Today’s WOW! Blog Tour finds me over at Boys’ Mom Reads in Grand Prairie, Texas. (Some of my favorite poems in the book were inspired by the great states of Texas.)
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FEATURED: Sleeping with Ghosts
“It feels both extremely personal and universal. Despite the poems drawing on Payne’s experiences, many times I felt as if she had looked through a magic lens at my past relationships and emotions.”
Thanks goes out to Jodi Webb for this sweet review of Sleeping with Ghosts on Words by Webb. Jodi’s review is part of the month-long WOW! Women on Writing Blog Tour.
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Imposter Syndrome Soliloquy
The review says my poems are accessible
and I know that is a gold star
on something so easily otherwise considered
not something one reads on the fly
though quite the contrary, one does or one can
I do anyhow
keep a dog-eared volume
within easy reach for a metered pause
now and then and again
The volumes change-out of course
famous old school to popular lowercase
he said, she said, now more they saids,
collections and anthologies and
the short-but-sweet chaps
Which is not to say they all get gold stars
some enhance my furrowed brow,
deepen the lines that live there,
make me close-up a book with a clap
some even, I confess, make me feel small
stupid, insipid, imposter
Like the time that Rogue Poet
infiltrated my writing group
and made us all feel somehow lacking
somehow not good enough
somehow not even poets
Like the time the Queen Bee
sat in the front row and watched
the little drone vibrate so much the mic shook
and the poems fell sharp and hard to the ground
and her look — just her look — said
you are not something one reads at all
ever, not even on the fly
I wonder sometimes if they were real,
the Rogue and the Queen Bee,
and not some amalgamation of my self
and all of her inner critics —
you are a fabrication, imitator, mutt
with no pedigree for poetry
stop now please
But someone — or someones —
think I am deserving of a gold star
5 stars sometimes too
with accolades and atta girls
and just enough kindness to make me feel
momentarily monumentally poetic.
Photo by ArtHouse.
If you like this poem, you’ll love the poems in my new book…
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GUEST WRITER: “The Importance of Retreat”
Today, the WOW! Women on Writing Blog Tour for Sleeping with Ghosts finds me at Create Write Now, the website of personal growth mentor Mari McCarthy.
I’m a Guest Blogger blogger on her site, writing about “The Importance of Retreat.”
by Jodi Webb
WOW: Jen, welcome back to WOW! Women on Writing with your fifth book Sleeping with Ghosts. What inspired you to write about past relationships?
JEN: Hi Jodi. Thanks for welcoming me back to WOW! I loved working with all of you for Evidence of Flossing and am happy to be back for Sleeping with Ghosts.
What inspired this new book and its focus on past relationships? Good question. I have always had an acute ability to recall moments in time — I call them “defining moments.” You know, the point in time when something shifts or that you bookmark to remember later? As a writer, those “defining moments” are a pretty fertile source of inspiration for all of my work, most especially when it comes to writing memoir and poetry.
I think it’s called autobiographical memory — like photographic memory, but related to people, conversations, emotions, and interactions. I can easily find and settle down into memories and re- experience them in order to write about them. Sometimes I consciously rummage around to find something interesting, but often, the memories just show up — like ghosts — and ask to be written about.
I’m also a storyteller by nature. I frequently use analogy and story not only to talk about my own experiences, but to say, “I understand yours, too. Let’s talk about it.”
WOW:This book of poetry if so personal. Have you ever found it difficult to write about relationships featured in your poetry?
JEN: Some of these poems were definitely a challenge to write. There’s often sadness or grief knotted up in a memory. So when I untangle it to tell the story, those emotions resurface. But it’s more cathartic than difficult.
Other poems come more easily, welcoming the chance to reconnect with a love story, or remember moments with a dear friend, or find counsel from cherished mentors.
Have you read Brené Brown’s book Rising Strong? It’s one of my most dogeared books. She talks about being brave, showing up, telling our stories. It ends with her “Manifesto of the Brave and Brokenhearted”:
We are the authors of our lives.
We write our own daring endings.
We craft love from heartbreak,
compassion from shame,
grace from disappointment,
courage from failure.
Showing up is our power.
Story is our way home. Truth is our song.
We are the brave and broken hearted.
We are rising strong.
I love that!
I have to tell you…a side story…that the process of revisiting the ghosts in this book was fascinating. I had two amazing editors who read and critiqued every chapter, poem by poem. I spent hours with each of them, reviewing and reconsidering. It gave me the chance to dive deep into those past stories and live with the ghosts again for a while. That was an incredible experience — to be steeped in memory like that — it was visceral. Heartbreaking and beautiful all at once.
The insights and time from these two women were a true gift. The book is enormously more powerful as a result.
WOW:I am in awe of poets because I simply don’t have that lyrical talent. Tell us a little about how a poem is born. Does it come out in a rush of words or do you have to fight to create each line?
JEN: I know that some poets anguish over poems for weeks and months. To be honest? I don’t have that kind of patience. On the rare occasion when I do anguish, I end up with an over-kneaded poem that’s too tough and lost its original flavor.
I always say the poems “show up,” which is what it really feels like. Something will trigger a memory or offer up the first line…and whoosh…there’s the poem!
Ok, it’s not that quick of a process. I probably spend at least an hour or two on a poem — write, rework, read it out loud a few times, rework some more, repeat. Sometimes I go back later and edit, but not much and not often.
The poem that took the longest to write in Sleeping with Ghosts was probably “Under His Spell.” That took a few days, mostly because it’s a rhyming poem, and I don’t often rhyme. (In general, I resist writing to [poetic] form…though I’ve been challenged recently to give it a try.)
“Dear Jenny,” one of my favorites, took almost no time at all. That one showed up as if I was channeling the ghost himself and just transcribing his words. Like magic!
Poetry always kind of feels like magic to me.
WOW:A magic that is out of reach for so many of us. So tell us, how do you curate a poetry book? Do you select a topic and write poems, do you look at poems you’ve already written and perceive a common thread or is it some combination of the two?
JEN: Would you believe I’ve had the title of this book in my mind for more than 10 years? I even saved the cover art and artist’s name in a file for safekeeping!
The poems span about 20 years of work. The curating of them was fairly straightforward when it came to the ghost chapters — the seven ghosts are seven of those defining moments for me, with plenty of poems written over the years. But there were other poems — like the small pieces of stories you find in the Ephemera chapter, or the ghosts that reappear in Dreamwork — that needed to be included.
My favorite chapter to put together was Muses — these are the women who have shaped and continue to shape my life. It felt important to include them.
Most of the poems were already written, but about a dozen of them are new, written specifically for the book or because of the book. The very last poem I wrote for Ghosts is called “The Poet at Midnight,” which describes, in a sense, what the curating often feels like — a wandering through old memories and the discovery of which ones we hold onto.
WOW:Fascinating! I love the idea that you saved that image, knowing that someday there would be a book to go with it. Let’s take a peek at your life beyond poetry.In addition to a poetry and prose writer, you are also an artist, photographer, graphic designer (let me know if I’ve forgotten anything). Do you have a favorite creative outlet?
JEN: Writer, artist, photographer, graphic designer, yes. Also blogger and zinester…business owner (Words by Jen) and publisher (Three Chairs Publishing).
I don’t think I see them as individual roles, so much as tools I use for my Creativity. And I don’t have a favorite, really. Sometimes I love poetry — like in April when I write a poem a day for NaPoWriMo (National Poetry Writing Month), and sometimes I’m all about creating the next zine. It’s more like whichever burner is fired up is the one I’m cooking on today — LOL!
I need to create. It’s my raison d’être — who I am and how I move around in this world.
I’m just lucky that I get to participate in the creative process all day long, either for my clients or with my own various ideas and projects.
WOW:What a lovely life to lead. You mentioned being a zinester. Could you tell us a little more about MANIFEST (zine)?
JEN: The zine is like storytelling lite!
I had always dreamed of doing installation art — in my “spare time.” LOL! — like large spaces filled with words and visuals that visitors could walk through and experience. As an alternative, I came up with the idea of doing a zine that could hold the same ideas on a much smaller scale.
I had published another zine back in the early 90s, so I was familiar with the format and the (fabulous) zine community. It just felt like the perfect venue for my essays and poetry, and my other creative pursuits, like collage and photography.
MANIFEST comes out quarterly with a different theme for each issue. It has covered topics like change and transition, solitude, the pandemic, time and time travel — sometimes politics, like gun control and women’s rights. I just mailed issue #15 called Write, about finding inspiration.
WOW: So where are you finding inspiration? What are you working on now?
JEN:Mostly, right now, I’m working on shepherding Sleeping with Ghosts out into the world. So there’s a lot of publicity work and events to prepare for, including my blog tour with you!
But I also have the next issue of MANIFEST (zine) in process, and I’m trying to decide if I should resurrect an old manuscript or start fresh with a new project of essays and poems. Maybe also a podcast?
I guess we’ll have to wait to find out, right? Folks can follow along on my blog and social media for all of the latest HERE.
Thank you for your time, Jodi. It’s been great to talk with you!
WOW:And you. I’ll let you get back to your being creative and your WOW blog tour with Sleeping with Ghosts.
I am very excited to participating in my second WOW! Women on Writing Blog Tour! For four weeks in October and November, Sleeping with Ghosts will be featured more than a dozen blogs and websites across the country with book reviews, guest posts, book giveaways, spotlights, and interviews.
It all starts today with an interview on the WOW! Women on Writing blog The Muffin. I hope you’ll follow along!
I am very excited to participating in my second WOW! Women on Writing Blog Tour!
For four weeks in October and November, Sleeping with Ghosts will be featured on close to two dozen blogs and websites across the country with book reviews, guest posts, book giveaways, spotlights, and interviews.
It all starts on Monday, October 14 with an interview on the Women on Writing blog The Muffin. I hope you’ll follow along!
WOW! Women on Writing is a global organization, designed to support women’s creativity, energy, blood, sweat and tears, throughout all stages of the writing process.
Its concept is unique, as it fills in the missing gap between writing websites and women’s magazines. WOW! is dedicated to raising the overall standards within the writing community, and devote an active profile within writing industry associations, organizations and websites.
They actively contribute to the love, enjoyment and excitement of producing quality writing — so that the reader in all of us will never want for good material, in any form.
For more about WOW! visit www.wow-womenonwriting.com
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Mirror Mirror
The girl in the mirror takes on the twisted shape required to put on earrings — it’s a learned posture: how to do deft work without consideration.
I watch as she decorates herself with the green peridot pair I loved so much and notice the favorite pullover I wore once on a whale trip off the coast of Cape Cod.
The girl is familiar — the eyes mostly, since they are all I choose to look at usually. Those hardly change at all, except when a certain mood hits and they momentarily turn as green as those earrings.
Still, we look at each other sometimes — this girl and I — and we have that kind of silent eye conversation you can only have with people who know you well enough.
Most often it’s a this will have to do rolled-eyes thing she’s perfected. A slight lopsided smirk as if to say…something. I don’t know what.
God, she’s had that lopsided smirk since kindergarten. With a picture to prove it. It seems ironic, sardonic, sarcastic. At five-years-old?
It’s either the smile-smirk of an old soul or a poet, I can’t decide. Reborn or born that way?
But five was a long time ago. Time enough to let smirk lines coexist with laugh lines and that what the fuck indent between her brows.
Has she been perplexed all this time? Since five? Or is circular? Does she come around to understanding now and then? Belief, faith, confidence. Then adrift, nonplussed, confused.
There are days I recognize the all of that. Can see the well-roundedness to her reflections. And days I don’t.
Days I don’t even want to look — use my peripheral senses to pat down the cowlick and add a little color to her cheeks. There, there — a small comfort before we go about our day.
Photo & poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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Old Great Blue
From the bough under which the catbird mourns
I gathered a bushel of wild grapes
so that together — your Memory and I — could make sweet wine
to share with the family of swans who remember
outstretched wings, your solo flights across the pond
the kingfisher who cheered
green heron
and osprey
and chickadee
the turtles and frogs and snakes
and songsters all
remember you, old friend
We’ll drink our wine by your weathered white bones
narrate again your prehistoric startle from this cove
the seemingly impossible lift and soar
your meditative poses and postures
And I?
I will tell them of the winter we walked step-for-step by the back pond
how the world was silent and we listened to snowfall
the sharp haunted joy of us and no others
that moment last spring — the shock of morning wing song
watching as you landed on a branch crown-high, balancing on its sway
how every time I looked up,
you were still there
and still there
and still there
until you were no longer
I have pages now of poems for you
stories to tell to the gathering
and one last prayer
these fall flowers at your feet
beneath a birch that once was as well
with gratitude forever more
Amen
Photo & poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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Oh Yeah!
It’s OK that you drank the Kool-Aid, love.
You needed something
to get you through these last long years,
and the booze just wasn’t cutting it,
we both knew that.
So god it is…
I just wish it was a gentler god,
not an angry one, or judgmental,
not one locked in a house built on dogma
reeking of sins and incense.
I don’t know…if it was me,
I’d want to get to know the god who made the woods
and all its weird and wild creatures,
the one who filled up the ocean and dropped in
whales and welks and narwals,
the one who paints rainbows across the sky
and doesn’t care who takes offense.
I’d want to find a god to suture old wounds
and tug at the threads of trauma
that keep some of us from a fully woven life…
Kool-Aid comes in all flavors, darling
but I prefer mine good and sweet, oh yeah!
Photo & poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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Fall Morning
The air smells of wild grapes and skunk
but I don’t dare walk to the curb
to see if the devil has taken another one,
my heart is already broken so much
the weight of its bits and pieces
is pain now living in my bones —
so I ignore all of that
and stand barefoot in the damp grass
soothe the catbird worrying
with a tick tick tick of tongue
I learned from my grandfather
who loved birds enough to sing to them
but not much else, I don’t think
except maybe whiskey
— and guns —
the devil comes in all forms, doesn’t he?
angry men and scared men,
men with a throttle between their legs
so blind with power they don’t slow down
to spare the skunk, her mouthful of sweet grapes,
the joyous morning that could have been.
Photo & poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Don’t Miss Authors in Conversation: Poets Jen Payne and Julie Fitzpatrick discuss Sleeping with Ghosts at Breakwater Books, October 13
Three Chairs Publishing is pleased to announce the publication of its newest book, Sleeping with Ghosts: Poems & Musings by Branford, Connecticut poet Jen Payne. Known for her meditations and musings about our outside world, Payne takes readers inside this time…into the heart and mind of a poet, where memories wander, hearts break, and ghosts appear in dreams.
Those ghosts — her lovers, soulmates, and muses — reveal themselves slowly, chapter by chapter, in this wistfully reflective, time-traveling memoir that Branford Poet Laureate Judith Liebmann, Ph.D. calls “Beautifully crafted and luminous…an intimate and unforgettable journey of love found and lost, the joys of creativity, and the power of memory.”
Sleeping with Ghosts will be the subject of the Breakwater Books AUTHORS IN CONVERSATION event on Sunday, October 13 (5pm) with Payne and Guilford performer and poet Julie Fitzpatrick. Join them for a convivial exploration of the ghosts and stories from the book. In additional to reading selected poems, the two — who recently collaborated on Fitzpatrick’s poetry book Church on the Screen — will talk about the creative process and the experience of making books.
Come enjoy poetry, creative conversation, and sweet treats during this author event and book signing. Registration is required for the Breakwater event, and books will be available for purchase the night of the event. Please register now at tinyurl.com/ytbujx4h, or visit EVENTS on the Breakwater Books website, breakwaterbooks.net. (Please note there is a $5.50 charge to register, but on the night of the event, you will get a $5 Breakwater Bucks store credit to use any time.)
Sleeping with Ghosts will be featured in a national WOW! Women on Writing Blog Tour beginning October 14, and Payne is part of an Authors in the Shop series planned at Guilford Art Center in November. Details can be found here.
Copies of Sleeping with Ghosts (5.5 x 8.5, paperback, 182 pages, $20.00) will be available at Breakwater Books (81 Whitfield Street, Guilford) and the Guilford Art Center (411 Church Street, Guilford) in October, or pre-order your copy from our Etsy Shop now.
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Get a Sneak Peek of My New Book!
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Pre-Order Sleeping with Ghosts Now!
SLEEPING WITH GHOSTS
POEMS & MUSINGS
by Jen Payne
$20.00
Books ship in early October.
I am so excited to tell you about my new book, Sleeping with Ghosts! The ghosts — my lovers, soulmates, and muses — reveal themselves chapter by chapter, dream by dream, in this wistfully reflective, time-traveling memoir filled with poems, musings, and illustrations.
The book is at the printer now and should be available in early October. You can pre-order your copy today, see below. Then please save the dates for these upcoming book events, and watch for more details soon.
I look forward to seeing you!
❤️ Jen Payne
Words by Jen
Three Chairs Publishing
BOOKS & BLOOMS at the BLACKSTONE
with the Branford Garden Club
Friday, September 27, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Blackstone Memorial Library
(758 Main Street, Branford)
• Tickets
AUTHORS IN CONVERSATION
with Julie Fitzpatrick and Jen Payne
Sunday, October 13, 5:00 p.m.
Breakwater Books
(81 Whitfield Street, Guilford)
• Register Now
WOW! WOMEN ON WRITING
NATIONAL BLOG TOUR
begins Monday, October 14
AUTHORS IN THE SHOP
at Guilford Art Center
Book Signing
Saturday, November 16, 12:00 – 2:00 p.m.
Guilford Art Center
(411 Church Street, Guilford)
SLEEPING WITH GHOSTS
POEMS & MUSINGS
by Jen Payne
$20.00
Books ship in early October.
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What of her, anyway?
They hardly slow down for me
solitary on the side of the road
walking before the heat rises,
so what of her, anyway?
There have been so many this year
one bunny, two bunny…
I count like my grandbaby advises
three bunny, four bunny…
Dead bunny.
Wonder if the driver slowed at all,
considered his violation,
said a prayer if not for her
then for the three babes
one bunny, two bunny…
asleep in the down
dreaming of their mum
and mornings in dewed grass.
But what of her anyway?
She, no matter,
just a long red stripe
over which I step this morning
— there but for the grace of god —
wary of the next car coming
light speed around the bend.
Photo & poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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they were once a family of four
I see them on the side of the road
have to hold back tears or
suffer similar fate —
we are merciless these days
our endless race
to get from here to there
nevermind the casualties —
so I file them away with
Roadside Tragedies
too much to bear for any family
until they reappear in a dream
their sweet furred selves,
mom and her babes
masked and giggling
running circles on
a green shag carpet that
could be grass or forest
or pillowed green moss
a soft landing for heartache,
respite from the cruelties
of our hard, brutal world
©2024 Jen Payne. Photo from U.S. Fish and Wildlife. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
You, my friend,
are on the wrong side
of history
and someday,
years from now,
they’ll write about you
like they’ve written about
your kind before.
They’ll include photos
of your red hats,
and your fandom flags.
They’ll roll clips
of the playground bully,
the fakes and fools,
your lockstep hate,
the idolatry and rhetoric
that set the fate of your country
— and your offspring —
at the edge of a wild precipice.
They’ll speculate
at the types of personalities
who were more easily duped,
who followed out of fear
or inferiority,
weak mindedness or
— worse —
some base interpretation of god,
and they’ll make comparisons
to the evil we used to read in books,
the ones our families fought wars for,
and they’ll shake their heads,
scorn your poor decisions,
scorn you and
the long, sad wake of your ignorance.
©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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What Comes Around Goes Around
Come the day when your god
falls out of favor
what then?
When you must
face Mecca five times a day,
obey the Buddhist Precepts
posted in your schoolroom,
worship the Golden Plates,
honor a Saturday sabbath,
abstain from
sex
coffee
alcohol
smoking
pork
pornography
swearing
gambling
dairy
shellfish
modern medicine
electricity
music
dancing?
abstain too from
the worship of false prophets
your idolatry of
evil men and criminals
what then?
©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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July 16, 2024
I want to wake up
thinking about my To Do list
or the last slice of Zuppardi’s pizza
I’ll have for breakfast.
I want to turn over and pet the cat
glance at the book I’m reading
and think about Sunday:
coffee, book, cat
and that’s that.
I want to lie for a while
and plan out the road trip
we wanted to take —
its next leg from Wyoming
up and around and down
to California if we can —
wonder at how we’ve managed
all these years like that
and when we will again.
I want to rest easy
in this wide, soft bed
in this comfortable, quiet home
knowing I have taken good care
of it and myself enough
to outlast the Zeitgeist
roaring outside my window.
But instead I wake too early
wondering if I should stockpile Ramen,
learn how to shoot a pistol,
hoard enough barbiturates
for me and the cat,
consider my escape route
if I should be so lucky.
©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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He Tows the Party Line
He tows the party line
so hard now
I expect to see rope burns
in hands that held me.
So hard now
his gestures of hate
in hands that held me —
how blind was I?
His gestures of hate
he holds so firmly —
how blind was I?
Those hands I loved.
He holds so firmly
I expect to see rope burns;
those hands I loved…
he tows the party line.
A pantoum poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
The poems in the
new literary review
are long winded
like me and my
menopausal middle
(or end)
wide and seemingly
without boundary
word upon word upon word
they
write and write and write
until what?
until the train of thought (finally) subsides or
the ink runs out or
the smooth gray lead breaks or
the ribbon runs dry
Wait!
Does technology even have an end point
Does it ever run out?
save for the
Who came up with the idea of a
battery-operated keyboard anyway?
I confess the poems are so long
three pages, six pages, eight pages
I can’t even read them…
my glasses run out of patience
Is that bad? Does that make me a poeta non grata?
What little I can read / bear / swallow
are full up with words
in LONG POEM form
like the exercise of writing
a 500-word essay in school
gathering flowery fragments of tethered expressions joined by marks intended to separate elements and clarify meaning
onto the page
It’s me, I’m the problem. It’s me.
This stew of hormones and ego
fear and frustration
resistance
even in the face of its futility
Please don’t make me fit into this form
wear spanx
abstain from ice cream
suck in my belly
while I
write and write and write
until I’m as out-of-breath as me
post core workout
post parking lot incline
post headline skimming
post anticipating the bleak future that lies ahead
“The long poem is just right for our confounding, fractured age”
writes a woman named Tess I do not know
Perhaps that explains it:
poets wanting to sink into this epic age
“represent the sheer unmanageable scale, the vast and messy confusion, the epic ambivalence, of the 21st century”
while I am pen-wielding and at-the-ready
to slip out the back door and tell you
about the voles who have taken up residence here
in this hundred-year-old cottage
built by a family who wanted nothing more
than a place to enjoy their summers —
listen to bullfrogs in the pond
and watch fireflies dance over the edge
of the mossy granite ledge
where now I plant iris
and wait to catch a glimpse
of the bobcat who only once visited my yard, but still…
But still…ness
is what is required
in these monstrous days
when even poets can’t sit idle
or wax nostalgic about bobcats
and large bowls of ice cream
or plain old simpler times
charged instead to take up the pen and the sword
write and write and write
until the margins explode
or we do
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne with references to an article by Tess Somervell in PSYCHE. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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Things Appear Smaller from Far Away
It had become meager,
the smallest portions of love
metered out in tiny bowls,
with tiny spoons even,
in gestures that implied
generosity
and she would smile
at the novelty of
the dollhouse scale
into which she had settled;
it was a full-face smile
so her eyes could close
pretend she didn’t see it all
for what it was
which was
just enough to hold her
feet glued down
in the pretense of it
the pretending
it was all enough
that stingy love
to which he couldn’t even
give a name
because that would be too much
don’t go fishing
he chastised
when she said she loved him
one last time,
trying to reel in the catch
she knew she had to throw back
before she got so small
she disappeared.
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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Morning Casualty
Was I the only one to pray for you
before the sun fully arrived
to take you back to summer ashes
or sky burial, feted by crowsong
Was I the only one to remember your face
masked among morning shadows,
wondering if the cat and I could see you —
it was just yesterday, my sweet friend
Was I the only one to tend to you
roadside ravaged and alone,
laying you down in soft green comfort
a gathering of god-words at your feet.
Photo by Anne Desch. Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Study hard, be smart.
Weigh the pros and cons of your decisions.
Stand on your own two feet.
Hard work is a key to success.
Dream big.
Love what you love with passion.
When you fall off a horse, get right back on.
Laugh a lot and often…
and you’ll come out on the other side just fine.
That’s my dad and me, college graduation 1988. Today would have been his 81st birthday. I am now 6 years older than he ever got to be. Life is fleeting — perhaps that is the biggest lesson of all.
Categories
Witness
The chipmunk,
through no fault of his own,
sat trailside wounded
perhaps I interrupted his prayer —
final words on the wind —
but he startled slowly
and limped across my path
with labored breath
into the shady solace
of honeysuckle
as I whispered comfort
in a soft, quiet voice
stayed a while as witness
found myself still thinking
about that chipmunk
through no fault of his own
wounded, trailside
as the blue car crashed
more silently than you might think
into the white minivan
on the busy byway
pieces of metal flying
in front of me, wondering
did he die without fear
quietly — there — in sweet release?
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Morning Cast
Deep in the woods
a spider casts her story
across my eyelids
invites an intricate dream
of fine woven memory
raindrops as sweet wine, and
stars come down to glisten, listen
eavesdrop into her delicate days
the tightrope balance
of patience and power
the writhe and wriggle
in her sacred dance,
even she wonders sometimes
what stories they have to tell —
the ant, the fly, the beetle —
but pays no mind
for hunger is deep
and instinctive,
she whispers,
it knows small mercy.
Photo by Phil Kallahar. Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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Now on Sale! Manifest (zine) WRITE
Writing guru Natalie Goldberg advises: “Say what you want to say. Don’t worry if it’s correct, polite, appropriate. Just let it rip.” And author Neil Gaiman suggests, “This is how you do it: you sit down at the keyboard and you put one word after another until it’s done. It’s that easy, and that hard.” Explore what it is about writing — about creating — that has us so frequently stymied. Ask yourself: Why can’t we Just Do It?
INGREDIENTS: collage, color scans, digital art, ephemera, essays, original photographs, poetry, quotes, vintage artwork. With thanks to Emily Dickinson, Peter Fischli and David Weiss, Grey’s Anatomy, Madge Kennedy, the New York Zoological Society, Oliver Twist, Harry Potter, Natasha Pulley, and Taylor Swift.
16-page, Full Color 4.75″ square booklet and a curated Spotify playlist. Cost: $8.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
Do I have as much of a death wish
as the motorcyclist
weaving weekend traffic,
hair in the wind,
shirt so caught up in the moment
his rib cage is showing,
and he not a care in the world?
Am I embracing life as much
as the motorcyclist
weaving weekend-traffic,
his arms outstretched,
wind in his face,
that loud vroooom of
rebellion and joy,
not a care in the world?
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
He used to choke on Cottonwood seeds,
the sweet smell of wild roses,
strong female voices,
and perceived insults in dreams,
but never on his own bitter words —
that acidic response to
the odd, queer, gaudy, perverse —
probably never on the dry, brittle body of Christ
from whom he now finds absolution
that never requires atonement,
only tithes
and tethers to rank ideas
and pungent, noble hatred.
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
This is my ode to summer
its simmeringness
its swell of sounds
everything astir
swarming
seething
its steamy storms
smoldering
its days s t r e t c h e d
supplemented
by sustained sun
and incidents
of social sustenance
sonorous
and
incessant
until September.
Poem & Photo ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
It’s Time! Support Manifest (zine)
MANIFEST (zine) issue #15, WRITE, is on its ways to the printer and should mail sometime in June! I hope you’ll consider supporting this creative project by subscribing today! Your subscription of $25.00 gets you the next 4 issues of MANIFEST (zine).
In the earthy space
where he and his crown have fallen
lies a sacred place
of rain-brushed roots,
rough, rocky undersoil,
soft green moss and
a small dry hollow in which
one might curl up
wait out the storm
dream of that first root
extended deep into the
damp and loamy sod
its acorn nut split
wide open, screaming
cap askew, laboring
before a symphony release
of tendrils here and there
here and there
excuse me please
this place where it all began
I touch the underside
stroke my hand across time
one hundred
two hundred
his rings indecipherable
how many years
and storms
and creatures like me
tucked in for solace
and safekeeping
can you leave me here please
and leave me be
to watch the dark clouds
gather and pass?
Poem & Photo ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Next Generation
They will no more notice
the loss of the White Pine Way
than they will the spidery web
of atlas lines
that told you how to get
from here to there.
That sacred knowledge —
our finger touch of distance and time,
the intuitive knowing of how —
as foreign as the waypoint Oak
that stood mid-path,
its forked trunk noting
this way to loop back home or
that way, the path less traveled
that way, where the white pines whispered welcome,
and the weathered veins of the world let go
just long enough for you to hear your breath
and muted footsteps on the soft ground,
where you could disappear
into shade and shadow
and silence…
before the storm
the shearing off of what
we thought we knew for sure,
the deception of always
and certain revealed now
against the stark blue sky.
Poem & Photo ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
The Whale Show
No one seems to notice the whale doing backflips down the aisle. Small and almost indiscernible from the waves in the bay, maybe it’s the lighting that gives it a forced perspective. Because there, to the east, the sun sits center stage and setting. So while 30 faces bask in the golden glow of stardom, just one looks east at a sideshow not to be missed.
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Darlin’
I’m gonna plant my flag
with the righteous,
the ones Jesus would host
on a starlit patio
with wine and
fresh loaves of bread,
talk about the good guys,
they’d be his favorites —
his ragtag crew of saints and misfits,
the migrants who shared his path,
the strong sinful woman he loved,
the poor and the afflicted,
the beggars who had no choice.
Forget fear and fallacies,
I’m gonna arm myself
with love and compassion,
unlocked and at the ready,
even for you,
my sweet, misguided, friend
don’t you think
love thy neighbor as thyself
would look good on a t-shirt, too?
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. Inspired by a t-shirt promoting “guns for good guys.” If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Coffee Meditation
The coffee here
in this cottage
by the sea
is a meditation
in itself —
never mind
the mechanisms
of convenience
this is hot water
from a kettle,
poured over
rich grounds
gravity and steam
grace and silence
sunrise
simmering
through glass
brewing
patience
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. Photo of Baloo and Shere Khan, two of the beloved trio BLT (Baloo, Shere Khan, and Leo) from the Noah’s Ark Animal Sanctuary. Click here for the story. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Pay No Mind
The carpenter bee
pays little regard
to the clamor
of dogs barking
and boys splashing,
intent on its
discoveries
here
and here
and here
here
and here
and here
no matter the rain
that approaches
on tip toe
across the pond,
no matter the
strange woman watching
from the bridge above
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. Photo of Baloo and Shere Khan, two of the beloved trio BLT (Baloo, Shere Khan, and Leo) from the Noah’s Ark Animal Sanctuary. Click here for the story. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Great Cape Escape – Day 7
“Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.”
— Mary Oliver
A poet and a sculptor
were walking
at Long Point Trail
sometime after midnight,
the moon was dimmed
by evening clouds
so while the bear
definitely looked like a bear,
the two tigers
were harder to discern.
He, the sculptor,
backed away quietly,
tucked himself
inside a cabinet
of curiosities,
emerged apologetically
as Hubbell Gardiner,
and disappeared up
the misty woods road.
She, the poet,
picked up a driftwood stick
and stood her ground,
roared like a lion
until the bear ran for its life,
turned to face the tigers
then knelt down
and offered them tender kisses
and soft gentle strokes
along wicked, wild stripes.
Poem ©2024 Jen Payne. Photo of Baloo and Shere Khan, two of the beloved trio BLT (Baloo, Shere Khan, and Leo) from the Noah’s Ark Animal Sanctuary. Click here for the story. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Great Cape Escape – Day 6
“I have a room all to myself; it is nature.” — Henry David Thoreau
I sense her ghost here
on this blustery coast
400 miles east of where she lived
and lies, still, now
Perhaps she came here
with Him, my grandfather
kept his house here, too
in routine obedience
but her haunting is more subtle
more hint than apparition
she’s a shadow at the window
moving white cotton curtains
for a first view of morning,
a creak in the wood plank floors
and a swish of sweeping sand,
the smell of ivory soap
and eucalyptus by the sink
its cold cast iron against my belly
sends a chill as I suddenly
consider a cup of tea
and her early silent pleasures.
Photo and Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Great Cape Escape – Day 5
Wild Geese
By Mary Oliver
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
Photos ©2024, Jen Payne
The sun has fired up the moon this morning,
so much there’s steam rising from its Sea of Rain
or so it appears there to the east, above the harbor
between Saturn and Mars — not to forget our place
its ten degrees high, just right of the circlet of Pisces
where Aphrodite and Eros tether together forever
a thunderous moment — for gods and humans alike
all of us illuminated and roaring through space
the birds are well aware and in an uproar
a predawn cacophony of sound and sacrament
a chorus of gulls calls out from the shore,
a crow offers its blessing, the doves in mournful prayer
grieve the night’s quiet before it ends
the day quickly writhing and rising to meet us
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Alan Dyer. For more see his website. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
Great Cape Escape – Day 4
“Hope is radical openness for surprise — for the unimaginable. If that is the attitude with which we look, listen, and open all of our senses, we enter into a meaningful relationship with whatever Life offers us at a given moment.” — Brother David Steindl-Rast
Photos ©2024, Jen Payne
Categories
Great Cape Escape – Day 3
“I began to make plans for what my future might be—what once felt like a mad dash to the end of a cliff now felt like an interesting path in a beautiful wood that may or may not lead to the top of a mountain. And yes, the chances of my arrival at that destination were uncertain, but oh! What a mountain! And oh! What a view! And what a pleasure it was to keep moving forward.” ― Kelly Barnhill, When Women Were Dragons
Photos ©2024, Jen Payne
Categories
Great Cape Escape – Day 2
“Anytime we approach a state of awe, we are in relationship with divinity. We are awake.” — The Wild Unknown Animal Spirit Book
Photos ©2024, Jen Payne
Categories
Great Cape Escape – Day 1
“Every person needs to take one day away. A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future. Jobs, family, employers, and friends can exist one day without any one of us, and if our egos permit us to confess, they could exist eternally in our absence. Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for. Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us.”
― Maya Angelou, Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now
Photos ©2024, Jen Payne
moon stones
round and white
translucent
fearless in their
devotion to tides
the pull of their namesake
reveal all and nothing
in one full breath
of a shimmering wave
their stillness
a talisman
of strength
and awakening
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Inspired by The Wild Unknown Animal Spirit Deck and Guidebook by Kim Krans. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
29 – Car Trouble
Ain’t nothing more Roughneck
than a man who castrates bulls
with a rope he pulls
from the backseat of his pickup,
whose hard gravel laugh
makes you stand taller,
wipe a tear from your eye
and matter of factly
explain yourself
and that goddamn car —
you swear for affect —
fold up the Damsel
with neat corners
for her next distress,
today you’re a Warrior
no more than inconvenienced,
a firm hand on the
blade tucked in your front pocket
and eye on the ironwood stick
you keep in the back seat
for walking
(or wounding, in a pinch).
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Ivan Mudruk. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
To my left
the great star sets
while to my right
the full moon rises
in between
nothing but this
odd appendage of land
jut out into the sea
and I think for a moment
that if I stand tall and wide
and step one way
or the other
I might instigate
some universal force
to move them
up
and
down
back
and
forth
at my command
I am Rose on the bow
queen of the world
ancient goddess who
commands the fulcrum
day
and
night
then
and
now
up
and
down
back
and
forth
Photo and Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
The red fox
near Race Point Beach
circles back as if to ask
“are you coming this time?”
We’ve met before,
he and I, here
on this sacred sequence
but I don’t recall him asking
it was more of a tease then
to this serious request
and I consider
for a moment following
through the pitch pine
and winter heath
into the dunes
lie on my back
forever to watch the stars
as whales breach
and moons rise over
my bare white bones
Photo and Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
While watching whales,
wondering:
do they laugh
as they breach,
squeal in delight,
exalt the air
with fins and tails
and tittering,
or is the entirety of joy
contained in the
ooomph! and huzzah!
spouted
for all to see?
Photo by Taylen Lundequam. Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
FOR GREG
How are you a ghost here
when you were often only a conversation
words on a keypad
our ethernet tethers and ideals
someone I barely knew
save for a soft, full kiss on tiptoes
and the perfumed promise
of again and more
on a day that never came
but here, in Truro now,
your ghost whispers daily
of bourbon and dunes
the curve near Longnook
a family I never met
and Cassie at the Lobster Pot
you, even then, a shadow
of what might have been
those air wave words
“whatever she wants”
you told her
paying the price
from two thousand miles away
Photo and Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
24 – Helen
Poetry comes
sometimes
in precious drops
hard won from
a tea bag
saved by the sink
folded in foil
for a second cup
at lunch with
saltines and butter —
if rations allowed —
her whole life,
my grandmother’s,
was that spent tea bag,
all of its elixir
steeped for someone else
with none left to spare
for her own self
rationing every bit
so brittle she broke
too early
rare glints of love
and laughter
that peeked out
through the folds
like poetry almost,
or should have been
her sparce, beautiful life
a poem, really,
that not too many
could read
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
They tell October tales about these things, the damages and injuries, the unforeseen consequences when humans think they control beasts.
It’s why we kept them under beds and in closets, in heavy chests with wrought iron keys and secret words.
Everyone knew the rules: what not to open, where not to go after dark, what should never be said out loud, and what to wear on a strand of string around your neck at all times.
Then they evolved. They made themselves small enough to live in pockets. They lost their tails to roam more freely. They learned to talk to us, to answer our questions. They paid attention.
But we did not.
We loved their companionship, the immediacy of their response. We needed to feel connected and important. They made us seem relevant and center stage.
So now we all have a monster. It tells us where to go and what to do. It knows exactly where we are and where we’ve been. Its shorthand directives — the beeps and dings and whoops — lead us around all day, call us back when we go astray. It monitors our heartbeat, our sleep cycles, and just how fast we can run.
If we could think about it, it would be terrifying.
Photo by Roman Odintsov. Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
The Universe is conspiring
conspiring frogs, I tell you
as little zabko considers dragons
the oracle insists on
clearing, cleansing, healing
revealing
the true nature of a spirit
out of balance
in need of water
for energy life breath
in the light of the
frog moon
drink from the cup
she says
put down that heavy load
forgive
rest
release
Inspired by the The Wild Unknown Animal Spirit Deck and Guidebook by Kim Krans and When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill. Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
21 – Soundtrack
drops of Jupiter
9 to 5
total eclipse of the heart
hold on
50 ways to say goodbye
unwritten
it’s all coming back to me now
don’t go breakin’ my heart
any way you want it
I would do anything for love
(but I won’t do that)
don’t stop believing
take me home
bless the broken road
you can feel it in the air tonight
save tonight
believe
I saw the sign
straight up!
all the small things
give it up
I want to break free
a thousand miles
dance the night away
a moment like this!
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Red is Relief (now)
Racy
Rmmm! Rmmm!
and ROAR
(what a) Rush
this Rocket (ship)
Ridiculous
Radical!
Righteous (dude)
Rejuvenating
and I am
Reborn!
Rebellious
Rambunctious
Rowdy
Risqué?
a Red Car driver
Rock star
Right as Rain
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Her first husband was a rogue
too young for what she had in mind
but it was high-school sweetheart love
and her parents insisted
in a Roman Catholic sort of way
his too, it was a good investment
that soon included the benchmark 2.0 kids
in a house-and-white-picket-fence world
but he was prone to outrageous fortunes
and accidental accidents
that practically left him speechless
her too, most nights, waiting by the phone
so she gave herself a Divorce for Christmas
and never, ever looked back.
But he did. Retraced his missteps
relived his worst nightmares (and mine)
hit rewind and started over
with a nimble bride the same age
his first wife had been
though a better investment this time
consented not contrived
with two more dividends and
a house on a Dream
where he sometimes smiles
that scoundrel smile
to his reflection in the mirror
a flash of wicked conceit
for an endgame so very well played.
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo from Canva. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
I suspect
the next
I know of you
will be the summary
the
life well spent
synopsis
and I know
it will come
as a shock
that sparks
through me
stays a while
like you did
perhaps
between now
and then
we might meet
embrace
like old friends
but
linger
a long, slow
epilogue
never to be
be printed
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Céline. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Hope is balancing a silk pin
while Faith dances round on top
Vision is blind and searching
and Dreams are at full stop
They used to call on Whimsy
and get her to stir the pot
But she’s bunked down with Sadness
and can’t really help a lot
So they lean into Serenity
and pray with all they’ve got
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Illustration by Elizabeth Chandler. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
The day is still
in silhouette
its angels
and demons
simplified
to sharp lines
against
the pale sky
hard to take
offense yet
left to
revel in the
chorus
just a while longer
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Miriam Espacio. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
15 – Exit Strategy
Ice Floe has always been my number one pick
a slow hushed push out and away
nothing dramatic
Walk into a cornfield and dissipate, not bad
Witness Protection Program
Bermuda Triangle
Tornado (too much)
Tardis
Wardrobe
Rabbit Hole
Worm Hole
or Alien Abduction!
without the probing questions
More ET or First Contact
Just take me with u
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Miriam Espacio. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
You can tell a lot
from a handshake
who has the upperhand, really
decipher the code
and read the room
in one firm
(or not so)
gesture.
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Alena Shekhovtcova. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
13 – Poetry
Poetry
like the maple’s seed
demands fertile ground
but more than that
temperature
and
location, location, location
clear days
and rain
but not too much
then
patience, perhaps
room to put down roots
figure itself out
bide its time
pray it’s not interrupted
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Antoni Shkraba. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
When even the cat
knows you’re having a hard time —
it is time to rest.
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Antoni Shkraba. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
I’m livin’ on the edge these days
distant cousin twice removed
from almost everything
Twilight zone or
outer limits
or this someplace
where everything in between
— the meat and cheese of the day —
are too much to bear
lettuce pray
I feel crazy, almost,
just enough to be scary
or raise concern
but only if I start talking
and there’s no one to talk to
thankfully, maybe
on the edge of night and day
except the cat
which makes it even madder
I’m considering a nocturnal existence
here on the dark side of the clock
leave the decision making
and negotiating to the day walkers
who don’t burn hot when the sun rises
do the birds only wake to the dawn
or are their insides flaming like mine
wondering what comes next in
these unpredictable days
Pay no mind to that man behind the curtain
he only thinks he controls his days
every day is unpredictable, darling
you’ve just had the blinds ripped off
the rug pulled out from under
your wings clipped
This too shall pass
she thinks with a wicked laugh
and what comes next will, too
so round and round we go
until we, dizzy, die
I feel thin, Bilbo said,
stretched like butter
over too much bread.
I need a holiday.
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by Antoni Shkraba. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
10 – Tribute
There was no time
for gratitude
or remembrance
how the bees
loved her in spring,
the blossoms
full of promise
how the Robins
sought refuge in her
abundant branches,
suffered storms
raised families
no time hold
the memory
of her sweet fruit,
consider
its ripeness
one last time
to thank her for
summer shade,
the filigree
of shadows,
the soft
unexpected breezes
nor even to
regard the lichen
and velvety moss
that gathered
in her neglect,
embraced her
unpruned limbs
One hopes
the axman
soothed her,
that the
Jays and Doves
were nearby
comfort
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
It’s a snake and turtle day at the pond
66° and everything seems enchanted
suddenly!
except my winter hips
which long for the agile ease
of the black racer
except my worried brain
that envies the tranquil turtle
and its sunshine meditations
but my ears still hear
know the garter under leaves
understand the ire of the wren
the wingbeats of the heron
my heart still marvels at the
osprey’s enthusiasm
to sing love songs
for yet another season
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
8 – Wit’s End
The path
to Wit’s End
starts wide
and unexpected,
beckons you
with promises of
Hope Ahead >>
There are steep hills
built high on
Anticipation
followed by
dark valleys of
Disappointment
that eventually lead to
a narrow rocky path
marked
Just Keep Going >>
eerily dark
day or night,
its brambles making
forward movement
near impossible
its Switchbacks
and Turn-Arounds
keeping you
sufficiently
dizzy enough
not to notice
you’ve arrived
Wit’s End
breathless
heart pounding
Fight or Flight
muscles
glistening
wondering do you
follow
This Way >>
one more time
or jump?
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo by kublizz. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
7 – Kismet
She is a peculiar cat
full of spice
with an innate
determination
and
confidence
Said “I am here”
the first day
without qualm
and has been
persistent since
I wonder sometimes
how she came to me
what wheel was spun
in the great
Cat Distribution System
that put two and two
together to make
she and me here
at this particular
moment in time
that demands
my own resolve
and fortitude
asks me to lean in hard
like she does, often,
insisting
I belong here too.
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Photo: Molly helping me write this poem. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
6 – String Theory
I am most envious
of the cat
sleeping
who knows not
the
long lists
or burdens
besides
the
particular
angle
of the stranded
string
its shadow
enough to
contemplate
for this day.
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. Image: Woman, Cat and String, Will Barnet. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Or: When a Writing Prompt Takes You to a Battleground
The poet’s
skin soft from age
(perfumed in
Calvados perhaps)
knows the pulse
of waves
beneath her
feels how they
beat within, too
remembers well
the stories
and great heroics
of trust
and love
walks now
a gravely path
to an expanse
of cratered lawn
where ghosts
commune
in whispers
and tears are
only memory
reflected in
the morning rain
where sharp wires
— a final kindness —
keep her safe
from another fall.
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne, recollecting a trip to Pointe du Hoc. Photo: Pointe du Hoc, courtesy of the World War II Foundation. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
4 – Witching Hour
Folklore says
the witching hour
arrives between
midnight and four,
but I beg to differ
I will tell you
with no uncertainty
that the devil appears
sometime between
7 and 9
as regular as the sun
in a wild cacophony
of sounds and alerts
hoof beats and
tire beats
engines roaring
bass thumping
Pavlovian dings
for here! no there!
over there!
and here!
Cursed notifications
and incoming calls
and speech bubbles
that
pop! pop! pop!
bang! bang! bang!
Headlines
and Bylines
and Subject Lines
It’s mischief
and madness
and mechanisms
seeping through
the heavens of morning
that only
the most wicked
could fashion
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. IMAGE: Wikicommons. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Categories
3 – Rain: A Haiku
some will say the rain
come again some other day —
not spring buds (or me)
Poem ©2024, Jen Payne. IMAGE: 1933, Kawarazaki Kodo, woodcut tulips. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
He uses a word
I should know
should be able to define
provide example,
one of my own even
(poet, my ass)
To be, or not to be
like the woman next to him —
roll up a sleeve
to show my favorite lines
inked in perpetuity
So I make a note
That is the question
But shouldn’t I come equipped
with the tools of my trade?
The rhyme. The reason. The rhythm.
Emily etched on a forearm
I’m nobody.
But am I a poet?
Really?
And what am I making
of this wild and precious life?
Two roads diverged
and I found myself lost
wandered lonely as a cloud
until the word pulled me back
said LOOK ME UP!
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Until you find your way back
full of sound and fury
Poem and photo ©2024, Jen Payne. With thanks to William Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson, Mary Oliver, Robert Frost, and William Wordsworth. IMAGE: Still life with skull, candle and book, Paul Cezanne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
April arrives in flames
bright plumes on the horizon
and it
without the benefit of sirens
instead inspires birdsong
and the slow rumble roar
of the long
awakening
so I drop and roll
in the field
press my ear against the ground
to hear the millions yield
their sound
the bulb and bird and beetle
how we go
too
from smoke to red hot fire
the days from start to end
burning holes
through quiet
Poem and photo ©2024, Jen Payne. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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