What Writings?

When I turned seventy in January, 2025, the “bucket list” became real. There were things I suddenly needed to do: spend as much time as possible with my baby grandson; bicycle from my house in Kirkland , Illinois to my son’s house in Irvington, New York (where my grandson resides); return to Argentina after a fifty year hiatus; publish my writings.

After I retired from teaching in 2020, I devoted myself to writing, but I didn’t devote myself to submittiing my writings to publications. I dreaded the submission process because I feared it would take away time and energy from writing. But, I knew I had to do it.

Sure enough, submitting my writings to publications has taken a lot of time and energy, and what I dreaded… came true: for the first four months of this year, I pretty much stopped writing.

I have gotten a dozen or so poems published, as you can see (click on PUBLISHED WORKS, top right on the home page) with a few more in the pipeline. Winning first place in the Helen Schaible sonnet contest in the modern sonnet category for my poem “She Wanted to Sleep Head to Foot”– was the turning point that made me decide the time might be right to start this “media platform”.

The contest judge , Donna Vorreyer, said this about the sonnet:

This sonnet’s form seems to be a nod to Diane Seuss’s long-lined sonnets in Frank. This form also complements the narrative – the infinite and haphazard movements of caretaking and confusion, seeing everything you used to know changed. The images of the sleepers at the beginning of the poem and the reference to bodies at Pompeii at the end resonate beautifully as images of both tenderness and what is and what once was.

On October 5, 2025 the sonnet was read aloud over Zoom. Now I am submitting it to be published.

In order to get my writings published , most publishers require that the pieces remain unpublished elsewhere, including here on this blog.

I have written nearly 700 poems, 24 short stories and one play.

I really want to share all of these with you.

I’ll keep submitting, trying to get them published.

I intend to share some unpublished poems here, along with the ones that get published.

Let me know if you want to read the winning sonnet (if you haven’t aleady) or a small sampling of my poems. I’ll send these to you by email. You can specify the kind of poems you are interested in: God, clouds, psalms, death, cycling, gardening, Gaza, love, etc. I’ve probably got something for you.

Here is one of my bilingual poems:

Ardor


Amar no es esa joven que de curiosa paraba 
paraba como un sinsonte deseando la voz de otro.
No es esa noche perdido, cuando las estrellas centelleaban
sobre la piel que, sudorosa, centelleaba también.

Amar no es el viejo sendero por las sierras azules
ni el azul del mar que tintinea dedos colgados,
busca en festivales, fiestas y carnavales espíritus
para compartir bajo mantas de acero susurros plateros.

Acariciamos sabiendo que la vida no nos busca,
pero lo buscamos como dos  gorriones comunes
uno que trae la ramita de heno para el nido y el otro 
la semilla del girasol que en nuestros picos se desmoronará.

				


Ardor

To love is not the young woman who stood curious
stood like a mockingbird desiring the voice of another.
It is not a lost night, when the stars sparkled
over skin that, sweaty, also sparkled.

To love is not an old trail through the blue sierras
nor the blue of the sea that tinkles dangled toes
or looks for spirits in festivals, parties and carnivals 
to later share beneath blankets of steel silver whispers.

We caress knowing that life does not look for us,
but we look for it like two plain sparrows
one that brings to the nest a sprig of hay and the other
the sunflower seed that crumbles in its beak.

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