January 2016

WYOPOETS
Winter 2016 Edition
WYOPOETS PREPARE FOR SPRING WORKSHOP
To join WyoPoets or to renew your membership you may use the form below.
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______________________________________________ 12 _______________________________________________
Linda M. Hasselstrom will instruct the WyoPoet’s Spring Poetry Workshop on
Saturday, April 23, 2016, at the Holiday Inn in Riverton, Wyoming. On Friday, April 22,
2016, WyoPoets will host a reading from 6:30-8:30 p.m. at the Riverton Branch of
Fremont County Libraries with Ms. Hasselstrom and WyoPoet contributors to a new
chapbook.
Hasselstrom, a South Dakota rancher who has roamed miles of grassland with no
company other than her horse, is the full-time resident writer at Windbreak House
Writing retreats, established in 1996. Her writing has appeared in dozens of anthologies
and magazines. Dirt Songs: A Plains Duet written with Twyla M. Hansen won the
Nebraska Book Award for Poetry in 2012 and was a finalist for both the High Plains
Book awards and Women Writing the West’s WILLA Award. The author’s Bitter Creek Junction won the
National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum’s Wrangler Award for Best Poetry and her No Place Like
Home: Notes from a Western Life won the 2010 WILLA for creative nonfiction. Her newest book is the
Wheel of the Year: A Writer’s Workbook, (Red Dashboard Press), offers writing challenges to inspire a poet
or writer for two years. Linda is an advisor to Texas Tech University Press. Her writing has also appeared in
dozens of anthologies and magazines.
Members may follow Linda M. Hasselstrom on her blog at windbreakhouse.wordpress.com,
or website: www.windbreakhouse.com or www.Facebook.com/WindbreakHouse.
For additional workshop information contact: Katie Smith, 307-687-0131, [email protected].
or Myra Peak WyoPoets President, 307-875-2893, [email protected]. The workshop is $50 and
preregistrations are to be postmarked by April 8th, 2016.
WORKSHOP SCHEDULE
Friday April 22, 2016
Readings 6:30-8:30 p.m.
Riverton Branch Fremont County library
1330 W. Park Ave, Riverton
Readings by Ms. Hasselstrom and
WyoPoet contributors to a new chapbook
Saturday April 23, 2016
Holiday Inn, Riverton, WY
8:45-9:30 a.m. WyoPoets’ Business Meeting
9:30-10 a.m.
Registration
10 a.m.-12
Workshop Session I
12-1:15 p.m. Lunch/with registration
1:30-3:15 p.m. Workshop Session II
3:15-4:00 p.m. Sharing and Book Tables
PUBLIC READING
The public reading will be Friday, April 22, 2016, from
6:30 – 8:30 p.m. at the Fremont County Library, Riverton
Branch located at 1330 West Park Avenue in Riverton,
Wyoming.
LODGING RESERVATIONS
Call the Holiday Inn at 1-877-857-4834 (toll free) or
direct at 307-856-8100 for lodging reservations and
follow the voice instruction. The room rate will be $109
plus taxes. Individuals must refer to booking code WYP
and provide a credit card for their guarantee of the
booking. The room block will be available until 5 p.m.
Friday, April 8, 2016.
WyoPoets’ Officers
& Committees
President: Myra L. Peak
Box 404 2200 Mississippi Street
Green River, WY 82935
[email protected]
Past President: Abbie Taylor
352 West Whitney St.
Sheridan, WY
[email protected]
Vice Presisdent:
Seeking a volunteer
Secretary / Newsletter:
Echo Klaproth
12233 Hwy 789 #64
Shoshoni, WY 82649
[email protected]
Treasurer: Arthur Elser
1730 Locust Street Denver,
CO 80220 [email protected]
Historians:
Cindy Bower
1351 S. Pennsylvania
Casper, Wy 82609
----------Nancy Gerlock
736 East 16th Street
Casper, WY 82601
Eugene Shea Nat'l Contest:
Art Elser & Chris Valentine
Strophes:
LeeAnn Siebken
Website Manager:
Susan V. Mark
The poet, it is said,
can see the ocean
in a drop of water.
Irish quote
WRITERS GROUPS
Schedules for 2016
From the Peak
Happy New Year to all, and may this year find us delving into our poetry,
our friends’ poetry, and new ideas. I have no New Year’s Resolutions since
I fail to keep them long enough, and I try to start new habits throughout the
year.
I’ve been reading about habits. Some sources state that three days with a
new habit is a good start. Some say a week. Some say a month. I just close
the book on the sources that state that 90 days is necessary to develop a new
habit. I can’t face that. I need hope. That means hope is defined as less than
90 days.
One thing about habits is that once we accept them they carry less
emotional energy and less physical strife. My father died in 1995, and my
mother died in 2008. Each time we go to Illinois, I work on a project to
clean out or reorganize things in the house, barn, machine shed or timber.
The timber is full of hog houses, hog feeders, watering tanks, and old
implements that will need a crane and a semi truck for removal. I feel more
energy tackling the 78 and 92 years of accumulated memories now than I
did in 2009.
Working on cleaning those things out requires huge amounts of
emotional effort like creating a new habit or picking up an old one. Multiple
tasks are necessary with the iron removal since I’ll have to cut down the
trees that have grown through them or into their pathways. I’ll have to tie
straps around the tanks and feeders and pull them out with a 4 wheel drive.
When I see the metal in the timber, I think of how insurmountable its
removal will be.
The timber project is like poetry. If we want to write in a new poetry
form, like alexandrine or sestet, we have to learn about it before we create
those new poems. We have to prepare ourselves. The requisite pen and
paper, just the right music or view from a desk, the correct balance of noise
and silence – all can be preparations or procrastination.
Intellectually we know that writing can become less effort and more fun
if we try a little each day. Emotionally we need convincing, and as poets
we need to see product.
The price of scrap iron is maybe $30 a ton and once was $300. That
$300 is like the poetry muse – she may never come again. The lesson to me
is that the muse may be quieter. I need to be more patient to hear her. If I
create one stone on her pathway, that’s one more than I had yesterday.
In an effort to create new habits or find the route to the old ones, I offer
these ideas:
1. I write a phrase or sentence in the subject line of emails to a specific
friend. It may be my only creative writing that day, but it gives my brain a
fork in the road. If you take this up, you may need to warn the friend.
2. I choose a word from the dictionary using each letter of the alphabet and
find a word in the same approximate location on a page as I follow through
the alphabet. If I don’t like the word, I find another close by.
3. I write a word or description from highway billboards.
4. I write on a really small piece of paper so I can say that I filled an entire
page.
Share with us your tricks for creating material. Yogi Berra once said,
“When you see a fork in the road, take it.” I agree.
My Best,Myra
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BUFFALO: Writers' Ink meets 1st and 3rd Wednesdays
at 4 p.m., at the Occidental Hotel. For more information,
contact Margaret Smith at [email protected].
CASPER: The Casper Group meets the 2nd Wednesday
night of each month 7 p.m. All genres welcome. For
more information, contact Neva Bodin at
[email protected] or Gayle Irwin at
[email protected].
GILLETTE: Prairie Pens meets monthly except
December, third Saturday at 1:00 at Campbell County
Public Library. We welcome writers to join, although we
ask that they just listen and learn what we do and how we
do it for a couple of meetings.
As of January 1, Sequestrum is open to short fiction,
nonfiction, poetry, and cross-genre submissions for the
2016 publication calendar. We're all writers at
Sequestrum and respect the vital role local and
regional organizations play for writers in all stages of
their careers. We'd appreciate if you could pass this note
along to any writers who might be interested in
contributing to the journal. Our library contains NEA &
Guggenheim Fellows, Pulitzer Prize Nominees, and
other award-winning poets and novelists in addition to
emerging talents and new voices. The following details
our current calls for material. Thanks for your time.
Editor's Reprint Award & General Submission Details
We are now accepting submissions for our second
annual Editor's Reprint Award, in which $200 will be
awarded to one piece of previously-published fiction or
nonfiction (plus journals, and everything in-between.
The Reprint Award is a chance for writers to nominate
their own work for a second breath of life - a rare thing
today.
Editor's Reprint Award Guidelines here:
http://www.sequestrum.org/contests
General submissions are open too, and so are (as
always) free subscriber submissions: http://
www.sequestrum.org/submissions. Find publications,
send submissions, and keep updated on everything
we're doing at www.sequestrum.org.
To receive frequent contest information:
[email protected]
If you have a website or blog that's not
listed, please contact webmaster
Susan Mark at:
[email protected]
with the link and we'll get it posted.
JACKSON: Writers Group meets 1st and 3rd Tuesdays
of each month. 6:30-8:30 pm, in the conference room at
the Center for the Arts. All genres welcome. For more
information contact Linda Hazen
[email protected].
RIVERTON: Westword Writers, Fremont County, meet
on 2nd Monday of the month at 1:30 p.m. in the Riverton
Public Library and 4th Tuesday of each month at 6:30.
Visitors are welcome as are all genres. For information,
email Teri Wiblemo: [email protected].
ROCK SPRINGS: The Sweetwater County Writers’
Group meets every other Thursday afternoon at 4:00 p.m.
in the Meadow Room of Hay Library on the Rock
Springs campus of Western Wyoming Community
College. Contact Dianna Renz or Dave Polhamus
(307-371-2478) to confirm upcoming dates.
SHERIDAN: Range Writers meet on the second
Saturday of the month 1:00 p.m at the Sheridan County
Fulmer Library. Contact person: Rose Hill at
[email protected]. And 3rd Thursday Poets meet on the
3rd Thursday of each month at the Senior Center from
2-4 p.m. For more information, contact: Abbie Taylor at
307-752-0033 or [email protected].
SUNDANCE: Bearlodge Writers, Sundance, is open to
all who are serious about learning the craft of writing,
whether they're beginners or published authors. This
multi-genre critique group meets on the first Tuesday (11
a.m. until about 3 p.m.) and on the third Tuesday (5 p.m.
until about 8 p.m.) of each month at the Crook County
Public Library. Email Andi Hummel at
[email protected].
Want to be a featured WyoPoet?
Send your bio and poems
Attn: Echo @
[email protected]
______________________________________________ 11 _______________________________________________
Forever Home (by Fred Savage)
That day you walked into the pound
Hoping to choose
I watched you out of the corner of my
eye
Not daring to hope at all
Yet you came over walking by
Other great companion choices
And said hello and then I dared
To come alive and greet you
I know my tail was wagging
My eyes were full of hope
Not knowing what to expect
You seemed so matched with me
Missing You by Jim Rolf
Four years since death wrenched us apart
And still you live deep in my heart.
Those moments dear, recalled so clear,
Of precious memory;
Of good times shared, adventures dared;
Mean all the world to me.
With those soft reveries held tight
To keep me through each lonely night
Your gentle face appears to calm my bitter tears
And, in your sweet and oft’ remembered smile,
I find the strength to walk another mile.
Now I lay here at your feet
A sense of wellbeing
Content and happy, feeling love
That I will always return
Death
Grief ever sounds.
Just, some days
Its song is muted
by Stephen S. Lottridge
Reconnaissance
by Lyndi O’Laughlin
Yet another poem about me
on a walk,
just a little walk in the morning
along the riverbank
wearing one shiny pink dancing shoe,
the other foot bare
except for three tiny magicians
riding along on the crooked toe of their choice.
It’s the bare foot that notices things,
flowers that wink,
the guy up ahead with the pointed cape
resting his scythe on a wine barrel leaking
afterbirth.
I am a fool
hanging upside down in a tree,
trying to see if anyone, anyone at all,
has written instructions across
the bottom of a spruce bough.
The January, 2016, issue of Strophes has
been posted to www.nfsps.com. The web
edition can be viewed by clicking the
Strophes Online link.
I expect the print edition to be shipped
before Christmas to the state society
mailing coordinators. Because of the heavy
volume of packages UPS is trying to
deliver this season, the shipments may not
arrive until early January.
If you do not want to be included in
future notices that the web edition of
Strophes is available, just let me know and
I will take you off this list.
Paul Ford, Strophes Editor
[email protected]
news, news, news
WELCOME New Members:
Donald W. Oakley
4512 Inverness Dr.
Leesburg, FL 34748-7554
Reatha Mae. Oakley
4512 Inverness Dr.
Leesburg, FL 34748-7554
Betsy Bernfeld
PO Box 474
Wilson, WY 83014-0474
Chris Valentine’s “Afternoon Music” originally appeared in Helen: A Literary Magazine
Issue 2, April 2015 and has been chosen as one of their six Pushcart Prize nominees. (see pg 7)
a day with words
and friends who make poems
day in heaven
(Art Elser)
Saturday breakfast at the cafe
by Susan V. Mark
There’s no decaf here,
and a half-order of biscuits
is more than you can eat.
The next table: four ball caps,
An old straw hat, two hatless.
They talk chainsaws and guns.
One got an antelope and a deer.
Work clothes -- jeans, flannel,
Warm shirts with Carhartt labels.
They drink giant, mismatched
mugs of coffee, wait for plates.
“Did you order, Dennis?”
“Yesterday.”
“What’d you order?”
“Burnt toast.”
Laughter. They’re on to coal trains,
600 people laid off somewhere.
I grew up in a house of men like them:
Father, brothers hard-working
with hands both deft and rough.
I hear my family in their voices.
I long to sit at their table,
held safe in that solid world.
________________________________________________ 10 _____________________________________________
Karen Call received 3rd Honorable Mention for her poem, “The Yellow Rose” in the Arizona
State Poetry Society 2015 annual contest.
NEWS
Congratulations to: JocelynMEMBER
Moore, Renee Meador,
and Art Elser. All three members
were in the latest (Fall) copy of The Avocet Nature Journal!
Fred Savage’s new novel: Black Indian Red Heart (White Justice) is recently released. This is
a traditionally published novel by Oak Tree Press - more info at blackindianredheart.com.
Carol L. Deering’s poem “The August West” has been accepted for the fall issue of Soundings
Review.
Juan Felipe Herrera, Poet Laureate of the United States
Announces New Project: La Casa de Colores
Hello everyone and welcome to La Casa de Colores, my Poet Laureate project. La Casa de
Colores, or “the House of Colors,” is a house for all voices. In this house we will feed the hearth
and heart of our communities with creativity and imagination. And we will stand together in
times of struggle and joy. The website includes two features:
1. La Familia (The Family) is an opportunity for you to contribute to an epic poem of all our
voices and styles and experiences that will run the span of my Laureateship. By contributing
to La Familia, you will be part of my family—and all our words will be seen and our voices
be heard, throughout the nation and beyond.
2. El Jardín (The Garden) is a special place where I will share my experiences with curators at
the Library of Congress. Peek into the Library’s wealth of materials, such as: Pablo Neruda’s
“España en el Corazón,” given to him by soldiers—the pages made out of their clothes turned
to pulp; a letter the folksong pioneer Woody Guthrie wrote on the back of a dust jacket to
Alan Lomax; a silkscreen by Yolanda M. López, on the courage of "Mujeres Trabajadoras"—
women workers. I hope you will be as inspired by them as I am, and you can take the
treasures of El Jardín with you—in heart and with pen.
"La Familia" Theme ~ What Peace Can Bring ~ Dec. 15, 2015 - Jan. 14, 2016
Every one of us loves peace: peace of mind, peace of heart and—in one way or another—
“peace on earth.” Tell us about your kind of peace. Write a poem with your list of things
that will happen if we attain peace.
Latest press release update:
http://blogs.loc.gov/catbird/2015/12/la-casa-de-colores-update-new-segment-new-theme/
Main page: http://www.loc.gov/poetry/casadecolores/
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Former WyoPoet and Wyoming Writer,
Clayton Merle Stabnow died peacefully on Dec. 23, 2015,
of diabetic complications. He was born June 29, 1947, to Merle
and Sylvia (Lien) Stabnow in Britton, S.D. He graduated from
high school in Lead, S.D. and immediately joined the Marine Corps.
Clayton was very proud of his service to our nation from 1965 to
1978, which included 18 months of combat duty in Vietnam. Near the
end of his service career, he married Laurie Cramer on Dec. 23, 1977.
They had one son, Jeremy, who was the light of his life.
Clayton graduated from the Billings Vo-Tech in 1984 and ended his
post -military career as a dispatcher for Stillwater Mine.
Clayton was a prolific writer who published two books of poetry.
His favorite hobbies included stargazing, photography, and kite flying.
Sorry to hear that Clayton has
passed. If I am right, he headed
up the Wyoming Writers contest
for several years. I enjoyed
visiting with him at conferences
and he seemed too vibrant to be
gone.
Nancy Curtis
Wyoming Writers, Inc 42nd Annual Conference
Mark your calendars for June 3-5, 2016; we’re headed to the beautiful Wind River Hotel and Casino in Riverton,
WY for a weekend filled with seminars, camaraderie, and inspiration! This is a great opportunity for first time
conference goers and veterans, alike. With a well-rounded faculty of educated and experienced writers, speakers, and
professors, you won’t want to miss a single day. Keynote speaker Joseph Marshall III will offer insights to his tribal
upbringing while C. Caskey Russell, John Calderazzo, and Pamela Fagan Hutchins host seminars aimed at building
writing and narrative skills.
There’s no better place to stimulate your writing than the stunning environment of an early summer Wind River
Canyon. Surround yourself with a community of poets, novelists, bloggers, and publishers, writers from all walks of
life, who are eager to build up your confidence and encourage your craft. Beaux Cooper said of last year’s conference
in Cheyenne, “It was manuscript shattering and everything I needed to motivate myself into a higher level of writing.
The Open Mic nights were exhilarating! I can’t wait until next year.”
Check our website for more information or follow us on Twitter! Any questions can be directed to Echo Klaproth at
[email protected].
Dear Past Contributors to Manifest West,
Please see about submission details for the exciting upcoming edition of the anthology for 2016. We loved your
work enough to include it in the past, and we love “repeat business” by writers whose work we love!
Dr. Mark Todd, Professor of English / Editor-in-Chief, Western Press Books
western.edu
Western State Colorado University / 970.943.2016
[email protected]
---------------------------My friends,
In case you didn’t yet know, in addition to running Conundrum Press, I’m also now the director of the Certificate in
Publishing in the creative writing graduate program at Western State Colorado University. One of my duties is to direct
Manifest West, the excellent annual anthology that is produced by my students and published by Western Press Books.
This past summer, we came up with the theme and title for 2016’s edition: Serenity and Severity. Here’s the official
description:
The theme brings to our minds the serenity of growth and renewal that follows the severe destruction and terror of a
forest fire. We also think of the pleasing severity of our peaks and sharp precipices over our meadows' serene
smoothness. A dearth of precipitation at haying time is what all ranchers pray for as the serenity of dryness is preferable
to the severe hardship and danger of wet hay. During the rest of the season, serenity is a surfeit of rain to water that
same hay; in drought, the lack of rain is the height of severity. Inspiration may come from concepts like easy or
arduous, harmonious or tragic, restoration or desecration.
How do you define our theme? What is your take on this archetypal contrast? How would you express the dual sense
of nature as it impacts our identity and shapes our character, lifestyle, outlook, world-view, and values? Are serenity
and severity symbiotic or exclusive; is it possible to have one without the other? We want a wide and deep sample of
Westerners' writing, so please send us your best work and share your voice.
If you have anything written, or if the theme inspires you to write something new, I would love it if you would
submit your work here: https://westernstatepress.submittable.com/submit Also, please encourage any other writer you
know to submit their work as well!
Caleb J Seeling, Publisher, A division of Samizdat Publishing Group, LLC
http://www.conundrum-press.com / 720-984-2810
Stay connected with us—subscribe to our newsletter!
_______________________________________________ 4 _______________________________________________
A WIFE'S PRAYER
Daylight Saving Time
Lord, may there be no instant in his life
When he regrets that I became his wife,
And keep his dear ears just a triffle deaf
To my constant talk, unabated breath.
The Arizona sun rose,
sent warm waves
down to its desert.
Rabbits, quail, coyotes
and other creatures
played and scampered
under the Palo Verde,
Mesquite, Creosote
and
everywhere.
Help me do the utmost in my power,
Prove myself a strong enduring tower.
But, if I fail sometimes along the way,
Lord grant that he wtill hold me close that day.
And let him make allowance for my tears,
Then chase away with kisses all my fears.
And, may our children see his love for me,
Oft-times his love for them I too may see.
Since time will bring to each a world of care,
May we together help each other bear,
And when death calls for one of us to pass,
Let not too long our separation last.
By Henry N. Goldman
Flyover Country by Art Elser
From thirty thousand feet at night the glow
of city lights from DC to Boston confounds.
If each light represented only one person,
the numbers would astound. Pack too many
rats in a cage and they fight, kill, and eat
each other. How do people thrive, jammed
together like that? Why don't they go crazy?
Violent? Perhaps that’s why the evening news
in those cities is so messy.
I’d rather look down at flyover country,
the braided North Platte, emerald green
alfalfa circles, towns with grain elevators
along the railroad, a thin road to an airstrip
two miles out of town, ranches miles apart,
a field half light, half dark, a tractor pulling
the dark thread. Cattle gathered around
a stock tank in a windmill’s shadow.
The fruitful work of man in nature.
Life drifted in the warm,
relaxed day;
the Arizona sun
watched its inhabitants
work, rest and play.
It looked and
saw neighbor suns
over Colorado,
New Mexico,
California
and further to
Hawaii.
They rushed,
their creatures hurried
no matter what they did,
to gather that hour
of effulgent daylight
the crazy two-legged creatures
wanted to capture.
Except
the Hawaii sun
smiled back
at the Arizona sun
and called to the wind
and warmed breezes
and sent rays
to the contented islands.
By Karen B. Call
COURAGE is...
striving to straighten
the bended knee
when the heart's weight cracks.
...choosing light
when fetal darkness of immobility
is more comforting.
...striding forward
when lifetime fears pull you
backward into infinity.
...singing, when tears come
more easily…
Loving
the unlovable...
By, Colleen Purves...Oct. 8th, 20l5
_______________________________________________ 9 _______________________________________________
MARRIED OUT OF IT by Neva Bodin
Cancelled checks by Treva Lannan
I remember
The fresh sweet smell of cut alfalfa with poky spiky dried stems
Crunching beneath boots
Scratching tender insteps
When foolishly wearing sandals
I found twelve boxes of cancelled checks
dating back to the 90’s,
twenty four years ago.
I remember
The pungent fresh smell of cow-processed hay lying in the gutter and
other places
Soft and shiny, brown and squishy
Giving way under boots
Or oozing between bare toes
I remember
Soft velvet lips of week old orphan lambs nuzzling earlobes
Laying silky heads against my cheek
Pleading bleats for milk
Yet quiet when held
I remember
First time city boy visited and met parents, brother, dog, pet sheep
Hoping it would mean love, understanding
Wonder, bonding, meaning and
A life worth remembering
I remember
Endless city, small yards, stores and neighbors close, exhaust fumes
A new world of soft green grass
Bordered by concrete, pavement, shrubs
Hemmed in yet with exciting possibilities
I remember
Growing, yet not growing with no place to taste sunshine
Be alone, shirtless, surrounded by sunshine and cattle
Wheat waving the wind on
Drinking in the silence
I remember
Moving to find a piece of all that I remembered
In a new land, a small acreage
Yet our own, and not so crowded
Not alone, but not so close
I remember
We could walk, taste the sunshine and swing our elbows a bit wider
Remember, compare, and adjust
Have a horse, dog, some chickens
Compromise—city boy and farm girl.
Fortune Cookie:
Writing is thinking
on paper.
As I shred them
I noticed who they were for.
One was for a passport
and I remembered our first trip,
after retirement, to Ireland.
Some for children,
for cash,
utilities were cheaper,
contributions to church,
charities, school.
Many for grocery stores
dinner for fourteen every night.
Mortgage payments,
dentist—a benevolent man,
monthly payments for years,
twelve children in for check-ups.
None made out for
sleepless nights
tears of frustration
long hours of work.
Just necessary records
for income tax,
Blood, Sweat, and Tears
An awareness comes, won’t leave her alone,
so while her left side holds to the thought,
it’s her right that bleeds her heart through a pen.
It’s a simple but insistent labor
as sweat furrows and falls from her brow
the words begin to amass and it’s then
they flow freely like tears on the page,
releasing feelings she can’t explain,
so they pile up with no shape once again.
Yet relentless is the thought as it stands
and relentless the blood in her veins
so she chooses to sweat with a pen,
shed her tears, heave her heart to the wind,
surrendering all she is, hopes to say,
and trusts the Word will guide her through again.
© Echo 10/2015
_____________________________________________________ 8 ______________________________________________
WyoPoets Salute Eugene V. Shea
on His 90th Birthday
Eugene V. Shea, for whom our national poetry contest is named, has been instrumental
in the development of who we are as WyoPoets. Serving as president and vice
president in our early years and for many, many years as our National Poetry Contest
chair, he has willingly served our organization to help us become better poets and a
better known group throughout the country.
Eugene received the first WyoPoets' Excellence Award on January 15, 2007. After
that, WyoPoets changed the national contest name to the Eugene V. Shea National
Poetry Contest to honor his many efforts.
Members remember Gene fondly as a humorist and poet with a background as an instructor at the Wyoming
State Prison in Rawlins. They say he was “a terrific early president, probably the second one WyoPoets had
after we gained our independence. He was in cahoots with the NFSPS poets and was a member of several
State chapters. He was originator of our National Contest and ran it for many years.”
His patriotism is genuine and his loyalty to WyoPoets and the Arts is unswerving. Eugene lives in Hanna,
Wyoming, and has found subjects for his poetry in many places. He has self-published too many poetry
books for us to count, but some remember chapbook titles like: The Last Caboose; Antidote for Cabin
Fever; When the Magpie Sings; Barefoot in the Briars; Birds of a Feather; Windfall Watermelons; Duck
Soup and Crossbar Hotel. His “Medicine Bow River” has won awards in Poetry Society of New Mexico,
Poets Roundtable of Arkansas, Indiana Federation of Poetry Clubs, By-Line Magazine, Range Writers of
Wyoming, and is featured in several anthologies, including Duck Soup the author’s chapbook of rhymed
poetry.
Over the years he shared his poetry at many cowboy poetry gatherings around the western states. His
name is on the contest winners’ lists of many state societies, in narrative, ballad, rhymed and humorous
categories.
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Eugene V. Shea Poetry Contest Results
Judge David Mason's general comments: "I have read through the poems and thought a great deal about my awards.
The truth is that my top three all feel pretty equal to me, and the HMs could all be ranked higher as well. What I looked
for as I read was work that had fully made the leap from prose to poetry. Sometimes even competent verse is still too
wedded to prose sense. All 9 of my top poems are fully poetic, I think, and I congratulate the authors. It was a pleasure
doing this work, and again I congratulate all the winners. There were several others who could easily have been on this
(Stats for contest: 50 Poets; 223 Poems; $383 in entry fees; $275 in prizes and honorarium )
list."
Results: Poem
Poet
Judge's comments about the poem
1st
"10 Years After Katrina" Mary Jo Maguire **
Englewood, CO
What I love about this small poem is its big, sassy heart and the way it follows its own logic of sound.
2nd
"George Faulkner, Dying at Daysboro"
Sandra Lake Lassen
West Jefferson, NC
This writer has taken in the tough spirit of Southern Gothic. I love the poem's earthy reality.
3rd
"Breaking Point" Barb Blanks
Garland, TX
The wacky energy of this strange, violent poem made me feel in the presence of a real writer.
4th
"Enjambment" Marian Kaplun Shapiro
Lexington, MA
It's a rare poem that can take an aspect of poetic technique, play with it, and simultaneously make us feel
something important about life.
About our Judge, David Mason:
HM* "Inheritance"
Marian Kaplun Shapiro
Lexington, MA
David Mason was the Poet Laureate
Another poem that leaves much to the imagination.
of Colorado from 2010 to 2014 and is
HM
"John Walters" Jerri Hardesty
Brierfield, AL
Professor and Chair of the
This poem has real magnitude, and its ending is terrific.
Department of English at Colorado
HM
"King of Barnhill"
Barbara Brannon
Lubbuck, TX
Colorado Springs, CO. His
There's a strange, understated intelligence in this poem I really appreciate College,
books of poetry include the historical
a willingness to leave out explanation.
novel in verse, Ludlow, The Buried
HM
"How to Lose Your Mind"
Cathy Moran Little Rock, AR
Houses, The Country I Remember,
An unsentimental poem about a difficult prospect for any of us.
and Sea Salt: Poems of a Decade,
HM
"A Rumor of Coyotes" Christina Kamnikar ** Cheyenne, WY
2004 – 2014. He is published in many
in many nationally prestigious
I love the unexplained, and the lyric power of the refrain.
journals and has also written essays,
* Honorable Mention in no particular order ** WyoPoets member
memoir, and novels.
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Winter Memories, Melancholy, Music, & Merriment
AUBADE by Stephen S. Lottridge
I’ve come to the time in my life
When just getting out of bed is exercise.
Reaching up and pulling back the curtains is
aerobic.
Which is what I did
Wednesday morning,
And looked out on the inch or so
Of new snow, and on
The three mule deer
On Karen’s old lawn across the road.
They were bunched together, absolutely still,
Their heads fixed north on something,
Intent. The tracery of incense
From their nostrils wreathed
The stunning darkness of their eyes.
They were so perfectly composed and radiant,
You would have thought they were an icaon.
They were so alive you would have thought
There were a triptych painted by St. Francis.
I braced my body against the window frame, silent,
Attentive, devout, the cool morning air in my
nostrils, too.
We stood.
A twitch, a shift in the air and all their pent energy
Released. They went, bouncing,
Hestitating, springing
Warily toward the butte,
Each moving in her own way.
For a moment, I watched the emptiness.
Then I, too, turned and went,
Supple enough, for the moment, and we all
Headed into the day.
Driving Home on I-25 in October
by Sheryl Lain
Autumn flares.
Yellow orange flames
Turn aspen treetops into tapers
Glowing with sunset.
Laramie Peak darkens against pumpkin sky.
Meanwhile, life for Jody is
A queen-sized bed.
Her eyes flutter.
Almost all is burned out except the essential breath
Whispering her daughter’s name
And moving the black hairs on her husband’s arms
As he holds her face.
Trees, teach me
To die so well,
Flaming yellow gold
Before deep cold.
A Circle of Family for Fern Callen
By Rick Kempa
The picture is familiar to us all:
Grandma out in the garden leaning on her hoe,
squinting through the dust raised by our approach,
lifting her arm in greeting, then
bending back down to finish off a row.
How astonishing that garden was!
Year after year, despite killer frosts, locusts,
hailstorms, it yielded under her care
bushels of potatoes, corn, tomatoes, turnips, peas...
Our mouths water just to think of it.
Once when we were snapping beans, I asked,
“Grandma, how do you do it? What’s your secret?”
She shrugged, said something matter-of-fact
like Anything grows if you water it,
but the truth is, as we all know,
that she coaxed every plant in that garden to life.
That was her special gift: to love the life in every seed,
in the fluttering heart of every bird, in every child’s eyes.
And everything responded to her love.
A lucky thing, to be born a kitten on the Point Ranch,
and to learn that every afternoon without fail,
her cry would ring out, Here kitty, kitty, kitty!
and on a platter by the front gate
you would find more than you could eat.
(Kempa, “A Circle of Family” 2)
Curl-Up Winter Poem by Carol Deering
The gray, heavy, torn-woolen sky
won’t roll up its sleeves
to show off the mountains.
The snow pond, the bitter chill,
shiver me through three layers.
There is no comfort like a house
with a recliner, an afghan, cushions
to spill. And the warmth of knowing
it’s already snowing on the other side
of the hill.
I’LL KEEP THIS MEMORY
of my wedding always,
guests seated in rows of white plastic chairs,
an arch framed by flowers and balloons,
the string duo that played Pachelbel’s Cannon,
as I marched down the aisle
and "Ode to Joy," as we recessed,
unaware that tragedy would change our lives.
FRIENDS
--for my mother-in-law on her 90th birthday
By Sarita Eastman
Where along the way, do you suppose,
On the long trip we’ve taken on the same
Train through life in adjoining cars,
You might say, from one station
To another, nearly thirty years apart
Yet side by side - when did we know
We’d be such friends?
I picture us in Evanston a lifeTime ago, courteous and wistful
In our dance of introduction,
That old square dance of a man’s new love
And mother sizing up - cautiously
Approaching, touching hands and nodding heads,
Backing off and hoping for the best.
We both so loved the same dear man,
And here we are in tandem, weathering
And laughing and delighting in our
Young ones, telling stories, playing cards,
And also comfortable in silence,
No explanations needed, just like
Old, old friends.
Monet’s Garden by Ginny Odenbach
Tours daily, March through November
10.2 Euros to see what he saw
When he wasn’t painting
was he out there with a hoe
rouging out the errant weed?
And when I plant my seeds
from the packets marked
“Monet’s Garden,” will
my neighbors gape over
the back fence, be inspired
by the splendor right next door?
Will a Nebraska summer
be anything like the summers
in Giverny? Too hot here, perhaps,
or too dry? Certainly no
bus loads of tourists peering
between the gaps in the tall pickets
If I were a famous poet,
we could harvest the seeds
wrap them up in little poems
and sell them labeled
A Poet’s Garden, and the rainbow
children of Monet’s garden
would live on in another biography
GUERNSEY RUTS by Jocelyn Moore
I trudge beside beloved belongings,
iron pots, a chair, grandma’s china,
trundled in my wheeled home,
four oxen yoked as one.
Wet, cold, determined, destined,
sedge grasses cut my cotton skirt, their
seeds fill soggy, meager shoes,
not meant for a thousand mile march.
Sun-burnished sandstones beckon, threaten.
Metal edged wheels carve the grey-pink rock,
like parallel cuts in my heart seared in memory
of those left sleeping in the path.
Steadily west through Dakota, Wyoming,
the wagon lurches – jolts – jerks - jars,
pitches drivers off the seat, and
sloshes water out of barrels.
Stone ruts stagger the big beasts
slowed and saved by the pole brake.
A rest stop in the river hewn valley,
I chisel immortality on the cliff face.
I Trust
As I grew up I hoped I’d be
a reasonable facsimile
of someone who’d resemble me;
but grown up I was, strange to say,
unknown to the me on display
and missed the me who’d gone away.
Now I’ve grown old and I’m not sure
there is a me that should endure,
but time will work its magic cure;
and like the clay at Yorick’s grave,
I’m neither paradigm nor knave,
and possibly I will be brave
when time expires as time must,
and I have leisure to adjust
to being only dust, I trust.
By Tom Spence
Afternoon Music by Christine Valentine
Firewood by Dave Polhamus
Forest Service permit
out toward Big Piney.
Snag of pine, chainsawn
into weather-checked blocks.
Loaded pickup trucked
into town and my yard.
Splitting mauled or double bitted axed,
then wheelbarrowed to back door.
Stacked high on left-over 2X4s.
A double handful of kindling split.
Lined-mittens, stocking cap,
sweatshirt, and work coat
soon yield to sweating.
Firewood warms you twice.
At home it’s usually quiet.
You hear an occasional motor,
bird squabble at the feeder,
occasional drone of a plane.
Today in town
sound overwhelms me
with an opus of engines.
Power saws squeal a descending scale
of metal against metal,
making music with the bass notes
of diesel trucks
and their staccato beeps.
A plane flies overhead
introduces middle notes
to the soprano saw
and the diesel motor.
I sit quietly in class –
enjoy Abbie’s perfume,
top note of jasmine,
the soprano to lily at mid-range
and bass notes of amber,
all connecting with the staccatos
of her Braille machine.
By Abbie Taylor
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