SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

by Ann Neuser Lederer

 

 EARLY GARDEN


Now opens spring:
A quick tearing, rip of seed packs

The gates of the heart 
swing in the breeze

Planting by signs:
Tiny lettuces, sweet fetuses
germinating since Valentine's Day

Pea husks poked into holes
in the slush, for St. Pat

Potatoes on Good Friday!

Marking the holy remnants
with green hopes

As the boggy moon, like tides,

tugs them from their casings

All mourning is buried

Sprouts flee from the ground,
freed ghosts singing
in birds' voices



CARNEGIE PRESS II,
1998
Carnegie Press








 STOP IN THE NAME OF LOVE

". . .you can get a feel for the hilly Detroit 
streets of the 1840's--before bulldozers made
virtually the whole city flat."

    Peter Gavrilovich, The Detroit Free Press



Hot steam rushes, like Hades,
up from the rutted streets
of Motown, after the downpour,
an unexpected lurch into summer.

Hop onto the raft of Michigan surprises!
Ride to the land of no transitions, 
down to the flat fields of the east,
her hills scraped off, pummeled and pressed
to her solar plexus, between 
the Great Lakes of her waving arms.

How would it sound if you had been hacked
and punched in the middle?
Like the whip of a shout?
Like the low growl of "Eat the Rich"
spray painted on the abandoned gas station
around the corner?
Like the jaws of the bulldozers, rearing up
on their hind legs and snapping?

Would your pot holes gobble whole factories?
Would your streetlights blink, and burn out?
Would your stairwells cross their arms
and refuse to let anyone else pass?

Would it sound like the train of funnel clouds
seen clearly from afar,
now that the land is flattened?
Like the roar of violation
that leaves nothing to the imagination?
Like the guy on the radio who said:
"I'm not afraid of anything.
I'm a construction worker.
But when the tornado came, 
I climbed into my bathtub
and had ten minutes of pure terror."


POTATO EYES 13, Fall 1996







 WINTER SOLSTICE 

It is almost yule.
I am finally home, and warm.
We have seen the sun
since the last moon.
We make lights, hoping
to coax the new flickers,
green or red flashes in the north.
I look unrecognizable from the wind
tunnel, flushed and old.
The birds have come when I was gone.
Their frantic printing marks the new snow,
cracked seed scattered over it.
I think of my achievements:
swimming in Lake Superior, 
finally seeing the fox;
and my yearnings:
for ancient Lake Baikal,
to hear the wolves howl.

We make lights.
We have hope.
The Earth, our sister,
will twist in her spin.
The day will creep back.
We will proceed.


POTATO EYES 17/18, Fall 1998






 THE UNDIFFERENTIATED 

They will clump together
and find each other, pulling hair

They will climb all over,
like ants on the undersides of leaves,
sucking out juice

They will poke grubby little fingers
into each other's eyes,
just to do it

Sometimes they will rake their fingernails
along each others' skin,
like undisciplined day campers.

It is called "loss of contact inhibition,"
what those unruly cells are doing.
There are lists of other behaviors as well:
invading, escaping surveillance, diverting resources.
There is no end to what these naughty ones might do.

They should be spanked, then bathed,
then tucked back into little cots in rows.


PUDDING 32, December, 1996

Pudding

and in 
WOMPO anthology LETTERS TO THE WORLD, 2008






 LA BELLE PROVINCE 

In the north country, we do not do well with this heat.
There come a few days in summer's last gasp
where the ominous sky squeezes
and the heat lightening yelps
with a pink squiggle of pain, like a stepped on animal.

In the tail-end of being repeatedly beaten down,
a blue-eyed Huron, speaking only French,
quotes the half-breed great-grandmothers,
while spreading out plastic fish to dry for the visitors'cameras.

Tipped on the edge of the Great Lake of September,
into the darkening,
where the wrecked vessels slumber,
the last day of August shifts.

The heat pushes, a heavy dog breathing.

We will plunge now,
into the cellar of unnatural coolness,
bowing to the explosions of the tightly-lidded season.
We have brought a candle, and a little radio.

We are covering our heads from the hurled bombs, 
the high pitched hurricanes,
the street riots,
the crash of bottles, 
the late and furious storms.

We will crouch under tables, 
as the nuns taught us.

Then we will climb on our knees
to the top of the tallest shrine
and view Brother Andre's heart behind glass
in its red painted box.


WIND 76, Fall 1995






See journal for text of poem:

Scissors, Paper, Stingers in Xconnect 







See journal for text of poem:

To The Borderlines in THE BLUE MOON 








See journal for text of poems:

Bits of Advice in THE 2 RIVER VIEW


Weep No More in THE 2 RIVER VIEW 







 VIBRATIONS 
Smacking the tuning fork against her palm,
then setting it delicately 
upon the bone of the toe,
she says: The music is mere diversion.
As with pinpricks and cotton wisps,
please pay attention to the sensations.

At moonrise, late August, Kentucky
is finally evolving into her stereotype.
She pulls her warmed arms
around the haze of trees,
loving on the buzzing crickets
that hint: fall, nightfall.

She takes the quilt from the bed
and folds it, hands it
like a flag, to the oldest child,
who passes it on to the youngest. 

This is the kind of story 
I would put into a letter. 
But lately, a better messenger is silence. 

PUDDING 44, Summer 2002
Poetry Tour Book U.S. 62: a literary highway

Pudding






See journal for text of poems:

White Flight and The Vagabonds' Pilgrimage
in THE ADIRONDACK REVIEW, Summer 2002 








See journal for text of poems:

The Drying Barn and Speak No Evil
in THUNDER SANDWICH, 2003 







See journal for text of poems:

Spiraling, 
No Yes, and 
Szpilki

in PULSE, 2003 






See journal for text of poem:

Otherwise, Fuzz
in MORIA, Winter 2004






See journal for text of poem:

Adorational
in BANYAN REVIEW, 2004






See journal for text of poem:

Seeing Babies
in LITERARY MAMA, 2004






See journal for text of poem:

Sweetest Honey
in BLUE FIFTH REVIEW, 2004







See journal for text of poems:

By the Signs, Creeping Charlie, Extravagance
in MILLER'S POND, 2004







See journal for text of poem:

Coloring
in 12GAUGE, 2003 







See journal for text of poem:

Country Wedding
in SZIRINE, 2004







See journal for text of poem:

Field Fire Field Notes
in DIAGRAM 4.5






See  journal for texts of poems:

Between the Lakes
in NO TELL MOTEL, 2005



Winter Swim
in NO TELL MOTEL, 2005



Two No-Nos in a Row
in NO TELL MOTEL, 2005



Pink Moon
in NO TELL MOTEL, 2005

and in 
BEDSIDE GUIDE anthology, 2006



Of Orbs, Opening
in NO TELL MOTEL, 2005








See journal for text of poems:

Interference, Interlude, Closing In, One Percent, Casuistry (Featured Poet)
in BLUE FIFTH REVIEW Winter 2005 
 









HARVESTING 

Right before the first killing frost, 
I gathered the last tiny tomatoes to dry,
now sweeter from cold, and nostalgia.

I rescued the plumes of Russian sage,
like blue breaths sucked inward, then held.

As I plucked the laced dill, her seeds
escaped among the elfin mints.

I brooded on my harvest, as though it were
my own tall boy 
chasing his footprints at the ocean's edge,
just as when he was a toddler.

I sat down with pride at my outdoor table, 
with bees made restless by their premonitions.

The purple grapes glowing 
in the late sunshine
need not be mentioned,
as I did not really grow them,
nor the pumpkin I would add to complete
the appropriate palette


NILAS 2004






See journal for text of poem:

Thunder Moon
in SALT RIVER REVIEW Fall 2005






See journal for text of poems:

Light Tricks, Straits, Night Messages
in TRIPLOPIA 2006






See journal for text of poems:

Caves and Towers, Traveling Bears
in POEMELEON 2006






See journal for text of poem:

Post Trilogy
in MiPOesias  2006






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Among the Nurses
in Umbrella  2007






See journal for text of poems:

Pariahs, Midwifery
in Umbrella  2007






See journal for text of poem:

White, Yet Undone
in Hospital Drive 2008







See journal for text of poem:

January Thaw
in Best of the Net Anthology 2007 (originally in Seque)







See journal for text:

Erie
 in HOBBLE CREEK REVIEW 






See journal for text:

But What About The Babies?
 in BREVITY 






"Notes on a Nursing Home" 
from GERIATRIC NURSING, July/August 1983, pp. 224-227
Ann Neuser Lederer was born in Ohio, and has also lived and worked in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Kentucky. Her poems can be found in journals, anthologies, and her chapbooks Approaching Freeze (Foothills), The Undifferentiated (Pudding House), and Weaning the Babies (Pudding House). She has degrees in Anthropology and in Nursing, and is employed as an R.N. See this for a comprehensive list .