Antiques and Jewels: A Winning Poem!

Here is a jewel of a poem submitted for the 'Antiques and Jewels' writing challenge on January 9. Congratulations gaye gambell-peterson! She comments, with her submission, "Who knew this photo would inspire a love song, ... this tiny wedge of a poem?" Indeed.

We approach our wedding anniversary

a matched pair

replendent and oh-so golden. We

are reflective, proud and tall. We

dare expose our incandescence

to scrutiny's glare, our dazzle

undimmed even as

our glaze crackles, peels.

We're trying to cope

by envisioning smooth,

by ignoring

any unpluggedness.

So, side by side, we

are sitting pretty,

as always-

here together.

And there,

waiting :

a door,

open.

by gaye gambell-peterson

Thanks again to AAA Antiques (Peoria, Ill.) for the great photos.

We DID see you there!

The reading at Left Bank Books was a delight. Thanks to all the poetry fans who braved some nasty weather to listen to us and see all the chapbooks from Cherry Pie Press. gaye gambell-peterson read from her two recent chapbooks, and I read some of my own work and then selections from the 9 chapbooks from Cherry Pie Press.

The photo is courtesy of gaye's husband, Jerry Peterson. (I've oftened wondered how those two get along so well -- he with normal capital letters in his name, she insisting on lowercase throughout. I guess they thrive on that delightful dissonance.)

See you there!

Left Bank Books, 399 N. Euclid, in the St. Louis West End neighborhood...

http://leftbankbooks.indiebound.com/event/rebecca-ellis-and-gaye-gampbell-peterson

Poetry reading December 2

On the night of the next full moon, Wednesday, December 2, 2009, Rebecca Ellis and gaye gambell-peterson will read recent work, showcase chapbooks and art at 7 p.m. at LEFT BANK BOOKS, 399 N. Euclid, St. Louis. The reading is in celebration of women poets and women-run independent presses.

Rebecca Ellis will read her own work and selected poems from the nine chapbooks she has edited and published in the Midwest Women Poets Series from Cherry Pie Press.

gaye gambell-peterson will read from two recently published chapbooks, and provide a peek at original artwork used as illustrations. Her chapbooks are pale leaf floating, recently published by Cherry Pie Press, and a new release, MYnd mAp, from her own imprint, Agog Press.

Download the whole gosh-darn flyer for this event here.

MYnd mAp, Gaye Gambell-Peterson

Gaye Gambell-Peterson's new self-published book, MYnd mAp, is described in an interview with Catherine Rankovic here: http://theconfidentwriter.blogspot.com/2009/10/talking-with-gaye-gambell-peterson-wine.html. Gaye talks about the creative process of combining poetry and visual art, in her usual precise and cross-pollinating way.

Gaye previously published pale leaf floating with Cherry Pie Press, and has created the cover artwork for some of the earlier Cherry Pie chapbooks (Breathing Out, The Permeability of Memory, Rotogravure). She has also provided support of the unmeasurable kind to Cherry Pie: humor, clarity of purpose, and indestructible nerve when I needed it most. Her poetry embodies those three qualities. Highly recommended.

gaye gambell-peterson at The Big Read

This just received:

Ta da! gaye gambell-peterson announces that her next chapbook of poetry + art is out into the world!! The newest is MYnd mAp (Agog Press), resplendent with 14 FULL-COLOR illustrations, joining pale leaf floating (Cherry Pie Press), also with illustrations.

Your first opportunity to get MYnd mAp ($15) is this coming Saturday,
October 10th, at The Big Read in Clayton.

At The Big Read Festival on Saturday, October 10, 2009, from 3:00 - 3:30pm, gaye gambell-peterson will sign copies of both her books at the St. Louis Writers Guild booth.

The festival runs from 9:00am-4:00pm at Clayton High School, Mark Twain Circle & Topton Way, Clayton, MO.

The Big Read is free and open to the public. The festival features publishers, book-sellers, national authors, readings, book signings, panel discussions, workshops, demonstrations and an interactive children’s area. The St. Louis Writers Guild will be represented at two booths--one for SLWG info-sharing, one for book sales and book signings. A schedule for workshops and lectures by "bigger names" is available on www.bigread.net/schedule.htm.

See www.gayegambellpeterson.com for more details and other chapbook events.

Found on Gaye Gambell-Peterson's Desk

Poetry at the Point Tuesday, August 25

gaye gambell-peterson will read from, and sign, her new chapbook of poetry+art, pale leaf floating, on Tuesday, August 25 at 7:30 p.m. for the Poetry @ the Point reading series sponsored by the St. Louis Poetry Center. The reading will be at The Focal Point, 2720 Sutton, Maplewood, MO 63143. This event is free and open to the public.

If you don't yet have in hand your own copy of gaye's gorgeous chapbook, you can view the cover and a sample poem here.

New chapbook! pale leaf floating by gaye gambell-peterson

Cherry Pie is delighted to announce a new chapbook -- pale leaf floating, by gaye gambell-peterson. This one is lovely to look at, and a muscular pleasure to read.

The poems gather up the objects of everyday life -- stones, a leaf, a bird, pennies, an egg -- and convert them to a wise philosophy of endurance as the poet navigates her way through illness, losses, the pleasures of grandchildren, the determination to enjoy each day and let every cup overflow.

Here's a poem:

Omens

There flew the gladdening red bird,
again, again, across my path.

There smiled the pale sliver of moon,
with a bright star at her side.

There bobbed upon flooded river, a bit
of trash that stayed afloat while I watched.

Here bloomed, after two years of making
only leaves, the purple ruffled iris.

There upon my cottonwood sat the
mourning dove – but his back was to me.
I am protected from grief.

I collected these omens so they’d tell me
the truth the way I wanted it to be.

Here on my stoop is one of my kept stones –
flecked gray, rounded, a solidity that reassures.
I turn its damaged side to a corner.

And another one, with an equal amount of grit and good cheer in balance:

Corticosteroids

“Common: loss of balance; puffy face; chronic trouble sleeping.
Rare: a sense of well-being.”
- from a list of side effects

I am at my open door, breathing,
as another day lowers.

Magenta stripe flashes a cloud belly
and Venus elevates,

hangs near my moon.
I let my attitude rise to her,

my lifted face newly full.
Some sort of conjunction, this new

aspect – between exaggerated
euphoria and dire possibility.

I’m awake on the high road,
tilting the light fantastic,

exalting for the stiff-jointed
marionette having left the building.

I am condensed to a quiddity,
leaning against my edges.

She moves away.
Comes back. Gleaming.

You might recognize gaye gambell-peterson as the artist of some previous Cherry Pie chapbook covers (Rotogravure, The Permeability of Memory, and the anthology Breathing Out). Here, she has again created the cover artwork, and also included half a dozen collages inside the book to illustrate her own poems.

pale leaf floating (ISBN 978-0-9748468-9-7) is $10, and available at Left Bank Books, 399 N. Euclid, St. Louis, MO 63108 (ph 314.367.6731). You may also order from Cherry Pie Press -- email cherrypiepress@yahoo.com for information, or download the order form from this blog site.

A Stranger Here Myself - kudos received

This praise just in to Niki Nymark on the release of her chapbook, newly available now through Left Bank Books:

Jerry and I celebrated a warm (as in not hot) Saturday afternoon by trekking to the Central West End. I had Barry [of Left Bank Books] dig A Stranger Here Myself out of his office so I could buy it. Then, as we waited on a shady sidewalk for our turn on Duff's patio, I read your poems out loud to Jer. What nice moments you provided!...

Huzzah to you, and to your publisher. I am also Greatly Impressed that the suitably flattering back cover blurbs are by Richard Newman and Steven Schreiner. Whoo hoo.

A gorgeous book in every aspect.

gaye gambell-peterson

Poem Bakeoff Winners!

Thanks to all who sent in a poem for the Cherry Pie Poem Bakeoff. Competition was hot, plentiful, and -- I'm glad to report -- yummy. I had planned on picking a single entry, but there were three competing for that spot, even after multiple read-throughs. So the results include a first-place winner, and also a second-prize and third-prize winner. I'll also mention some choice lines from other poems.

The first-prize winner will receive free copies of all three Cherry Pie chapbooks to be published in 2008. Since second and third prizes are now included (it's just so hard to say "no" when the poems are good!), those winners can each select one free chapbook from the 2008 selections.

The three Cherry Pie chapbooks for 2008 are:
The Urge To Believe Is Stronger Than Belief Itself, by Erin M. Bertram (May 2008)
A Stranger Here Myself, by Niki Nymark (late summer 2008)
Weaving the Light, by Mary Ruth Donnelly (fall 2008)


Here are the winning poems.

First Prize goes to an untitled cinquaine (loosely) from Dianne Ladendecker. I was charmed and astonished each time I read this economical little wonder.

The brine
Then there's the knife
It's out of proportion
I hear eerie sounds of half-life
Opera

Second Prize goes to Gaye Gambell-Peterson for a pantoum about a middle-aged mermaid. I was intrigued by the well-used effect of the pantoum's interlocking structure, and completely sold on the "C-sharp half-life, caught in the half-light" which mingles echoes of music, radiation/decay/science, time, and water so beautifully.

Mermaid’s Pantoum

I am unrepentant mermaid, middle aged.
Flesh and scales still in seemly proportion,
though wrinkled by brine and tattered by time.
Still adored, a diva of fathomed opera.

Flesh and scales still in seemly proportion,
a siren, chanteuse, my voice a knife-edge
shrill, adorned. A fathomed opera’s diva
in a C-sharp half-life, caught in the half-light.

A siren, chanteuse, my voice a knife-edge
cutting through tides. Me, under the weather,
caught in sea’s half-light with only a half-life,
still luring men with plaintive arias.

Cutting through tides, me, under the weather
though wrinkled by brine and tattered by time,
still luring men with plaintive arias.
A middle-aged mermaid, unrepentant am I.

And Third Prize goes to Elizabeth M. Johnson, who gains an extra point for incorporating the full title of a Cherry Pie chapbook (Kiss Me Cold). Some of the required five words in this poem were used in variant forms (e.g. disproportionate instead of proportion) and although I've seen many contests be strict on that count, I'm constitutionally unable to be strict and so will allow it. The poem's worth it.

Ending It

Last summer, in the months without an “R,”
we ate oysters, the jagged edges of
the shells were sharp against our tongues, the brine
cool in our throats, delicious as the crisp

sea salt against our skin, the beach bonfire,
the Great Bear asterism far above,
an operatic swell in the timeline
of us, peace tenuous but in our grasp.

But now the months have “Rs.” Also, “-embers.”
You lumber toward me, and I try to move
away; your heavy body next to mine
seems wildly disproportionate. You clasp

me, kiss me, cold, your lips a slick steel knife
at my throat. No half measures, just half life.

Congratulations on the great poems! The other entries were wonderful, and I hope everyone had fun with the contest.

Notable lines or moments from other entries, that I just couldn't resist:

From Bobbi Lurie, a prose poem that started off: "brine she says is nothing but the half-life of the pickle. . . "

And from Gail Eisenhart, a sinister love poem that included: "this tryst / has the half-life of house-fly."

To wrap up, an unexpected "non-winner" that simply must be mentioned for its refusal to follow any rules, and for the delightful poem that resulted. This is from Katherine Mitchell, who attempted a poem using the five required words but ended up with a poem that used a form of one of the words, did not use the other four at all, and is titled as a haiku but is, in fact, not a haiku. So here is a poem of . . . great resistance? Katherine sent it in as a non-entry, and I reproduce it here as such. Not a prize-winner, but in many ways a winner!

Summer Haiku

paddle boats float
on two tanks
painted copper lake

paddlers wear pajamas
hold champagne flutes
small rising circles
happy tongues

water smoothed
butter knives in cake frosting

orange bursts
over the horizon
sending heat
inside our paper lantern faces

Chapbook cover designer, Barbie fan!

And here is Gaye Gambell-Peterson, designer extraordinaire of two of the Cherry Pie chapbooks covers (Rotogravure, and soon-to-be-released The Permeability of Memory). She has recently admitted to a Barbie fetish, and is seen here on her way to a fundraising event for the local St. Louis Poetry Center.