We Have Reached Our (Initial) Goal!
I’m so excited to announce that we have reached our initial fundraising goal. We now have what we need to get started. If you still want to join our “Writer as Editor” workshop, you can still donate to the press. I’ve set a new goal for us to reach so that we can raise more prize money to incentivize poets to send us their best work. If you want to take part, just click the link below.
Donate to The Poetry Salon’s Press
Register for Kim Rosen’s Workshop on Saturday
While we are on the subject of upcoming workshops, I want to remind everyone that Kim Rosen, author of Saved by a Poem, will be offering a Poetry Dive workshop this Saturday on a sliding-scale basis.
You can find out more, and register at the link below.
Workshops with Kim Rosen
The last time I joined one of Kim’s Poetry Dives, I wrote this poem (below), based on an idea from Ellen Bass’ “Prayer.” I will share both poems here. (Mine first because I am not bold or brave enough to follow Ellen Bass.)
"Once in Florence"
by Tresha Faye Haefner
After Ellen Bass
A bouquet of kestrals opened over the Duomo.
Wings bright as flower petals, they circled
over the sun-burned tops of town
and landed on the church,
like grey ministers, coming to pray
again.
Once I would have prayed, Lord let me
rise up, like that, flying over all
that is human.
Marble haloes on the heads of statues,
plates of bread and the lace offerings
of salt drying on the shores of the sea.
Lord, I still love
loving the world like that.
All that is lovely spread below me.
Mountain tops, mouths,
romantic languages lingering
In the ears of the blue trees.
But God of distraction,
I’m tired of all the distractions.
The choiceless choosing.
Let me have one moment that rises
over every other desire.
Let it be enough
to stand still, under this one church,
eight hundred images
of Christ suffering.
The pigeons, nailed to their mortal perches.
Lifting into the sun, like petals
blowing open.
A violinist in the shadow of the stones
releasing songs from the wood, for all of us,
for free.
Originally Published in Elysium Review
Prayer
by Ellen Bass
Once I wore a dress liquid as vodka.
My lover watched me ascend
from the subway
like I was an underground spring
breaking through.
I want to stop wanting to be wanted like that.
I’m tired of the song the rain sings in June,
the earth, her ornate crown of trees
spiking up from her loamy head.
There are things I wanted, like everyone.
But to this angel of wishes I’ve worshiped
so long, I ask now to admit
the world as it is.
Just a quick note on a misspelling: it should be *kestrels*. Lovely poem.