Archives for posts with tag: Daniel Romo

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Congratulations to Daniel Romo, author of the poetry collection Romancing Gravity (Silver Birch Press, 2013) on the great review of his chapbook (and previous collection, When Kerosene’s Involved) at misfitmagazine.net. The review appears below.

Growing up as a decidedly Not chulo type in Southern California was not a pleasant experience for Romo.  A self-described geeky, skinning kid, shy around girls, awkward, though plucky at sports, a decidedly not Macho, he somehow manages to view his upbringing with humor and panache.  Now a teacher and a voluminous writer, as these two collections show (Kerosene is well over 200 pages of concise prose poems, while Romancing is a mere 60 odd pages of free verse). Romo’s is a voice and point of view, that grows on you the more you read.  He is both empathetic and clear eyed, but not overly sentimental. In short, Romo is the kind of role model you could  safely entrust your children with, knowing they he remembers the pitfalls of youth and what is necessary, now, to move on with life.” misfitmagazine.net

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REVISION
by Daniel Romo

           Let’s say we’re seahorses. Let’s say our forgotten birthday candles
have melted into coral. Let’s say the coral is forgotten, too.
         Let’s say the water is repetition. It is high tide. We have washed ashore.
The children scoop us up with plastic shovels.
                       They drop us into half-filled buckets of sandy water
                               hoping to revive us.
Their mothers convince them to throw us back. Our bodies turn to foam.
                                                               We are already dead.
 
Let’s say we’re notorious bank robbers planning our heist from our hideout. 
                            Let’s say our masks are big yellow happy faces.
                            Let’s say we are bad men.
                            Our mothers have written us letters trying to convince us
                                                             to turn ourselves in.
      We rip them up and smile. We were always disobedient children.
                        Let’s say we’re cops who have been tipped off,
                        about to raid the hideout.
                        Let’s say our guns are loaded, and our laughs are loud.
                     
  Let’s say we’re liars and none of this happened.
            Let’s say we were seahorses.
Let’s say our birthdays were never celebrated.
                       Let’s say we’ve crossed out those times in our lives.
                                    
  Let’s say we’re convenient rough drafts.    

…”Revision” appears in the Silver Birch Press release Romancing Gravity, a collection of poems by Daniel Romo, available at Amazon.com.

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Kudos to Daniel Romo for his recent rave review at ESCAPE INTO LIFE, a blog that features art and literature by emerging and established artists from all over the world.

Kathleen Kirk, EIL Poetry Editor, offered a resounding endorsement of Romancing Gravity by Daniel Romo (Silver Birch Press, 2013), saying, in part:

Romancing Gravity is a book with balls. Stickball, baseball, football, tee ball. Swear words, anger, regret. Drive-in movies, magic shows, liquor stores. Current events, social commentary, nostalgia. And a car chase. It’s got prose poems, free verse, and a sestina that repeats the words ‘bugaboo,’ ‘uvula,’ and ‘cajones.’ Yes, ‘cajones.’ That takes cajones.” (Read the rest of Kathleen Kirk’s review at ESCAPE INTO LIFE.)

Find Romancing Gravity by Daniel Romo at Amazon.com.

For his remarkable writing, Silver Birch Press will nominate Daniel Romo for a 2013 Pushcart Prize. 

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Congratulations to Daniel Romo, author of the poetry collection Romancing Gravity (Silver Birch Press, 2013) on the great review of his chapbook (and previous collection, When Kerosene’s Involved) at misfitmagazine.net. The review appears below.

Growing up as a decidedly Not chulo type in Southern California was not a pleasant experience for Romo.  A self-described geeky, skinning kid, shy around girls, awkward, though plucky at sports, a decidedly not Macho, he somehow manages to view his upbringing with humor and panache.  Now a teacher and a voluminous writer, as these two collections show (Kerosene is well over 200 pages of concise prose poems, while Romancing is a mere 60 odd pages of free verse). Romo’s is a voice and point of view, that grows on you the more you read.  He is both empathetic and clear eyed, but not overly sentimental. In short, Romo is the kind of role model you could  safely entrust your children with, knowing they he remembers the pitfalls of youth and what is necessary, now, to move on with life.” misfitmagazine.net

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REVISION
by Daniel Romo

           Let’s say we’re seahorses. Let’s say our forgotten birthday candles
have melted into coral. Let’s say the coral is forgotten, too.
         Let’s say the water is repetition. It is high tide. We have washed ashore.
The children scoop us up with plastic shovels.
                       They drop us into half-filled buckets of sandy water
                               hoping to revive us.
Their mothers convince them to throw us back. Our bodies turn to foam.
                                                               We are already dead.
 
Let’s say we’re notorious bank robbers planning our heist from our hideout. 
                            Let’s say our masks are big yellow happy faces.
                            Let’s say we are bad men.
                            Our mothers have written us letters trying to convince us
                                                             to turn ourselves in.
      We rip them up and smile. We were always disobedient children.
                        Let’s say we’re cops who have been tipped off,
                        about to raid the hideout.
                        Let’s say our guns are loaded, and our laughs are loud.
                     
  Let’s say we’re liars and none of this happened.
            Let’s say we were seahorses.
Let’s say our birthdays were never celebrated.
                       Let’s say we’ve crossed out those times in our lives.
                                    
  Let’s say we’re convenient rough drafts.    

…”Revision” appears in the Silver Birch Press release Romancing Gravity, a collection of poems by Daniel Romo, available at Amazon.com.

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We just received our second erasure poetry submission — created at erasures.wavebooks.com — by Daniel Romo, whose poetry appears in the Silver Birch Press Summer Anthology and in Romancing Gravity, his new poetry collection from Silver Birch Press. Romo’s source material is The Land of Little Rain by Mary Austin (find the text here), a series of interrelated lyrical essays about the American Southwest first published in 1903.

THIS IS…
Erasure poem by Daniel Romo
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:  Daniel Romo is the author of the poetry collections When Kerosene’s Involved (Black Coffee Press, 2013) and Romancing Gravity (Silver Birch Press, 2013). His poetry and photography can be found in the Los Angeles Review, Gargoyle, MiPOesias, Yemassee, Hobart, and elsewhere. He holds an MFA from Queens University of Charlotte and teaches creative writing. He lives in Long Beach, California. More of his writing can be found at danielromo.net.