Category Archives: Prose Poem

2024, Ohio River Valley Literature, poetry, Prose Poem, river life, work

from ‘the river north to South Point’ (for Amanda)

My love, I want to describe to you the waxing crescent rising opposite the setting sun: the waters of the Ohio sitting calm, cut like lead crystal — lovely and unreflective. And the moon, the moon Beloved, cutting open the evening sky, an eternity of pink red orange into another endless river.

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2023, Ohio River Valley Literature, poetry, prose, Prose Poem, the no-scape, waterfront, Working Class Literature

Alignments

Loads of wonder and trouble here at the world’s great wound. A clear crisp sunset, a cloudless night, an unmuddied waxing crescent moon highlighting four other planets along with Venus: Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, and Uranus. A high water planetary alignment, shining down on an unmoving floor of driftwood and river on the wharf, loose barges on McAlpine Dam and nuclear water leaked into the Mississippi River. Wonder and trouble.

Mile Post 604, Port of Louisville (by Ey Mick)
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2023, Ohio River Valley Literature, Poet's Life, poetry, Prose Poem, the no-scape

Day 24, 2023 (no.1)

When I was 23 and read Auden for the first time, an older poet friend was surprised I liked him. “I think you have to be older to really appreciate him.” I reread “As I Walked Out One Evening” regularly and find different reasons to appreciate him. Before it was his sarcasm, the promise of salmon singing in the street. Now it’s the endurance. I think I might be old enough now to appreciate F. Scott Fitzgerald, the sad determination of boats beating back against the current.

[for George]

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