Melinda Coppola

twenty four may | from the inside out

Melinda Coppola

twenty four may | from the inside out

A 2022 Story

  There was a little stream—more of a rivulet, really—that dribbled and dripped and murmured along through a swath of untamed land.  Many moons and suns cast their light upon her waters as she found her way around boulders and hills and the wide trunks of venerable trees. She was free of any precepts that […]

The Shift

art: Moon Goddess by Melinda Coppola, done in watercolor.   On my best days I do dwell in gratitude and I experience most everything as a blessing. My poem, “The Shift”, attempts to give voice to that. The poem, which you can read below, has been published in Writing in a Woman’s Voice Poetry Journal. […]

Night Upon the Prairie

My poem, Night Upon the Prairie, was published in Writing in a Woman’s Voice poetry journal yesterday. While writing this I channeled singer/songwriter energies. If I had learned to play guitar, I think this one would have morphed into a folk or country song.   It was night upon the prairie, new moon sliver in […]

Why Poetry Matters

I’m so pleased to share that my poem “Nobody” was published in Thimble Literary Journal today. You can read it by clicking on this link: https://www.thimblelitmag.com/2022/08/09/nobody/ My writing process is anything but logical. Sometimes it feels as if the poems begin as embryos planted in the unseen folds of my heart. Some grow in predicable […]

BE EVER SO KIND

In my nearly 30 year journey parenting my child with special needs, I’ve had much time to reflect on the juxtaposition between How I Thought Things Would Go and How Things Have Gone. How Things Are.  I revisit memories of child-me, teen-me, very-young-adult me, and wonder—what if she knew how things would unfold? What might […]

Slack Satori

satori \ sə-ˈtȯr-ē n (Buddhism) Zen Buddhism the state of sudden indescribable intuitive enlightenment  [from Japanese]• Hmmm. Tell a creative (poet, artist, musician, sculptor) that something is indescribable, and chances are they will receive your words as a delightful challenge! I’m happy to share that my poem, Slack Satori, was published today in Writing in […]

She Runs On

She Runs On and On, and On   A whole lot of nothing happening here in the Department of Creation of New Poems, and so I sat down with DETERMINATION and began to write, the way I used to write before I knew what “good” writing was and before I knew some of what I […]

What’s in a name? More pub cred, musings

Mid-April already?  Time is such a liquid concept. Today, my  already may be your finally. It is already April?  Finally, it is spring.  In February, my finally was louder than my already. Finally, Winter has lifted the frayed ends of her long gray coat and begun her drawn-out egress. I’ve had two more poems published, […]

Little Altars Everywhere

My home is host to little altars everywhere honoring lives lived, seasons arriving and leaving, the hundred sparks of grace and wonder, sorrow and understanding that pock and foliate hours and years squeezed into the dance of this body, my particular, grand, unbearably blessed and gratefully transient human experience. On good days I go bowing […]

Harmonious Discord

This morning I walked early, mismatched garments layered to repel a cold, spitting rain. I’d pushed his baseball cap down hard over the knitted ear band I bought to share with her, which she most emphatically rejected for not being soft enough, or pink. Featherweight Bean jacket— the one that lifts me to frequent if […]