Shut the Front Door by Kelsey Bryan-Zwick (MY FRONT DOOR Series)

Shut the Front Door
by Kelsey Bryan-Zwick

Shut the front door
& listen out the back
notice the sounds
of wind through the alley
distant gulls at the beach
a bamboo wind chime
in a neighbor’s yard
echo of children playing
hum of buses and cars,
foghorn, helicopter

Shut the front door
& look out the back
notice pair of house sparrows
building a nest, starlings
back in town for the season
mockingbird that knows
every car alarm good morning
song that there is, crows
and cooper’s hawk, the feathers
of a mourning dove,
red blood in the wet grass

Shut the front door
and notice out back
building-mates, going
to and from car garage
hauling loads of clothes
to and from shared
laundry machines, taking
out their trash and recycling
the big dumpster where
even now the clanking sounds
of cans being crushed
by hands feverish sorting
through the bins, trying to
find anything that might
improve upon what they have:
never enough to shelter
through a cold night

Shut the front door
& remember through the back
to sweet peas mother planted
six feet away from you, with gloves
and mask on, how the sprouts
are beginning to show, how
the squirrel will tease the cats
inside with you, cozy as aloe
soaking up April sun, as an
occasional cabbage white butterfly
or cloudy sulfur rushes through
like liberated flowers

Shut the front door
& fall through the back
imagine what else you might
know, what else would
could, and should
possibly be.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: This poem started when I heard coughing in the echoey corridor of my building, and I called out to my partner, “Shut the front door!” and the realization that everything was changing washed over me. As a disabled person with mobility difficulties I was already in many ways having to live this new lifestyle we’re all becoming accustomed to, though this drastic, tragic change in atmosphere hits hard and in unexpected ways. For me turning away from the outside world let me explore this new “inside” world, as I gathered my thoughts and emotions, appreciating the place that I do have, even as the front door shifts from being an entry way, to being a defense to the outside world.  And so the poem, “Shut the Front Door,” unfolds.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: A Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee, Kelsey Bryan-Zwick is a Spanish/English speaking poet from Long Beach, California. Disabled with scoliosis from a young age, her poems often focus on trauma, giving heart to the antiseptic language of hospital intake forms. Author of Watermarked (Sadie Girl Press) and founder of the micro-press BindYourOwnBooks, Kelsey’s poems have been accepted by Spillway, Trailer Park Quarterly, Cholla Needles, Rise Up Review, Right Hand Pointing, Redshift, Making Up (a Picture Show Press anthology), and she will be Moon Tide Press’s Poet of the Month for May 2020.  Writing towards her new title, Here Go the Knives, find her at kelseybryanzwick.wixsite.com/poetry.

Old Man in the Rain, poem by Michael O’Brien

OLD MAN IN THE RAIN
by Michael O’Brien

Got a copy of Bukowski
from the library.
 
Nice, hard
cover edition; nicer than any of the ones
I’d ever shelled out cash
for.
 
Just noticed that the red dye
from the binding
has bled out a bit
onto the inside
of the dust jacket.
 
Makes me imagine that somebody
along the line
was reading in the rain.
 
Not bad, old
man,
not bad.
 
Still there for us
when we got no place
to hide.

SOURCE: “Old Man in the Rain” by Michael O’Brien appears in appears in the Silver Birch Press Bukowski Anthology – a collection of poetry, short stories, essays, interviews, photography, and art from authors and artists around the world — available at Amazon.com.

ART: “Charles Bukowski portrait, 1994″ by RinaldoZoontjes

Ursula LeGuin’s Rejection Letter and Subsequent Acclaim

In 1968,  Ursula Le Guin‘s agent received the following letter from an editor regarding Le Guin’s novel The Left Hand of Darkness:

Dear Miss Kidd,

Ursula K. Le Guin writes extremely well, but I’m sorry to have to say that on the basis of that one highly distinguishing quality alone I cannot make you an offer for the novel. The book is so endlessly complicated by details of reference and information, the interim legends become so much of a nuisance despite their relevance, that the very action of the story seems to be to become hopelessly bogged down and the book, eventually, unreadable. The whole is so dry and airless, so lacking in pace, that whatever drama and excitement the novel might have had is entirely dissipated by what does seem, a great deal of the time, to be extraneous material. My thanks nonetheless for having thought of us. The manuscript of  The Left Hand of Darkness is returned herewith.

Yours sincerely,

The Editor
21 June, 1968

The following year (1969), Walker and Company published The Left Hand of Darkness to overwhelming critical acclaim. The novel also won the prestigious Hugo and Nebula awards. Here are some of the reviews Le Guin  has received for the book:

“[A] science fiction masterpiece.”—Newsweek

“A jewel of a story.”—Frank Herbert

“As profuse and original in invention as The Lord of the Rings.”—Michael Moorcock

“An instant classic.”—Minneapolis Star-Tribune

“Like all great writers of fiction, Ursula K. Le Guin creates imaginary worlds that restore us, hearts eased, to our own.”—The Boston Globe

“Stellar…Le Guin is a superb stylist with a knack for creating characters who are both wise and deeply humane. A major event in fantasy literature.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Find The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin at Amazon.com.

Trivia Tidbit: Ursula K. Le Guin and Philip K. Dick were in the same high school graduating class — Berkeley (California) High School Class of 1947

Coming in August: Silver Birch Press Bukowski Anthology

The Silver Birch Press Bukowski Anthology (available in August 2013) will feature poetry and prose about Charles Bukowski from over 50 friends and admirers — and includes portraits of the great author from artists around the world. The cover of the Bukowski Anthology showcases a portrait of Buk by renowned California artist Mark Erickson, a longtime Bukowski aficionado, and Austrian artist Birgit Zartl.  The collection will also feature photographic portraits of Bukowski by Joan Gannij — the photographer who has captured some of the most iconic images in the Bukowski canon.

As a preview, here’s a poem from the collection.

OLD MAN IN THE RAIN
by Michael O’Brien

Got a copy of Bukowski
from the library.
 
Nice, hard
cover edition; nicer than any of the ones
I’d ever shelled out cash
for.
 
Just noticed that the red dye
from the binding
has bled out a bit
onto the inside
of the dust jacket.
 
Makes me imagine that somebody
along the line
was reading in the rain.
 
Not bad, old
man,
not bad.
 
Still there for us
when we got no place
to hide.

…We will do our best to release the Silver Birch Press Bukowski Anthology on Charles Bukowski’s 93rd birthday — August 16, 2013.

Ursula K. LeGuin’s Rejection Letter — and Subsequent Critical Raves

Silver Birch Musings: I’ve come to believe that the most important thing for any writer — and what keeps you writing — is belief in your work, despite what others may say about it. Sometimes, other people don’t understand what you’re trying to do — or your style and subject matter is just too different from what people have seen before. I’ll admit I’ve been on both sides of this fence — I’ve  misunderstood other people’s work and have had readers dismiss mine. The main thing is to keep writing — and never let anyone else’s opinion discourage you.

To make my point, here is a rejection letter Ursula K. Le Guin‘s agent received in 1968 from an editor regarding Le Guin’s novel The Left Hand of Darkness:

Dear Miss Kidd,

Ursula K. Le Guin writes extremely well, but I’m sorry to have to say that on the basis of that one highly distinguishing quality alone I cannot make you an offer for the novel. The book is so endlessly complicated by details of reference and information, the interim legends become so much of a nuisance despite their relevance, that the very action of the story seems to be to become hopelessly bogged down and the book, eventually, unreadable. The whole is so dry and airless, so lacking in pace, that whatever drama and excitement the novel might have had is entirely dissipated by what does seem, a great deal of the time, to be extraneous material. My thanks nonetheless for having thought of us. The manuscript of  The Left Hand of Darkness is returned herewith.

Yours sincerely,

The Editor
21 June, 1968

The following year (1969), Walker and Company published The Left Hand of Darkness to overwhelming critical acclaim. The novel also won the prestigious Hugo and Nebula awards. Here are some of the reviews Le Guin  has received for the book:

“[A] science fiction masterpiece.”—Newsweek

“A jewel of a story.”—Frank Herbert

“As profuse and original in invention as The Lord of the Rings.”—Michael Moorcock

“An instant classic.”—Minneapolis Star-Tribune

“Like all great writers of fiction, Ursula K. Le Guin creates imaginary worlds that restore us, hearts eased, to our own.”—The Boston Globe

“Stellar…Le Guin is a superb stylist with a knack for creating characters who are both wise and deeply humane. A major event in fantasy literature.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Find The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin at Amazon.com.

Trivia Tidbit: Ursula K. Le Guin and Philip K. Dick were in the same high school graduating class — Berkeley (California) High School Class of 1947