5 pieces to Verse Wisconsin http://www.versewisconsin.org/
3 pieces to Upstreet Literary Magazine http://www.upstreet-mag.org/
and...
4 pieces to The Adirondack Review http://www.theadirondackreview.com/
I will share one of the pieces I sent to Verse WI;
Northlawn
Surrounded by indigence
from earliest memories
my youth, blanketed
me in ignorance.
The long brick buildings
we called home, resembled
Iroquois longhouses,
outside of which
juvenile past-times;
ding-dong ditch, statue-maker
and kick-the-can
seemed inventions of our own.
A cruel nursery rhyme
never committed to paper
accompanied the ritual
beheading of a dandelion.
Each moment captured
with no thought of tomorrow.
Childhood survival proved
an absurd presumption.This poem came out of reflective memories of where I did some of my growing up. Northlawn was or rather still is what is affectionately known as "the projects." It is one one of five sites in Milwaukee built after WWII, presumably for the boomers and/or returning GI's. Affordable housing and a built in neighborhood for idyllic family rearing. The others are Westlawn, Southlawn, Parklawn and Berryland. probably built with the best of intentions, by the time I lived there and continuously thereafter they deteriorated into custom-built and self-contained ghettos. I lived there from the age of four until I was eight. Though it was such a short time and young age, I have so many memories from that time. Besides this poem I have two more started that I am working on based on my experiences there. Coincidentally, my father lived in Westlawn for a time in his life, I think when he was a teen.
Wish me luck.
