M.J. Iuppa, US
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Free
Verse
Evidence
of Movement
1. Summer
Raindrops,
round as vowels:
a rowdy song in the far field
rises up from slippery mud—
an infantry of sunflowers,
golden heads nodding
in wind’s high step.
2.Twilight
Not far
from shore, ancient
willows listen to the lake’s
ripple, stones rubbing against
each other.
3.Twilight
Sometimes
my sandaled foot
stumbles on air. I catch myself
in my arms’ spontaneous
windmill.
4. The
Other World
The cutting
board
tastes like onions.
No matter
how many times
it’s washed.
Cinquain
Storm
Coming
Here, there
eyes watching sky—
Tiny emerald tree,
quaking leaves– echoing raindrops
there, here
Lullaby
Head tucked,
one mute swan sleeps
against the rock of waves.
Feathers ruffle in wind’s cradle.
Daydreams.
Haiku &
Senryu
gray clouds
great blue heron
motionless in pond . . .
Where the
creek thaws
then freezes again—
a milky scar
Dew Drop Inn:
a chair pulled out
in welcome
Free
Verse
from the
book Night Traveler*
Early
Morning
In the wide
yard of an abandoned farmstead,
a giant fir tree has collapsed—
fallen in the place of its shadow, lying broken
and stiff, its roots exposing the sore
mouth that's unable to speak—
I've been driving since the night before,
wheeling down mountain roads, seeing woods
and small towns repeat in the thrum of wind
and tire, and I am tired, coming closer
I stop, stop for a long time, look hard at
the giant fir, at the abandoned house, at
the wind-whipped yard, and wonder what life was
before shadows left country roads,
before nights became vacant space
and the house turned out its lights and only a tree
was left to stand against the odds of
*Night
Traveler is featured in the
July / August 2009 Book Fair.
About M.
J. Iuppa
M.J. Iuppa
lives on a small farm near the shores of Lake Ontario. Her
most recent chapbook is As the Crows Flies
(Foothills Publishing 2008) and second full length
collection, Within Reach, forthcoming from
Cherry Grove Collections (2010). She is
Writer-in-Residence and Director of the Arts Minor Program
at St. John Fisher College, Rochester, NY.
This M. J.
Iuppa's first appearance in Sketchbook.
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