Wilderness Interface Zone

After the electrical storm
rattles the windows
and spikes the sky ocher
and I go out in the dark
to douse the garden hose
superfluously watering the roses
a shock
to be blinded
by moon
full in the face
in the closed corridor
at the side of my house
and it is clear to me
like cool white fire
the you I know
still glows
in dark somewhere
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To read Paul Swenson’s [...]

Make
like a tree* and
grow, bloom and bear fruit,
give shade, give shelter, sow seed,
weather storms, dig deep,
breathe deeper.
Be useful
in your
death:
frame
well,
burn
bright,
enrich
the soil,
and,
mulch
made,
resurrect
a tree.
____________________________________________________________________________
*This is, of course, a variation on the common adage to “make like a tree and branch out,” and the less common adage, used primarily among canines (the dogs, not the teeth), “make like a [...]

Frequent WIZ contributor Karen Kelsay’s new book of poetry, Lavender Song, is out and available for sale here.   Karen’s formalist poetry is a well-kept garden of lovely sensibilities.  For samples of her work published on WIZ, go here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Writers: The deadline for Torrey House Press’s creative non-fiction contest is [...]

Coming soon to a mailbox (or computer) near you: Dialogue’s environmental issue.  Several Wilderness Interface Zone contributors are included therein–congratulations, friends! Frequent WIZ contributor Steven Peck guest edited this issue.
Table of contents:
Page     Author     Title
Mary Toscano     Front Cover
Inside Cover, Title Page
v     Edwin Firmage, Jr.     Letters
1     Steven L. Peck     Why [...]

Every year an old friend and I undertake an adventure. H. and I are middle-aged now. Past our prime and youth when our adventures were bolder and more carefree. I can remember when we then, full of laughter, took his new pickup and rubbed its shiny sides against aspens for luck while searching out some [...]

Light’s rise sparks bright blooms:
birdsong, fields of it, vining–
spring’s first green flourish.
These mornings, I step outside my back door to hear the hush of winter thrown off by a clamor of birdsong–the crackle of starlings, jazzy riffs of purple house finches, a lonely two-syllable call from a flycatcher,  screeches [...]

The Provo Orem Word, an online venue for artists in the Provo-Orem area of Utah, has published an excerpt from my novel The Pictograph Murders (Signature Books 2004) in this year’s nature-themed issue.  You can read the excerpt and rest of the issue here, or click on the picture.  Also, check out the ad for [...]

It’s funny how things look
From however many thousand feet
One has to be to sail on clouds and see no birds.
And when the clouds burn off, I find a charm in streets—
Their random pass, the patchwork of man’s world,
The green and brown space, the plaid or checkered shirt,
The crawl of hills as if topography encroached on [...]

A man could almost fall in love
With this sun-dyed black-gold place
Could go for arid mile on mile
And never see God’s face
And thus avoid disgrace.
A man could drift and wander
Change his shape like blood-red dunes
Pour his freedom out like water
And his faith like feckless spume.
After all, there’s ample room.
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For Jonathon’s bio and links to other poems [...]

Remember wild, ungardened greens?
Dark mulchy woods of unkempt trees?
That broad, telestial paradise
Of birds and bugs and field mice?
Remember snows of varied hues?
High drifts? spring thaws? fat summer dews?
And fragrant, flatland buzzing air?
Paint-palette, musty harvest fare?
We’ve none of those in this dry place
Where seasons are a figment of degrees
And landmarks fickle as a ninja bride:
Trembling within, [...]