I often feature poets I visit regularly on my Ripple Poetry Blog.
The following poem is an intriguing piece from Melissa Shaw Smith.
You’ll love her blog Woman with Landscape I’m sure.
Over time I’ll introduce a few more of my favourite blogging poets here. I aim to show some of the skeptics that online writing can be quality writing.
Not only that online writing can lead to discovering your own hidden talent.
This is what Melissa says about herself
Born and raised on whiskey and fairytales in Ireland, I now live and write in New York’s Hudson Valley. When I was a grub here’s what I wanted to be . . .
at 5, a nurse
at 6, a farmer’s wife
at 7, a storyteller.
In reality, I grew up to be a theatre director, and a producer of documentaries and arts events.
http://www.waitingforbeckett.com.
I became a wife (but not a farmer’s wife), a mother of three, and rekindled my love of children’s books.
I realized what the 7 year old me had known all along—my true calling was to be a writer.
What makes me salivate? An exuberant half-wild garden, old, clothbound children’s books, art supplies, natural dyed yarns, spice markets, anywhere with a tantalizing smell.
Favorite places to hang out: by the sea, in a hammock, on a park bench, a crowded café, a mountaintop.
Favorite writing implement: fountain pen, knife sharpened pencil.
Person I’m most in awe of: a great teacher.
Talent I’d most like to have: to be able to make beautiful music.
The man who balanced stones
took them home to bed with him, you know.
He rolled them under the covers
and ran the soles of his feet,
callous by callous,
over the fissures and dimples.
He knew the landscape of limestone and slate,
the terrain of every one of those globes of granite,
each freckle and glint of mica,
his namesake; and god knows the hands,
the great gulfed hands of a wall builder.
By day he pawed those bed stones of fieldstone
eyes closed to a flicker of emotion
and a slow sweet smile as
he found each one’s sweet spot—
the point at which it rested in perfect balance.
