A. Anupama
Wind speed is a factor. The more you can use it, the better. To be airborne, born into poetic flow, and fluid with each gesture, we need to embrace experiences. In artistic practice at our best and most honest, we trace the line of flight from birth to death. We balance on life’s axis. I’m…
Poetry is the art of sneaking up on someone. Like crocuses -- a magic trick in the lawn. Wonder is a pocketful of significance that can be taken as an antidote to most kinds of despair. Gentle is when cup-like purple flowers lie underfoot while we still need to wear winter boots. Darkness is a…
Everything in the heart is a burning device. Ovens, tiki torches, gas lighters, camp stoves, soldering tool, water heater, mosquito coil, hot glue gun, toaster. You know which your loved ones are. Device and desire are so close, when we are moving around in a piece of creative work. Using rhyme or a steady line,…
The way ice falls on us during winter holidays fills the imagination with shapes. Single-digit cold and drift-covered roads meant dangerous driving from home to hometown for me and many others this week. But I'm stubborn (as most poets inevitably must be). The pastoral mood exerted its irresistible pull, and we braved salted highways and…
It's a little bittersweet to think about how it is at the end of every semester — that mishmash of relief, pride, and sadness at wrapping up with a group of students. I'd be getting in the mood to grade a bunch of creative portfolios over the winter break if I were teaching. But I'm…
Waiting for my car at the dealership's service department this morning, I gaze at the flat-screen television in front of me, admiring a beautiful, crackling fire that should be framed by a magnificent fireplace. Yes, a little strange, but not in an unwelcome way. The Fireplace 4K experience erases some of the cold, alienating, new-car-smell,…
When it is cold and windy at night, the morning often reveals many deer lying in the garden, sheltering in the downslope under dogwood and forsythia. Here, they find a break from the breath of December on their not-quite-winter coats. The rest of the yellow leaves from the maple fell last night, making golden beds.…
The curve of each line of each branch in each tree smiles at us. Clear, dark skies keep pouring heaps of stars into the lines. Silhouetted in the shrubs next to the road, several deer watch us pass by. Gratitude moves in all directions. I wish all poems were like this. It might take me…
Making art is a good way to get to know yourself and others, and it usually feels good. Sometimes not. Sometimes you can get in trouble, as my daughter did in her art class the other day when she was being less-than-cautious with scissors. She's in high school now and definitely knows better, but when…
My favorite word is “or,” a hinge on which possibilities can open and close securely, which is an obvious necessity when using prose. But it’s more than that to me. Ask a question using “or,” and you will understand. It requires you to imagine what might be. If you really wish to complete the thought…
poet | artist 