ILLUMINATION: Highlighting Writers
More on Poems and Poetry
There’s been a number of great articles put out lately, highlighting new writers that have made their way to ILLUMINATION’s shore. Timothy Key, among others, has produced a stream of quality ones doing just that, which are a great way to discover new authors and new points of view.
I’ve wanted to do something similar to that but with an emphasis on one writer. Telling a story on why I think what they’re doing is kind of special.
I’ve “picked on” poets in the past with other articles and I do it because I think writing is not the easiest thing to do in the world and writing poetry that finds where people live and speaks directly to them, is even more challenging.
I feel that Harley does a good job in finding me on a regular basis and though I’ve mentioned him in the past, I thought, hey, why not write about this more fully and say a few words about the man and his words.
From his poem: I Am.
I am the clothesline where my mother hangs the wet clothes.
Not a typical beginning to a poem or anything else for that matter, but then, that’s what makes this one cool and enticing. The imagery burrows its way to a place where I live — the abstract and unwieldy corridors where time and space meet and bend and become what we may not want them to be.
It ends with –
Sometimes I am the dress my mother wears to church.
That’s about as close as one can get to another without getting all metaphysical and still see a separation that lends itself to respect and love.
From his poem: Gift Basket
I am a thief of the heart, stealing your love drop by drop and reselling each drop on the black market.
Imagery — yeah, I suppose. But I simply suggest you read it, let it swirl around your mind a little, taste it fully, then swallow.
I wish to run naked through the streets of heaven and knock on the door of St. Peter.
I would too. And now I know why.
From his poem: Organizing Heaven
My wife during A recent visit To heaven, suggested To God that he Needed to get organized.
Audacity perhaps or certainty. A way of looking at our relationship with God that is not typically on the tip of one’s mind. Further back, I would think, where truth and honesty and real love exists.
He invited her to help Him. So every Tuesday My wife advises God.
And why not. Kindness and inclusivity are certainly qualities that belong to God, and deserve to be shared.
From his poem: Phone Call
I taste the salmon between sips of white wine and wish for a night of passion with my lover who died last week in an accident while driving home from work.
When I first read this, I wasn’t sure what to think. Images of love, snippets of conversation, long stares into eyes that spoke endlessly of something, anything, all filled my mind. Simply, sedately, not in a rush to get through the mental process and be dumped out the other side as data, so much as to be savored with understanding and tears.
I’ll let you read the rest. You can let me know what you think.
From his poem: Ghosts
Sometimes late in the evening when the moon has risen in the sky and I am alone in my home, ghosts come to visit.
And so, they may; along with other creatures not of this world, but certainly dwelling somewhere within Harley King. Perhaps ghosts visit all of us. Not as apparitions or unnatural illusions drifting through walls, unsettling our pets and locking bathroom doors, while we dwell leisurely within. But as memories of what once was, that linger still in hopes of being again.
Their squeaky voices make me laugh and give me hope that one day I too will be a ghost who goes to visit strangers in their homes to sit and chat about the weather, the price of corn and how the government is stealing our money.
I’ll let those words speak for themselves.
I once commented on one of Harley’s poems, that wherever I am and whatever I am doing, his poems find me. They still do. I hope they find you as well.
Joe Luca is writer and editor for ILLUMINATION and a published author and writer of children’s stories, short fiction, non-fiction articles, screenplays and poetry. Publications include Child’s Life, Children’s Playmate and others. There are some other articles below — have a read. And thank you for stopping by.
