Up for trying to write a poem a day in April?

America's National Poetry Month has come round again, and as the results last year--both for me and those who joined me--were so positive, I'm trying again this year to write a poem a day for the month of April. Four of my six MA students--Alia Brinkman, James Evans, Jenny Martin, and Simon Reynolds--have already agreed to join me--other takers?

The Visitation, 16 March

The grandchildren's contributions

I set up a slide show of 70+ photos of Dad on my Macbook

Lindsey and Katelyn, cousins and sisters

(one of our many long stories)

At Carmody-Flynn Williamsburg Funeral Home, Bloomington, Illinois

Sara's gift for my birthday

I'm 40

What's next?

Joslynn Casperson

My niece, two years old come July

Battlestar Galactica comes to an end

Read the appreciative cultural overviews by The New York Times and The Guardian.

Siriol Troup's Beneath the Rime

Siriol's a friend, so as with Claire's book, I'll post a poem in lieu of the review I can't give. 

Willow Pattern

Each afternoon he walks me ragged,

paths dusty with catkins, fleshy

and sulphurous, a tapenade of grief.

It's the same old story:

towers and crooked fences,

a waiting boat, le pont des suicides.

Even the birds are dropping.

We begin where we end.

These trees with their blue leaves

have survived beyond imagining.

Siriol Troup

Beneath the Rime (Shearsman, 2009)

To buy the book in the UK, click here for Shearsman's online store.

To buy the book in the US, click here for the link to Amazon.com.

His obituary, as it appeared in The Pantagraph on 15 March

NORMAL - Henry Ross Etter, 68, of Normal died at 3:44 a.m. Friday (March 13, 2009) at his home. His celebration of life gathering will be at 11 a.m. on Tuesday (March 17, 2009) at the GE Clubhouse on GE Road in Bloomington with Chaplain Stephanie Soon officiating. His family will receive friends from 4 to 7 p.m. on Monday (March 16, 2009) at Carmody-Flynn Williamsburg Funeral Home, Bloomington.

In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to OSF Hospice.

Henry was born Sept. 26, 1940 in Washington, D.C., the son of Lorton Dale and Mary Lane Stanton Etter. He married Bernadine Meeker on June 18, 1966 at Holy Trinity Church, Bloomington. She survives. Also surviving are five daughters, Carrie Etter, Bradford on Avon, England, Laura (Reggie) Wallace, Bloomington, Nancy (Scott) Cummings, Stanford, Sandra (Charlie) Casperson, Bloomington and Joanna (Bryan) Perschall, Bloomington; and 12 grandchildren, Lindsey, Justin and Nathan Wallace, Matthew Cummings, Brandon Etter, Sara Cummings, Austin and Kaylee Lusher, Joslynn Casperson, Katelyn Etter, and Alex and Andrew Perschall. He was preceded in death by his parents.

Henry grew up in St. Louis and received a BS in journalism and political science from Washington University there. On graduation he was employed as a reporter for the Daily Pantagraph and later became Director of University Information at Illinois Wesleyan University. In 1970 he became editor of the Daily Reporter at General Electric in Bloomington and enjoyed the position for 13 years, proceeding to the position of catalog editor before he retired in 2002.

Over the years, he also served on the boards of the GE Credit Union and Oakdale School's PTA, and along with his wife, he was active in Marriage Encounter through the Peoria Diocese. An avid cyclist, Henry rode 25 miles a day before his illness; he was also a great enthusiast for rock and roll trivia, meteorology, camping and trains.

"The Forecast"

Dad leaves the weather channel on while he ferries
garbage cans to the yard’s edge,
the dead leaves cracking under his feet.
Though September, a Tornado Warning could
beep across the screen. Or a Severe Thunderstorm.
Get the cats inside. I can prepare,
crank the windows, huddle in the basement.
Preparing or stalling, Dad cycles
thirty miles a day; he alters the route
from one sequence of prairie roads to another.
Only change ceases to change.
He phones to give me an update.
I’m in Los Angeles, Dad. What weather?
He explains the specifics:
dew point, wind velocity, cloudcover.
When I move, he’ll delight in new territory to monitor.
He may not be able to control
the sky, but he knows the forecast.
His birthday is Monday.
I sense tornado weather
in California—ridiculous,
even the season is wrong—
yet the sky darkens, the chimes clatter-sing.
When I was six, a tornado sought
our train, I resisted hiding
in the ditch, I stood on the bank
and watched the black
a hundred yards off till Dad yanked
me down. On the birthday card I write,
Wish I could be there. Illinois:
I see a tornado approach, oh
far off, far off. Dad walks up beside me,
chatting the facts: the distance, its speed.
I grab his hand,
I fix him to the earth, glaring forward
He’s mine he’s mine he’s mine
while Dad states the shortened distance,
the heightened speed, how
black, how black it is.

written September 1994

Requiescat in Pace: Henry Ross Etter, 26 September 1940-13 March 2009