TIS A SEASON FOR POETRY

WHEN WHO POETS IN THE IMAGINAL DIMENSION
LIVES ON THE SIDEWALK OF YOUR CHILDHOOD...

WHO LOVES POETRY

Do you?
Let me introduce you to the new book trailer for
my August, 2017 release of Monsters & Bugs.


Enjoy!

       Monsters & Bugs on Amazon

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Cultural mythologer, poet-essayist, stephanie
publishes Mythopoetry Scholar Ezine
at    https://www.mythopoetry.com

and Mythopoetry Blog (Mythopoetics In Culture)
at    https://mythopoetry.blogspot.com 

STEPHANIE ON TWITTER

  twitter handle:  @mythopoetry

or visit https://twitter.com/mythopoetry

WEBSITE

https://www.mythopoetry.com

STORYHOUR : A Sea Glass Serenade #Friyay #mythopoetry

AND SO IT HAPPENED
True personality is always a vocation...vocation acts like a law of god from which there is no escape. -C.G. Jung

Archetypal Suffering  "The Development of Personality"
CW17, p. 175

Tear catchers popular once

among our womankind

whose men are lost in battle

during the Civil War; many

ladies of such mind

say tears of wives and daughters

are sacred much like holy

water

It makes me think of glassy sea & blues

that in their whitely singing foam

mermaids also knew

and of this ancient turning solid

suspending sadness in those tears they

drew—caring too, they might undo

the shipwrecked fates of men in lore

And, as if by some enchanted magic

pulled they underneath

the grey-green ocean

floor

swept up in varied colors thrust

such teardrops onto shore

©2017 Sea Glass Serenade stephanie pope mythopoetry.com

GUEST POST "song of the white dove" Beth Anne Boardman #mythopoetry #author #wednesdaywisdom

song of the white dove

the white dove came again.

i love how she sits far back

in the black, tangled branches

of that wild oak tree –

she glows through the falling darkness,

a phantom of herself….

she used to frighten me,

appearing unannounced

at nightfall….

you’re not from around here, are you?

i thought at her,

that first night….

i’ve tried to make up all kinds of stories

about why she visits when she does….

a harbinger of death?

of change?

but every day changes and dies,

as do we….

her song differs from

those of the mourning doves

that have surrounded me

since birth –

(my father taught me their song)

softer than theirs,

her song floats featherlike,

unmournful….

it curls

wispy

tender

wraithlike

(holy….)

we have watched each other

for years now….

through black ash

and endless smoky grey –

we are dual-captured

by blue-white

myriad starfields --

(our secret)

and still,

her song stops me midstep

midbreath

midquestion --

like an incognito

gasp of surprise….

then i recall an elder’s words

and realize:

she sings

not as a warning of death,

but as an

encouragement

to keep dying….


©2017 song of the white dove by Beth Anne Boardman for mythopoetry.com
©2017 song of the white dove Beth Anne Boardman All Rights Retained

_____________
NOTES

The last two lines recall the wisdom of Chungliang al Huang, who appears in Finding Joe, a film by Patrick Takaya Solomon.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Beth Anne Boardman, RN, MA, PhD lives in California and New Hampshire. She travels and lectures on the Mythology of Sport; Women and Myth; and the Alchemy of Adolescence (her dissertation topic), in addition to consulting as a writer to websites.  

Recently, Beth has served on the board of the Pacifica Graduate Institute Alumni Association and as Regional Coordinator for local alumni. Her career spans work as a registered nurse, the study of world dance and music, and the profound joy of raising two children.

BLOG

For stories and essays on creative life and culture visit Dr. Beth Ann Boardman at MYTHMUSE

POETRY BLOG

POEMS FROM THE OTHERWORLD

GUEST POST "reconciling grey" by Beth Anne Boardman #amwriting #poetry #authorslife

reconciling grey

sometimes the world’s beauty

seems to vanish

in one whoosh….

death bookends life,

fate turns on its dime,

and rugs shift

under our feet….

poems, words, colors, disappear

metaphor leaves….

shall we hope for no more happiness

if gifts come

on the sharp edge

of a knife?

•

this morning

i stood on my front steps

and this foreign wind

played in my hair,

ran all around my face

and made me dizzy

birds sang confusingly

of nests and mates

and territories….

the sun shone strangely

springlike

and i brought in the laundry….


© 2017  reconciling grey by Beth Anne Boardman  on mythopoetry.com
© 2017  reconciling grey Beth Anne Boardman All Rights Retained

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Beth Anne Boardman, RN, MA, PhD lives in California and New Hampshire. She travels and lectures on the Mythology of Sport; Women and Myth; and the Alchemy of Adolescence (her dissertation topic), in addition to consulting as a writer to websites.  

Recently, Beth has served on the board of the Pacifica Graduate Institute Alumni Association and as Regional Coordinator for local alumni. Her career spans work as a registered nurse, the study of world dance and music, and the profound joy of raising two children.

BLOG

For stories and essays on creative life and culture visit Dr. Beth Ann Boardman at MYTHMUSE

POETRY BLOG

POEMS FROM THE OTHERWORLD

GUESTPOST "Oh Mother, Mother" by Beth Anne Boardman #amwriting #SundayMorning #poetry

TROPHONIUS & THE BEES
photo courtesy Beth Anne Boardman

       OH MOTHER, MOTHER... 

in grief

sometimes

i cannot say more....

‘mother of gentleness’

‘mother of mercy’

‘mother of kindness’

visit me....

give me the vision

of the next few minutes –

remind me to breathe....

remind me of your presence....

remind me that these events

that shake me –

that topple my world

into pain –

remind me,

oh mother,

the sun will rise....

the sun will rise....

and oh mother, mother –

you will show me how to begin again....

©2017 Oh Mother, Mother Beth Anne Boardman mythopoetry.com

©2017 Oh Mother Mother Beth Anne Boardman All Rights Retained 

____________

notes
In mythology Trophonius or Trophonios is the story of a man who is swallowed up by the earth and transformed into the oraculur demigod or daimon (spirit) of a cave near the town of Lebadeia or Boiotia.

Trophonius translates  as "nourisher of the mind" from the Greek tropheô words and noos. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Beth Anne Boardman, RN, MA, PhD lives in California and New Hampshire. She travels and lectures on the Mythology of Sport; Women and Myth; and the Alchemy of Adolescence (her dissertation topic), in addition to consulting as a writer to websites.  

Recently, Beth has served on the board of the Pacifica Graduate Institute Alumni Association and as Regional Coordinator for local alumni. Her career spans work as a registered nurse, the study of world dance and music, and the profound joy of raising two children.

BLOG

For stories and essays on creative life and culture visit Dr. Beth Ann Boardman at MYTHMUSE

POETRY BLOG

POEMS FROM THE OTHERWORLD

GUEST POST "a mother glows" by BETH ANNE BOARDMAN #mOTHERSday #SundayMorning #ReasonToKeepGoing #mythopoetry

PHOTO OVERLAYS mythopoetry.com

a mother glows

a mother glows

a mother gets sick

a mother swells

a mother dances about

a mother waddles

a mother wails

a mother dotes

how precious the hands!

how sweet the toes!

how frightening the wails,

how lovely the cradling….

a mother loves

a mother helps

a mother waits

a mother tries

to be redundant

to be unneeded

to be heartbroken

to be older

to be a mother

to be a lover

to be chosen

to be blessed

to love

to leave

to live

 

©2017 a mother glows Beth Anne Boardman mythopoetry.com
©2017 a mother glows Beth Anne Boardman All Rights Retained

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Beth Anne Boardman, RN, MA, PhD lives in California and New Hampshire. She travels and lectures on the Mythology of Sport; Women and Myth; and the Alchemy of Adolescence (her dissertation topic), in addition to consulting as a writer to websites.  

Recently, Beth has served on the board of the Pacifica Graduate Institute Alumni Association and as Regional Coordinator for local alumni. Her career spans work as a registered nurse, the study of world dance and music, and the profound joy of raising two children.

BLOG

For stories and essays on creative life and culture visit Dr. Beth Ann Boardman at MYTHMUSE

POETRY BLOG

POEMS FROM THE OTHERWORLD

GUEST POST: "day and night/silent wings" by BETH ANNE BOARDMAN #wedwip #mythopoetry #poetry

day and night/silent wings

day and night

my house is surrounded

by sacred wings….

two hawks call to each other across my roof

in the still dawn….

their screes grace the silence,

point to the silence….

they dance on the lifting currents of air

caused by the difference between night and day,

cold and warm,

dark and light….

often they come back just before noon,

when drafts of air surge up off the warming hillsides….

their calls ring like temple bells:

reminding me to be still for a moment,

to stop and touch the eternal in the day,

to take a breath and offer myself to the mystery….

•

another calls

as the sun turns orange

and falls slowly down

into the billowing cotton layer

that covers the western ocean,

drawn up over the day like a soft blanket….

this one summons the night-shift:

the ones who will soar over us as we

live on in the darkness,

as we sleep,

and dream,

and sometimes dance….

when the night is well-established,

their sounds, too, pierce the trying-to-be-silence:

shrill ghostly gliding white cries

of barn owls

and great horned owls

tracking their crawling prey….

•

if you’re outside walking in

that rare warm coastal air,

oohing and ahing over the surprising sharp blue glints

(priceless diamond stars making a

one-night-only appearance….)

if you’re out there,

you can sometimes catch a glimpse

of white wings glowing high above you in the night,

coming in fast,

and soon gone –

right over your head,

without a sound….

but a sheerly distant whistle drifts somewhere behind

those silent wings,

leaving a certain trace

of untouchable presence….

            •

on the very darkest nights,

there is one who comes to the roof-corner

right outside my room….

and even though the window might be closed

against the damp night air,

he announces his landing

with an unmistakable, commanding scree….

I am here for the night.

I sleep and wake

under the jurisdiction

of sacred wings….

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Beth Anne Boardman, RN, MA, PhD lives in California and New Hampshire. She travels and lectures on the Mythology of Sport; Women and Myth; and the Alchemy of Adolescence (her dissertation topic), in addition to consulting as a writer to websites.  

Recently, Beth has served on the board of the Pacifica Graduate Institute Alumni Association and as Regional Coordinator for local alumni. Her career spans work as a registered nurse, the study of world dance and music, and the profound joy of raising two children.

BLOG

For stories and essays on creative life and culture visit Dr. Beth Ann Boardman at MYTHMUSE

POETRY BLOG

POEMS FROM THE OTHERWORLD




 

POETS OF MYTHOPOETRY: BRADLEY OLSON : Four Poems #mythopoetry #guestpost #NationalPoetryMonth2017

FOUR POEMS

PAUL VERLAINE'S AIM

You have me disadvantaged, dear Arthur.

You possess the sharp, quill tip of your pen

And your youth.

I have only this pistol…

If only my wounds were so easily mended.

I have not yet come to terms with written words

As you have--when you were yet a boy!--

And now you leave them,

And me,

Adrift in a drunken boat.

©2017   Paul Verlaine’s Aim   Bradley Olson  mythopoetry.com
©2017  Paul Verlaine’s Aim    Bradley Olson  All Rights Retained

WINTER LEAVES

When I first heard it, I thought

It was really only rumor,

That this late in December's unforgiving draught

One golden leaf could still be in good humor.

Yet there it was, a palsied beggar,

At the mercy of winter's biting caprice.

How often have I (unwitting figure!),

Governed by an unattractive eye, failed to give notice.

I entered his world a puzzle, mostly skulking about

Then, by turning each leaf, I saw myself reflected.

His folios revealed me, so shockingly fleshed out,

That the sound, the fury, the Lear-ing suspicions no longer infected

A dislocated soul.  A corroded spirit.

The littered psychic landscape unveiled by a warm spring sun

Is healed by the call away from winter if one can hear it

And grasp that, though logos contradict it, there is never, finally, a "done."

©2017   Winter Leaves   Bradley  Olson  mythopoetry.com
©2017   Winter Leaves   Bradley Olson  All Rights Retained

FLIGHT INFORMATION

I watched her from behind my newspaper

Trying to read a pulpy paperback

While the disembodied voice of flight information

(in both English and Spanish)

destroyed her concentration and sent her

eyes scouting the page for the word she last read.

When she left to board I wondered if she would ever finish

If the heroine would find love at long last

If the evils in her life would be overcome by good

If the someone waiting for her at some other airport gate

loved her Passionately, Deeply,

And Truly. 

She looked like someone I usually wouldn't think about twice

Unless she were to trade the battered paperback for Hegel

Or someone else I couldn't understand.

I don't want what's familiar to me; I ran from the provincial long ago

I know instinctively by watching her

I ran away from everything like her; not towards anything.

She looked happy--comfortable in her own skin--it alarms me to think she actually was.

©2017   Flight Information   Bradley  Olson  mythopoetry.com
©2017   Flight Information   Bradley Olson  All Rights Retained

LIMINAL SPACE

I am puzzled of  late

by my single and peculiar life.

I am not what I used to be:

An airy dreamer

with a too truant disposition,

nor any longer a dark, upheaved soul

alone and lonely,

but rather betwixt and between

suffering from a usurpation of the senses.

La belle dame sans merci

draws from her black sack

“beautiful untrue things,”

the necessary deceptions

symbolizing and signaling life;

those heralds most deeply felt and dreamt of,

yet remaining oddly unapprehended…

the soul’s fugitives

bringing substance to an insubstantial life

and imagination  to a mundane world.

From this sack,

the very same one,

She brought forth Ilych’s death.

Grotesque to those who watched,

but did not see,

beautiful to him

whom it brought forbearance and joy.

Beautifully used and artfully worn was It.

Beautiful and holy.

So holy It seems

It can hold nothing at all

but air…

and light…

and time…

and space.

Giving room enough to live,

saving room enough to die,

proposing room enough to discover (to my surprise!)

where It is,

Death cannot be.

©2017   Liminal Space   Bradley  Olson  mythopoetry.com
©2017   Liminal Space   Bradley Olson  All Rights Retained

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Bradley Olson, Ph.D is a former police officer who returned to school to earn a Bachelor’s degree in psychology and literature, two Master’s degrees in psychology, and a Ph.D. in Cultural Mythology. Dr. Olson is currently a psychotherapist in private practice at Mountain Waves Healing Arts in Flagstaff, Arizona; his work with clients is heavily influenced by his interest in Jungian Analytical Psychology and Mythological Studies. Brad is also the author of the acclaimed Falstaff Was My Tutor blog, which has earned him a nomination for the 2012 PUSHCART PRIZE in nonfiction.

BRAD'S BLOG

FALSTAFF WAS MY TUTOR

BRAD ALSO BLOGS FOR JCF.ORG

MYTH BLAST

WEBSITE

MOUNTAIN WAVES HEALING ARTS

VISIT BRAD ON FACEBOOK AT

https://www.facebook.com/bradley.a.olson

POETS OF MYTHOPOETRY: BRIAN LANDIS Two Poems #guestpost #mythopoetry #NationalPoetryMonth 2017

TWO POEMS

EL RANCHO GRANDE

Avocado trees planted in rows

       walnuts and grapes

In the arroyo, pampas grass

       as if trilled or plucked

A chord of pampas grass

singing down the breezy cañon

       to the sparkling sea

Two dogs in the sideyard

       barking

A lazy cat opens one golden eye

©2017 El Rancho Grande Brian Landis mythopoetry.com
©2017 El Rancho Grande Brian Landis All Rights Retained

FAMOUS PEOPLE

Pablo Picasso

          sits with Jean Cocteau

          praising miracles

(not life, which is common).

They drink espresso

          and eat Italian pastries.

"God," Jean philosophizes,

"judges us by our appearances

          and is the ultimate idiot."

Pablo paints God's portrait

          and is the ultimate idiot.

Idiocy is relative.

Albert Einstein, at the next table

          scribbles in the margin

          of his New York Times:

                   "Relativity is next to godliness"

He signs his name.

He leaves it on the table

          for the waiter to see.

(If you don't promote your own work,

          who will?)

©2017 Famous People Brian Landis mythopoetry.com
©2017 Brian Landis Famous People All Rights Retained

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brian Landis is a Buddhist/Jungian psychotherapist, because poetry is a very bad way to make a living, living and working in San Luis Obispo, California.  As the years unfold, he looks more and more like his beloved arroyos and potreros, wild and unkempt.  He likes it that way and is ecstatic to be going to seed after a lifetime of bloom.

BRIAN ON FACEBOOK

Visit Brian on facebook

BOOK

POETS OF MYTHOPOETRY: LINDA SUDDARTH : Three Poems #mythopoetry #guestpost #NationalPoetryMonth 2017

THREE POEMS

CURIOUS AND RICH

When I walk past
the fragrant forest
after heavy rain,
which smells like
the freshest salad
you ever ate,
some vegetation
from Otherworld
that when eaten
makes you feel alive,

then I listen, listen
and there is
nothing, nothing but.

When it is almost dusk
and the horizon is tinged
with the most delicate
hint of lavender,
against it dark
silhouettes of tiny
fruit-tree branches,

I listen, listen
there is nothing, nothing but.

When I pass the small mountain
rising like a god
impressing the night
and the still liquid sky,

I listen, listen
and there is nothing, nothing.

But nothing is something
curious and rich,
and I have heard it.


©2017 Curious And Rich Linda Suddarth
 mythopoetry.com

©2017 Curious And Rich
Linda Suddarth All Rights Retained

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

“Curious and Rich,” Featured poem for Parabola Online, Summer 2014

BORROWED FOREST, RENTED THICKET

My comfort falls on deaf ears.

Though you are only volunteers,

comical encroaching

forest with your odd smells:

sweet, tangy mid-spring,

hints of honeysuckle, cedar,

thyme, vinegar, rose, float,

don’t you know tomorrow

will be the back-hoe,

saws, bulldozers,

and your lovely thickets

will be undone?

Strange tiny flowers, like bells

and purple prehistoric shaped,

beside the poke berry

monster, decorated

with pieces of old fence.

You’re not sad?

Little birds, find other nests.

Yesterday when the crow

sat eating your young

on the telephone wire,

stolen from you,

and from the maple,

didn’t you see

that was a sign to scatter?

Yet you still sing,

sitting in the tree

that will be gone tomorrow.

The maple who has given

much shade and color

isn’t sad either. She

is giving me strength.

In my heart,

borrowed forest, rented thicket,

you are forever,

many and varied shades of green,

and ever joyous in your singing.

Someday I’ll put some money

down and buy some wild place:

let it be what it is.


©2017 Borrowed Forest, Rented Thicket Linda Suddarth
mythopoetry.com

©2017 Borrowed Forest, Rented Thicket
Linda Suddarth All Rights Retained

HAPPY OTHER PLACE

With every rain the woods

grow another foot,

on the breeze

rose and honeysuckle

faintly permeate

the corners of the sky.

In the far-seeing

of distance is

the blue of mountain

through the tree tops:

the mountain that looks

down on all of us.

I’ve been there,

these are the apple groves

up on top of the blue.

One fall we sat

under an apple tree,

spread a blanket

and ate apple pie,

while the bees

resembled angels

singing all in harmony.

People strolled in a daze

with apple nets

in their hands,

collecting the harvest

in this happy

other-place.
©2017 Happy Other Place Linda Suddarth
mythopoetry.com

©2017 Happy Other Place
Linda Suddarth All Rights Retained

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First publication of the poem, HAPPY OTHER PLACE occurs April 15, 2017 on Linda's blog, LINDA WORD AND IMAGE

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Linda Ann Suddarth sees the creative life as a vital expression of the psyche. Linda has been writing poetry and drawing/painting for more than thirty years. She has recently published poems in Parabola, Silver Birch Press, Anima, and Red River Review. Linda has a BFA in painting, an interdisciplinary MA in Aesthetic Studies, and a PhD in Mythological Studies with an emphasis in Depth Psychology. She teaches English, Art, and Humanities at the College level. Linda’s blog is www.lindawordandimage.blogspot.com, and she can be reached at linsudd (at) aol (dot) com.

VISIT LINDA ON FACEBOOK AT

LINDA SUDDARTH POETRY AND ART

LINDA'S BLOG

LINDA WORD AND IMAGE