maria Chisolm
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/154-backstory-of-poem-trading-places.html

#155 Backstory of the Poem
“The Reoccurring Woman”
by Debra May
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/155-backstory-of-poem-reoccuring-woman.html

#156 Backstory of the Poem
“Word Falling”
by Sheryl St. Germain
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/156-backstory-of-poem-word-falling-by.html

#157 Backstory of the Poem
“Vel’ d’Hiv Roundup of 7,000 Jews Detained in an
Arena”
by Liz Marlow
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/02/157-backstory-of-poem-vel-dhiv-roundup.html

#158 Backstory of the Poem
“Why Otters Hold Hands”
by William Walsh
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/03/158-backstory-of-poem-why-otters-hold.html

#159 Backstory of the Poem
“The Invisible World”
by Rocco de Giacoma
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/03/159-backstory-of-poem-visible-world-by.html

#160 Backstory of the Poem
“Last Call”
by Ralph Culver
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/03/160-backstory-of-poem-last-call-by.html

#161 Backstory of the Poem
“ALIVE”
by David Dephy
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/03/161-backstory-of-poem-alive-by-david.html

#162 Backstory of the Poem
“Mare Nostrum”
by Janice D Soderling
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/03/162-backstory-of-poem-mare-nostrum-by.html

#163 Backstory of the Poem
“Winnipeg Noir”
by Carmelo Militano
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/03/163-backstory-of-poem-winnipeg-noir-by.html

#164 Backstory of the Poem
“Needlepoint Roses”
by Jason O’Toole
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/04/164-backstory-of-poem-needlepoint-roses.html

#165 Backstory of the Poem
“Singing, Studying on Whiteness, This Penelope Strings”
by Jeanne Larsen
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2020/04/165-backstory-of-poem-singing-studying.html
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