The moon is a shy
smile, breaking into a blush
of velvet wanting
Tag Archives: poem
Summer Time
22 FebScreen door slam
lemonade fan
night reaching forever
into lush trees
everything echoes
lightning bug time
cricket star chime
warm evening
slow, honey
suckled breeze
When
9 JanWhen the moon glows full
and the stars speak to you with
infinite sweetness
when you find a green
rolling field, inviting you
to lay upon it
when a lofty view
tugs at that space within you
that never stays full
think of me, perhaps
feel me close, remember my
joy in knowing you.
Glowing Arch, Washington Square Park, October 2015.
This started out as haikus composed in my head while I tried to sleep. Although I did follow the traditional 5-7-5 pattern, and there is nature involved, the verses are more like American Sentences (17 syllables), and together form the complete poem.
When emotions run deep, poetry helps me distill the essence of what I want to take away from an experience. Sometimes, it takes a few times to distill it all. I am finding more and more, that fewer words are often best.
Small Packages
1 JanSavor the moments
though fleeting or few, joy comes
in small packages.
My first poem in a long time. A little bit of joy for me, in a small package.
Happy 2016
Fly By Day
9 SepMy flight departs when I put my left foot on the pedal and coast, down the driveway, onto the street, swinging my right leg over the saddle. If I had wings to beat, they would be my two feet, pedaling down the asphalt runway. This is my morning flyby. My feet push hard against the pedals: pushing away worries, pushing back years, pushing against thoughts of you which I can’t ever seem to escape from. I keep pushing until my thighs protest, my chest heaves. Lightheaded and flushed I soar through the streets of my neighborhood. I admit, I do spread my arms like an eagle, because it feels good; this is the closest I come to actual flight. I pump my legs and ascend higher and farther, as if this is all I have. This time, cutting through space, where I run to you and away from you at the same time.
The retired men, putzing around their yards in my neighborhood know me. They line the streets and cheer as I speed past, just a blur. As they watch me go by, I recognize the look in their eyes, it makes me want to keep going and never stop.
Hot drops of rain fall
on my helmet, I welcome
them, and feel alive.
I wrote this, my first haibun, for Dverse Poets Pub’s first Haibun Monday. Having never explored this form of poetry before, I am not sure that I totally nailed the form, but I enjoyed writing it. As I was on my bicycle this morning, these were my actual thoughts. Thoughts which were followed by a sense of dread that I would not be able to work my ideas into a coherent poem. Then I got home, hopped on the computer, saw the Dverse post and boom! Haibun!
Oh Say, Can You See?
26 AugI can see you
13 rivers red blood brothers
13 pillars victorious mothers
blue promises in the night sky
your stars shining as they guide
give me liberty, give me life
bless the fruit of our strife
o majesty, wave your banner over us
bless our battles in the dust
your colors dipped in God we trust
I can see you, I will be you
wave, wave, wave
one thousand places where you are not
24 Augrollinggreen grassy field, zephyrs concourse
saltcresting gulfstreamwaves, miles from land
hayloft of a barn, Tennessee horse farm
mossyaired spaces in between forest trees
nestlecurled beside a hollow rotting log.
Mexican rooftop, anotherplease tequila
sunrise filtering through empty playground
swings, floatspinning down a lazy river
in a warm rainstorm, poundingpavement
in the everincreasing heat of daytime.
an airplane holding pattern slowwaltz,
banking over the Panama Canal,
hilltopview of Manhattan, twin lights, painted desert
highwaygunning towards Pacifica, that
bar in Copenhagen, wintermidnights
on west 57th. the Jewish weddingdance
in Buenos Aires, au pied de cochon
Amsterdam, Aachen. Gare de Lyon.
who do I kid not? you were there, are
there, always will be and anywhere
elseplace I go you ceasenot
to leave your footprints for
even the windleaves they carry
your indelible invisiblemark
even in watersounds i hear your
wonderous laughter
Places. Kennings. An experiment and some truth. Can you guess the influences?
Take a listen:
Break Through
20 AugI’m looking for a spoon.
I’m looking for a spoon
to crack an egg. To smack
through the oyster shell
of my heart, the soft boiled
container of my soul.
That shining spoon
has to fit my fingers
it needs to be surgical steel
with the right balance
of stem and bowl
so when it thwacks
upside the egg, it’s ready
to dig, to scoop out
all the glorious goo,
all my runny ideas
and inspiration in one
yellow flow, but first
I need that spoon.
The Audience Awaits
5 AugI went outside to watch
the stars tonight, curled
in my Adirondack chair
but those stars, I swear,
peered right back at me
blinking their diamond eyes
in the quivering silence, inquiring
in some universal Morse code,
So, what are you
going to do next?
Pelicans Pause
29 JulPerched upon pilings,
pelicans pause, pensively
primping and preening.
We went to Ponce Inlet, FL last Saturday to participate in a poetry reading at Lighthouse Park (I got to read 4 poems, YAY!). Afterwards I wandered around the neighborhood taking photos. Across the street from the park, at the marina, there were a bunch of large pelicans perched on pilings, almost 20 of them. Pelicans are curious birds, and I love to watch them. This group seemed to be waiting for the resident head boats to come back from their morning fishing trips.
Wrote a haiku about them, because lately I have been in a haiku sort of mood.
Lupita Eyde-Tucker
Lupita's English translation of Venezuelan poet Oriette D'Angelo's collection, "Homeland of Swarms," was published in 2024 by co•im•press and was recently named a finalist for the 2025 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation and winner of the 2024 Florida Book Award Bronze Medal in Poetry.
Lupita holds an MFA in Creative Writing - Poetry from the University of Florida, and served as a staff scholar at Bread Loaf Translators Conference from 2021 to 2023. She is a Vermont Studio Center Fellow and has received generous institutional support from Bread Loaf Writers Conferences, Poesiaeuropa, the Kentucky Women Writers Conference, and New York State Summer Writers Institute. She is a 2022 Best New Poet and has received numerous Pushcart Prize nominations. She loves visiting the beach with her family, watching baseball, playing volleyball and word games, dancing, darkrooms, black and white film photography, road trips, live music, and trains.
Not Enough Poetry 