Art by Request for DED

Ready to Ship Out

"Thank-You-Note" and a little gift are on the way to your door

Orchid!

My orchid is about to bloom for the second time

News Letter from Tupelo Press 30 days / 30 Project

I would like to share a news letter from Tupelo Press.

***
In December we introduced you to the 30/30 Project, in which poets run the equivalent of a "poetry marathon," writing 30 poems in 30 days, while the rest of us "sponsor" and encourage them every step of the way. May's poets are well under way!

At year's end we'll publish a Best of the 30/30 Project, 2013 anthology in which at least one poem by each participant will appear. Stay tuned!   
Now we're calling on a new crop of volunteers, for June and beyond. If you'd like to volunteer for a month, please contact kmiles@tupelopress.org with your offer, a brief bio, and three sample poems.

Happy Mother's Day!

Flower arrangement by me

Flowers are from a local flower market, 3 bags / $12!

Jars are from Joe's Crab Shack (my hubby & I had a coupe drinks there)

Prism Review

"Carrying My 237 LBS in a Dance Studio" and "After the Laundry" were accepted by Prism Review!

Cherry Blossoms!

Cherry Blossoms by Our Apartment

Spring Cleaning

The new table cloth (my grandmother dyed the cloth) for the piano

All books back on the shelves after 30 days / 30 poems

$455!!!

Dear my supporters,

Thank you very much for your support for my 30 poems 30 days by Tupelo Press in April. My donation total is (drum sounds) $455!!! It is fantastically over my goal ($250). I feel love & kindness for my poetry career.

Here are the prize winners:
#1) Platinum: Requested art for David K.
#2) Gold: Requested art for Eddie O.
#3) Silver: My choice of art for Kathleene W.
#4) Bronze: Everyone who donated to me will receive my original postcards.

I would like to write a poem for Merryn B.

Many Hugs,
Naoko

Sakura!

Cherry Blossoms from Indiana University South Bend

LAST POEM for Tupelo Press's 30/30 Project

Day 30: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month) 
AT THE BAR

“Tell me how you write thirty poems,” 
a pirate says. 

He opens up a cold 
beer and hands it to me.

I say that it is easy 
like a serpentine dragon 

flying though a keyhole. Perhaps, 
it is more like a goldfish, lost in orange 

juice when I accidently drink it.

Either metaphor does not 
get through to the God damned pirate. 

I meet Queen Elizabeth in California too. She rules 
every green golf course 

and teaches me how to own it. Her tired 
poets are clogged in the beautiful fountains.

“You don’t want” 

adorns the kites reflected in the water. 

In her sparkling purse, I find 
a picture of Dachau on April 29, 1945. 

All the survivors waive at the sun 
faded sky that 

I want twenty seven minutes 

before the first day of May.

I scream, “!”


NOTE*** I received the following requested words for my last poem. (Death of a poetry session, Sun fades, Tired poet, Pirates, Kites, Fish, Orange juice, Beer, How you came to rule the world, Elizabeth, Serpantine Dragon, and Dachau)

**Please Support and Donate*** 

Your $5, $10 will be a great support!!

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

1 DAY LEFT!

Day 29: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month) 

STILL LIFE

I want your eyes.

Above the moors,

a sudden crack
cuts through a cloud

after a drizzle.

A herd of deer

rests around flaming
ginkgo leaves

on an upright piano.

Your finger plays
with the cold stain on the notebook.

A lead pencil drops.

Your loose shoe lace
tangles like your poem.

I still have an obedient

heart to write one last word.

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

2 DAYS LEFT!!

Day 28: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)

The Condition of 1992

The best bread I ever had was seventeen years ago.
My grandfather drove a red
scooter and stole from an alley;
expired crusts for pigeons in Tokugawa park.
My parents still own
an apartment near that park. Dew softened
sakura-leaves,
I used to press the white petals in a zoography book
between the pages on tufted puffin.
I read about the bird in the evening, 1992.
Then my grandfather had a stroke.
My sister and I ate McDonald’s using ten dollars each,
worried about the sleeping pigeons. No crusts.
We sat on our parent’s bed. The moth wings
scattered where tufted puffin lives.

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

3 DAYS LEFT!!!

Day 27: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)

RHAPSODY IN SPRING  

I lay under the piano when the eighty-eight’s revolutions 
reverberate in my skull and spine. Tomorrow morning, 
I may not be here, for example. Just like a ghost falls into a 
grass-colored bedspread and tosses my heart away 
from my ribs. I close my eyes to remember how to create 
millions of words. Fingers trill the keys like an avalanche. 
From the window, I see hail bulleting the soil.  

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

4 DAYS LEFT!!!!

Day 26: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)

THE DRUNK

I want to kill your cat
...............(and make a purse from the fur)

It sleeps on your lap
...............(and you snore like a pig with empty bottles)

A shoestring noose around its neck

Murder is not a solution
...............(and I shovel gravel outside at the garden) 

on my ordinary Thursday  

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

5 DAYS LEFT!!!

Day 25: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)


GLASS CEILING


The yellow thistles 

creep up the land and bloom. I lose 
my shoes at a sandpit and wear shorts.

No regrets to die today.

The spangled ice 

falls at night. I collect 
shooting meteors by riding a bicycle.

I am too 
young to be a poet. I want 

to be a ghost hunter.

Could I live three more days or thirty years?

A deer decays 

on the spring snow. I open 

a refrigerator, take out bologna, 
and drop tomatos on the kitchen floor.

Binoculars are sold 

at the edge of universe. I find 
a rabbit in the whiteout.  

Time ticks. I cannot 
open the spaghetti jar.  
  
Boiling water splashes 

on my eyes.  

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

Day 24: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)

UNTITLED

When there is no 
poem in a starless night,

I search for a water lily. I follow 
the long radish roots into a deep

pond. No light. No life, 

but I hear my heart beating. 

I want to breathe one more time.

Then the water beads 

rise against gravity to the lighthouse. 
Plumes of iridescent 

dust fall onto my legs. I stand 

and watch first the moon, 
and then the earth slowly 

disappear into the dark matter. 
Everything is like crushed 

green eggshells in my hand.

After the small particles 
smolder, another 

cosmic explosion swirls.

I celebrate 

being a part of it.

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

Remember!!! 7 Days Left

As a part of my 30 poems / 30 days project by Tupelo Press, I am organizing a raffle. A total of four winners will receive gifts from me in May.

Raffle Details *Click*

About Tupelo Press *Click*

I am super appreciative of the people that are emotionally supporting me every day and who have generously donated to the project. After the project is done, I would like to design "Thank You" postcards with all doners' names. I am still brain-storming on the design; however, you won't be disappointed.

When people donate, they will receive my original "Thank You" postcard. And the four selected top people will receive the winning gifts.    

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here* 

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

Day 23: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)

HALF

There is my half heart. 

I find it 

in my mother’s womb. It doesn’t 
permeate through the placenta.

That is why I’m not falling in love.

When I peel white paint from the iron 
balustrade at your lake house, you entangle 
sanded sheets in a net of stars 

and write a poem.

Am I dying without knowing my naked 

body under the moonlight?

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

Day 22: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)

Clean the Closet on Non-Working Day

“Is it so stupid typing barcode numbers?” 
I said when I vacuumed. 

I want to play Debussy 
in the city hall of an emerald city, 

but my 220 lb butt is filled with filtered 
office water; though I try not to snack 

on the peanuts at my desk. I toss 
torn black stockings. Fifteen

jeans are on a shelf and I cannot 
fit in them. I am extremely jealous 

of the sinking woman who drowned 
after she sang a love song. She was opera-fat but 

beautiful in the winter lake. Yet, 

I have not recognized her loneliness 
and vexation of not being a wife. 

“Still vacuuming?” you looked into the closet. 

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*

Day 21: Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Project ( National Poetry Month)

ON THE BED

Your head is sunken
into the white pillow cases. I put
my chin on your shoulder and ask,
“Did Virginia Woolf sleep like this?”
Your warm socks are curled
up on the carpet. It is snowing powder
outside and young sprouts
shrivel and yellow at the edge.
“Probably not,” you say. I stroke
your backbone with my forefinger.
Your shoulders are cold and
pale under the weight of unemployment years.

**Please Support and Donate*** 

(When you donate, please kindly put my name)

*Click* 30/30 Project by Tupelo Press 

If you would like to donate me. Please *Click Here*