Great Poetry Posting Site

PoemHunter.com is a great place to post your poetry. Lots of great resources, including reader statistics, creation of your own e-books, listing of your books with book cover photos, your website, reader comments, email and your search engine listings. And they put all that in themselves. They do all the work. All the poet does is join for FREE and type in her poems.


stephensaul.com

Tobacco Row by Stephen Saul

She was thirteen, maybe, and black like the earth.
And she would stretch to hang tobacco bundles
high in the air to dry. A black boy, much younger
than she, would sit on the stoop and watch. When
she turned, he looked wide-eyed into the dark
ovals of hers, oblivious to the woman's body taking
shape under the thin cotton dress.

Sometimes, when the sun was setting, I watched
her rise from her knees among the tobacco rows
and sing softly through bee-stung lips. The waning
light caught the growing curves of her breasts and
hips. And she blew on her blistered hands, then
fanned them, to cool the sting.

She wore a straw hat with a band of red silk. Her
long hair, tucked away, worked loose in strands
and fell about her face. She often looked up at me
and waved, her hand clutching tobacco leaves. And
I waved back from the wagon filled with strawberries
on their way to market.


stephensaul.com

a poem with love from prague

Astronomical Sestina

Waiting for the hour
to strike, a swift wind blew
across Old Town Square, dead
leaves and lost postcards aimless,
skimming over my feet. I watch
freckles rise on cold

arms, suppress July rain-cold
with a shiver. Quarter to the hour
noon according to my watch,
but I can’t read this clock, with its blue
and gold, its four hands motionless,
framed by sins and death.

When I was fifteen, my mother died,
gave in to January cold
and cancer, her last breath soundless.
I lit a church candle—our
Catholic prayer—flame glowed blue
in the wake of snow outside. I still watch

the fire dance in my head, watch
wax melt, remember her dying
for days wrapped in translucent blue
veins, oxygen cords, cold
cloths and warm blankets. The hours
passed slowly then, much less

speed than now, alone in Prague, lost
in a crowd hoping to watch
the Astronomical Clock tip the hourglass,
golden bell chiming by death’s
skeletal hand. Were there crowds that cold
winter? Did their hands turn blue

like my mother’s, blue
and shrinking? Did the timeless
clock chime when her cold
body released its soul to the watchful
eye of God? The wind dies
as the Astronomical Clock’s hour

strikes. Blue doors open and I watch
apostles parade, waving. No one dies
here. Another cold hour past.