Reading this Friday night (June 3rd)

The Arts and Humanities Council of Southwest Louisiana and the Porch Coffee House & Café will present a reading by two local poets, Rita D. Costello and Trée George on Friday, June 3rd, at 7 p.m. at the Porch as part of the First Friday Reading Series. The reading series, which began in January, has showcased the talents of poets and writers in Southwest Louisiana and has helped to generate interest locally in building the Lake Charles literary scene.

Trée George was born and raised in Baton Rouge and received his B.A. and M.A. in history at LSU. He has lived in Tennessee and worked in sales and management training before starting a studio where he works to produce multi-layered artwork with photography, poetry, and fiction. His poems work closely with the prose poem instead of the more traditional forms of poetry. “As a visual learner, my poetry is almost always the byproduct of an image,” George stated. “I see first, write second.”

Originally from New York, Rita D. Costello has lived all over America and China. She is Director of Freshman/Sophomore English at McNeese State in Louisiana and co-editor of the anthology Bend Don't Shatter. Her work has appeared in journals such as: Glimmer Train, ACM, Baltimore Review, and Hawai’i Review. Costello has won the Glimmer Train Poetry Prize and her poetry has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.

Testing iWatermark again

Testing iWatermark

First Card Design

Happy Mother's Day (a bit early)

finger of wind

I could open a vein this morning. I feel that pull, that flow, of sun rising, so silent in low spring arc, so relentless, this spinning, this rising and falling, this exhaling of heat into the darkness. And too, this giving of life. And I wonder of my waste, of what value is thrown into the ocean, of what feeds. Perhaps here, as I watch morning warm lucid petals, is my tether.

And I think of reading, of how I do so little anymore, of how I never wanted to read too much, never wanted to finish anything but the worst. I know this attraction, to lie in the summer grass and feel the breeze of life, cleansing. Life beckoning life. Brother to brother. This is how it feels. That kiss of warmth on my cheek. A brother looking back. A finger of wind calling forth.

___________

. . . I feel that pull, that flow, of sun rising, so silent in low spring arc, so relentless, this spinning, this rising and falling, this exhaling of heat into darkness. And too, this giving of life. . . . I know this attraction, to lie in the summer grass and feel the cleansing breeze. Life beckoning life. Brother to brother. This is how it feels. That kiss of warmth on my cheek. A brother looking back. A finger of wind calling forth. Come walk with me.

how

How does one write without what is not within? How does one add anything of substance to the daily narrative? What does it mean to build? And of addition, what is this? In a reality of change, can anything last? Is anything not relative? And of Love? What of this? This water and fish. This bird and air. So I say be damned all the clocks, especially the one on my wall that is an hour behind, that one I never bothered to change. It will be right again. I'd like to say the same.