Melinda Coppola

twenty four may | from the inside out

Melinda Coppola

twenty four may | from the inside out

About My Blog

I started this blog to quiet the voices in my head and heart that have been whispering and cajoling and sometimes yelling at me to write more.

This is a space where all the parts of me—mother, poet, wife, lover of beach stones and furry creatures and frequent toe-dipper in the river of song, Yoga practitioner, and teacher and she-who-cooks and she-who-makes-art and she-who-loves-silence, where all the parts of me can come out to play.

I started this blog to keep myself engaged in dialogue with my soul. If what I write interests you, educates you, moves you, …well, that’s a beautiful bonus.

Most Recent Blog Post

New Poem Published

I’m pleased that one of my pieces, “Honeymoon”  was just published in Last Stanza Poetry Journal. The journal is available in hardcover, softcover, and on Kindle.  Last Stanza is a beautiful journal, so if you’ve any interest in poetry for yourself or as a gift for someone special, please consider ordering a copy.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D28R69VQ/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&dib_tag=se&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.wY0A1oXJxC9H52BkfBJe2CtaMRH1CveI2fvY0_G7fn8.Mup6ucmLiTO910-CxspaHeIT7nqHv9qTyZSSK736WK8&qid=1713626398&sr=1-18

The poem:

 

Honeymoon

Across the Kenyan plains,
armies of fine golden dust
rose and swarmed around every living thing,
clung to skin and lips,
tongue and cornea,
the camera’s shuttered eye.

Who can say when a marriage begins or ends?
There are no dreams here,
she might have thought, no poems.
at night under the mosquito netting,
perhaps she watched his back rise and fall,
didn’t sleep but mourned the years ahead.

Three decades later, she excavated
a brown book of photos, met
a man and a woman, young and familiar,
hats angled away from the dust or each other.

Against a backdrop of zebras grazing,
with elephants walking in the distance,
the two squinted straight into the lens,
the haze already coming between them.

 

–Melinda Coppola

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read More Blog Posts

New Poem Published

I’m pleased that one of my pieces, “Honeymoon”  was just published in Last Stanza Poetry Journal. The journal is available in hardcover, softcover, and on Kindle.  Last Stanza is a beautiful journal, so if you’ve any interest in poetry for yourself or as a gift for someone special, please consider

Read More »

Ode to a Vessel

Dear Useful Thing   You are more than receptacle, a pleasing weight in my cupped hands. You’re the one I reach for, mornings when I stumble into kitchen, into waking, into day, and if I haven’t said it aloud— I love the way you receive, unquestioning, whatever I pour, be

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More Autism Awareness

For many folks on the autism spectrum, medical encounters are fraught with anxiety and fear. Sensory issues, limited ability to understand procedures and express themselves, the speed at which things are expected to proceed, traumatic memories of previous encounters—all can combine to create some serious daytime nightmares. Bink and I

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These Monikered Months

A  month of daffodils is upon us.  Yay, spring!!  April has been branded both Autism Awareness Month and National Poetry Month.  Here you go, then, a post that covers both.  I’ve shared this poem before, but it feels annually relevant.  As D, a sister mom of a young woman with

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Farther

I’m so pleased that my poem, “Farther”, which I share with you below, was just published in the Spring 2024 issue of Metonym Literary Journal. Metonym is a print journal, available for sale through their site at https://metonym-journal.com/ Poetry is art. While not everything written in all poems actually happened

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In the Pink

“Fruits on Pink” by Bink She begins. First, there is pink. Well…vivid electric magenta is more apt.  She pushes the frayed brush into the water jar, hitting the  bottom too hard. Taps out a neurodivergent rhythm on the canvas. Some would call it background. To her, I think, it is

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A Tale of Two Motorists

Poem for the Pissed-Off Driver   I have a third eye that sees beyond your scowl, man-behind -the-wheel who couldn’t bear to wait when I slowed to turn right and so zoomed past, horn blaring, finding just enough time to turn and glare at me, mouth a “F*** you” before

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Still, After Years

This is the Love Poem, Mid-Life for Super Guy “Who, being loved, is poor?” –Oscar Wilde Remember the night I woke moaning, ankles on fire, some ghost gripping my arches, preventing even a twitch of toes, a wiggle’s wriggle? You rolled without hesitation from the warmth of our layered nest,

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