NPM 50 State Tour -- Maryland, My Maryland

Please come in and welcome to my neighborhood, Maryland!

We've lived in the Baltimore 'burbs for ten years and I admit, I still feel land-locked. (New Jerseyans get anxious if we're more than 45 minutes from the ocean). Remind me to tell you that funny story about crossing the Mason-Dixon line some other time.

Maryland welcomed me with open arms. I've been a poet-in-the-schools for the Maryland State Arts Council for eight years. And Baltimore's CityLit Project is publishing my new chapbook for National Poetry Month. More exciting news on that in a second.

Some Maryland facts: 7th state, joined the union 4/28/1788, home of the very awesome Berger Cookie (it's a black and white cookie without the white) and the Baltimore Honfest.

Another reason I've proudly adopted Maryland? Unlike my home state of NJ, *we* have a poet laureate -- Stanley Plumly, a professor at the University of Maryland. Go Terps!

To help you celebrate spring, I'm sharing Plumly's poem, "Wildflower."

Wildflower
by Stanley Plumly
Some--the ones with fish names--grow so north they last a month, six weeks at most. Some others, named for the fields they look like, last longer, smaller. And these, in particular, whether trout or corn lily, onion or bellwort, just cut this morning and standing open in tapwater in the kitchen, will close with the sun. It is June, wildflowers on the table. They are fresh an hour ago, like sliced lemons, with the whole day ahead of them. They could be common mayflower lilies of the valley, day lilies, or the clustering Canada, large, gold, long-stemmed as pasture roses, belled out over the vase-- or maybe Solomon's seal, the petals ranged in small toy pairs or starry, tipped at the head like weeds. They could be anonymous as weeds. They are, in fact, the several names of the same thing, lilies of the field, butter-and-eggs, toadflax almost, the way the whites and yellows juxtapose, and have "the look of flowers that are looked at," rooted as they are in water, glass, and air. I remember the summer I picked everything, flower and wildflower, singled them out in jars with a name attached.

Read the rest of the poem here.

The exciting news? SAVE THE DATE! April 17 is CityLit Festival at the Enoch Free Pratt Library in Baltimore. I'll be reading with Stanley Plumly, 1:30 PM, and signing the new book. Hope you can make it!

Tomorrow morning, we'll continue our National Poetry Month tour of the 50 states. We're leaving bright and early for South Carolina. No Wall of Shame for them.

National Poetry Month 50 State Tour -- Massachusetts

Massachusetts, the 6th state (2/6/1788), lists their Poet Laureate as "No Position." As in, when it comes to poetry, we don't care enough to have an opinion.

Fie on you, Bay State. (BTW Marylanders, I think we should take over that nickname.)

With a poetic heritage like yours  -- check out this list of Mass. poets -- poetry should be honored in your state. You claim Ralph Waldo Emerson, e.e. cummings, Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, Mark Doty, Mary Oliver, Anne Sexton, Louise Gluck. Show poetry some love!

I promised a visit with Emerson today. Since his home state has given us the cold shoulder, here is Emerson describing a Massachusetts winter.

The Snow Storm
by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Announced by all the trumpets of the sky, Arrives the snow, and, driving o'er the fields, Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven, And veils the farmhouse at the garden's end. The sled and traveler stopped, the courier's feet Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed In a tumultuous privacy of storm. Come see the north wind's masonry. Out of an unseen quarry evermore Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer Curves his white bastions with projected roof Round every windward stake, or tree, or door. Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work So fanciful, so savage, nought cares he For number or proportion.

You'll find the rest of the poem here. And you'll find Massachusetts on my poetic Wall of Shame.

Put aside that goopy New England Crab Chowder and get ready for the good stuff, Maryland Crab Soup. We're off to my stomping grounds later today, visiting Maryland, My Maryland Poet Laureate Stanley Plumly -- and I have an exciting announcement!

Poetry Friday Remembrance: Lucille Clifton

Poet Lucille Clifton died earlier this week. After I heard the news, I wrote this post about Clifton and her importance to our local literary community in Howard County, Maryland.

Clifton is best known for her National Book Award winning poetry and her long tenure as Maryland's Poet Laureate. But she was also an author of children's books.

Rather than post one of her poems for Poetry Friday, I'm sharing a wonderful clip of Lucille Clifton reading to a group of children. You can see what an easy, wonderful rapport she had with young ones.

I love how "Don't You Remember" begins: Once upon a time, there was a four year old person who remembered everything.

That one word person -- rather than girl or child -- says much about Clifton's respect for human beings, regardless of age, color or gender.

For more Poetry Friday offerings, please visit our gracious Host: Irene Lantham.