I’m pleased and happy to announce that my poem, “Nature’s Child,” has been selected as a finalist in the Arizona Authors Association 2022 Literary Contest. On November 5, 2022, the final winners will be announced. Either way, my poem will be published in the 2023 Arizona Literary Magazine. I don’t usually enter contests, but I was feeling confident and decided to take a chance.
Thanks for visiting!
Dawn Pisturino
September 13, 2022
Copyright 2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
Night
The night was heavy with honeysuckle,
Warm and still,
Full of mystery and life,
An immense blackness
Stretching to Eternity,
Clustered with stars.
April 17, 1987; August 29, 2022
I’m pleased and proud to announce that my poem, “Melissa and the Angels,” has been published today on Spillwords. I want to thank Dagmara K. and her wonderful staff for publishing it. I chose to use an unusual rhyming pattern and some words that are difficult to rhyme. It was these difficult words that shaped the story.
Melissa and the Angels
by Dawn Pisturino
Melissa, in a tattered dress,
Came slowly down the lane,
A wicker basket on her arm,
Fresh eggs and butter from the farm,
Her tresses in a tangled mess,
Barefoot, and limping with the pain. . .
Please visit Spillwords here http://www.spillwords.com/melissa-and-the-angels/ to read the rest of the poem. If you like it, please like it on both Spillwords (the little heart at the top of the post) and my blog. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your visits and your support.
A big THANK YOU! from the bottom of my heart.
Dawn Pisturino
August 22, 2022
Copyright 2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
Old Dreams
So many years! —
And still your memory
Lives in my heart
As a vibrant heartbeat,
Beating new life into
Old dreams . . .
~Dawn Pisturino~
August 19, 2022
Copyright 2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
Sweet Revenge
If love is pain,
I nailed you to the cross
With revenge so sweet,
It blossomed into a crown of thorns.
~ Dawn Pisturino ~
August 15, 2022
Copyright 2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
Radha to Krishna
You planted your pink lotus seeds
Inside my heart
And opened me up like a radiant flower.
~ Dawn Pisturino ~
2011; August 12, 2022
Copyright 2011-2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
The Adulteress
by Dawn Pisturino
“It is the law,” Old Moses cried
A-top the mountain called Sinai;
“And everyone who broke it, died,”
The people in the valley sighed.
“And what of me?” the young girl said,
Shaking her black and tousled head.
“I will not send him from my bed,
Not if the sun becomes blood red!”
She spread her arms as if to fly:
“Not if the moon should leave the sky!
I love him! Strong, yet very shy —
The man whose side I must be by!”
Her husband prayed the whole night through.
“What have I done? What must I do?”
He muttered as the sky turned blue.
The laws were made; they must hold true.
The people gathered with their stones
And broke the young wife’s slender bones.
And when she died with cries and groans,
They turned and heard her husband’s moans.
“The price is paid,” they cried as one.
“The sinful tie has been undone.”
The young man turned, as if to shun,
The righteous crowd whose law had won.
~
September 18, 1986; August 3, 2022
Copyright 1986-2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
Boudica’s Soliloquy
by Dawn Pisturino
Foul deeds of war have broken me.
Come, smell the blood! Hear the moans of the dying!
The corpses of my daughters lay silently at my feet,
Shamed and murdered by our Roman tormentors.
Colchester and London — what glorious victories! —
The blood flowed freely from Roman wounds.
They howled in rage as they died. How we cheered!
But Rome’s crawling legions caught us in their snare,
And now, we are vanquished.
Britannia is no more. Weep for a chastised people!
No longer Queen, I am marked for death.
No longer Mother, I will not be consoled.
No longer Wife, I burn with revenge.
I lift the flask of poison to my lips, tasting the bitterness in my mouth.
I will lie here with my daughters, my shield across my breast
And my spear by my side, and welcome Death with honor.
~ Dawn Pisturino ~
Published in Wounds I Healed: The Poetry of Strong Women anthology, June 2022. #1 Amazon bestseller in New Releases of Poetry Anthologies. Available now! Get your copy today.
July 29, 2022
Copyright 2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
Thank you so much!
Dawn Pisturino
July 17, 2022
Copyright 2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
Richard Cory – the poem that inspired Simon & Garfunkel
by Edwin Arlington Robinson
Whenever Richard Cory went downtown,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.
And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
“Good morning,” and he glittered when he walked.
And he was rich — yes, richer than a king —
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.
So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.
~Edwin Arlington Robinson~
~
In 1966, Simon & Garfunkel borrowed Robinson’s poem, “Richard Cory,” modernized the language, and set it to music. The song is both thought-provoking and astonishing – just like Robinson’s poem – and was included in the duo’s hit album, Sounds of Silence.
~
Bio: While Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869-1935) is not remembered much now, he was a highly prolific and enthusiastically praised poet in his time. He often wrote on “themes of personal failure, artistic endeavor, materialism [and wealth], and the inevitability of [progress and] change” (Robert Gilbert). Robinson self-published his books of poetry until Houghton Mifflin agreed to publish his book of poems, Captain Craig, in 1902. The book was not successful, and Robinson became a drifter and alcoholic. In 1904, President Theodore Roosevelt became aware of Robinson and his book, The Children of the Night. Roosevelt convinced Charles Scribner’s Sons to republish the book. He also obtained a job for Robinson at the New York Customs House. Job security allowed Robinson to continue with his writing. Robinson won a Pulitzer Prize for his Collected Poems in 1922. He won a second Pulitzer Prize in 1924. In 1927, he won a third Pulitzer Prize. Robinson died of cancer in 1935.
Thanks for visiting!
Dawn Pisturino
Copyright 2022 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.
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