writing – Page 2 – Rural Oklahoma Museum of Poetry

The Case of the Autograph Book Curiosity

June 2, 2014 ROMPoetry

I am working on the new museum exhibit on autograph book poetry, and I have found an interesting poem/page in one of the books. This comes from a 1940-1941 autograph book that belonged to Betty Boerner from Hampstead, Maryland.

1st Curiosity
The poem in question appears to be original to the writer, which was highly unusual. One of the things I’m finding in my research is that the same group of rhymes, with little variations, were used over and over throughout the 20th century in these books. Of the twelve books that I have that range from 1892 to 1974, this is the only occurrence of this poem: Continue reading “The Case of the Autograph Book Curiosity” →

Musings, Poems

Forget Me Not: Autograph Book Exhibit

May 26, 2014 ROMPoetry

This summer I will be replacing the Marginalia exhibit in the Rural Oklahoma Museum of Poetry with one on Poetry in Autograph Books. I think finding poetry-worthy marginalia in old books was kind of a singular phenomenon, meaning, I am crazier about such a thing than most people. It may be that I am crazier about old autograph books than most people, too, but . . . here goes! Continue reading “Forget Me Not: Autograph Book Exhibit” →

Poems

Mockingbird

May 24, 2014 ROMPoetry

My mom used to tell us how she yearned
to go to Mockingbird Hill. It was somewhere
in the countryside near Snake Creek,
so enticing-sounding, so Eden-like:
One could glimpse paradise
in a place called Mockingbird Hill.
Continue reading “Mockingbird” →

Poems

A Writer in the Norton Introduction to Literature was Born in 1981

February 26, 2014 ROMPoetry

Her name is Alicia
And the photo next to the title
Of her story is a black and white shot
Wherein she rests her left cheek
Against her right denim-clad knee.
Her glowing face reveals
Baby fat on her cheeks.
Her closed-mouth smile is Mona-Lisaish
In its knowing. Continue reading “A Writer in the Norton Introduction to Literature was Born in 1981” →

Events, Musings

From Those Unknown to Us

September 4, 2013September 4, 2013 ROMPoetry

I just read the great poet Pablo Neruda’s description of a lifelong inspiration in his poetry. He was playing in the lot behind his house when he found a hole in the fence:

“I looked through the hole and saw a landscape like that behind our house, uncared for, and wild. I moved back a few steps, because I sensed vaguely that something was about to happen. All of a sudden a hand appeared—a tiny hand of a boy about my own age. By the time I came close again, the hand was gone, and in its place there was a marvelous white toy sheep.

“The sheep’s wool was faded. Its wheels had escaped. All of this only made it more authentic. I had never seen such a wonderful sheep. I looked back through the hole but the boy had disappeared. I went in the house and brought out a treasure of my own: a pine cone, opened, full of odor and resin, which I adored. I set it down in the same spot and went off with the sheep.

“I never saw either the hand or the boy again.” Continue reading “From Those Unknown to Us” →