Hey, all,
Here’s a beautiful set of short acrostics which Jon graciously provided to us from the experiences of his project.
We’ll let him explain:
“These are poems from a project called POND. Every day, for one year, I will walk to our pond, jot a few notes, and take a photo or two. Then I’ll write a 4-line acrostic using P, O, N, D as my first letters, with the extra caveat of never using the same first-word twice. I began the book on November 9, 2018 – will finish November 9, 2019.
Grazie.
-John “
Thank you again, John.
Enjoy, everyone:
___
11.10.2018
10.06 a.m.
34 degrees
Pitchy dark where winter has just this moment arrived
out of the north hills; it crawls up under my shirt,
naturally and unfazed, as if it were trying to warm itself —
daguerrean-downstream rush of the brook gossips with its cold voice.
11.11.2018
3.11 p.m.
39 degrees
Ponds’ conflux – run-off from Fowler’s pond
overflows the small stone wall along with street run-off;
nozzling, they warble a crystal duet in the bird-less
dusk beginning to bear down on the half-buried bullheads sleeping.
11.13.2018
2.46 p.m.
39 degrees
Piety arrives with a female evening grosbeak.
Offed by chill wind, the leaves cover the wet forest ground.
Nearby, the look of running water
dazzles like a miniature Topajos, miniature Amazon.
11.24.18
8.33 a.m.
24 degrees
Peabody, Peabody, Peabody, Old Sam Peabody!
Oblique geometry here, mirror-smooth there, thick battered hem, gray
nuances of ice seal it all – those on the bottom – those in the bottom.
Determined white-throated sparrow searching for Sam, though I’m the only one here.
12.2.18
12.30 p.m.
45 degrees
Peaceful rain, steady all night, leaves the ground soppy
overshowered and spongy, and the confluence of springs
necks torrential, as the rain soaks the air,
dampening everything but falling so lightly that the pond is silent.
12.5.18
2.39 p.m.
35 degrees
…and your tears on the wings of the plane
where once again I cannot
reach to stop them
and they fall away behind
going with me
-W.S. Merwin
– …from Plane (The Carrier of Ladders)
Plane. One of my very favorite poems
of W.S. Merwin’s. He is our beloved
nobleman of the rees, with me
daily, a knot of sparrows tied to the cedar.
___
John L. Stanizzi is author of Ecstasy Among Ghosts, Sleepwalking, Dance Against the Wall, After the Bell, Hallelujah Time!, High Tide – Ebb Tide, Four Bits – Fifty 50-Word Pieces, and Chants. His poems have appeared in Prairie Schooner, American Life in Poetry, The New York Quarterly, Paterson Literary Review, The Cortland Review, Rattle, Tar River Poetry, Connecticut River Review, and many others. Stanizzi has been translated into Italian and his poems have appeared in many journals in Italy. His translator is Angela D’Ambra. Stanizzi teaches literature at Manchester Community College in Manchester, Connecticut, and lives with his wife, Carol, in Coventry.