Featured Poet: Rebecca Loudon

Where Do They Come From?

When I opened my planning calendar to October, I found the words "the list of things that no longer matter." I don't remember writing this, but finding it was like cracking open an egg and discovering a ruby nestled inside. Many of my poems come from this ephemerae. These poems take months to incubate and I have to peel them open, one word, one comma, one breath at a time. Then there are the poems that jitter, dance, squeal and jump around on my brain's front porch, poking out their tongues, pulling their hair and wriggling like three year olds who have to pee. These poems will not be ignored. If I don't mind them, things start disappearing: shoes, keys, entire chunks of memory. They're very persistent. On rare occasions, my life emerges into a state of poetry. Everything that crosses my path becomes a poem: friends, animals, a glimpse of a piece of tinsel through a window, a story that folds in on itself. This is the state of grace.