David Anthony Sam's Blog, page 134

Thank you to these Editors for accepting my work in 2019

My deepest thanks to Kelsay Books for publishing
my book Dark Fathers last December and the to the editors of the
following publications for accepting my poems in 2019:

Aji Magazine

Artemis Journal

Backchannels Journal

Clementine Unbound

Cutthroat: A Journal of the Arts

december magazine

Fredericksburg Literary & Arts Review

Gravel Magazine

Haiku Journal

Haunted Waters Press-From the Depths

IO Literary Review

Light:
A Journal of Photography & Poetry

Manzano Mountain Review

Peeking Cat Poetry

Poetry Quarterly

Sky Island Journal

Smoky Blue
Literary and Arts Magazine

The American Journal of Poetry

The Big Windows Review

The Ideate Review

The MacGuffin

The Magnolia Review

The Voices Project

The Wayne Literary Review

Walloon Writers Review

Heron Tree accepted my poem “Enlargement” for publication

Thank you Heron Tree Editor Chris Campolo for accepting my poem “Enlargement” for publication. This the sixth time Heron Tree has accepted my work.

Photos from reading at “The Longest Night” – Blacksburg VA Dec. 22, 2019

Thank you Matt Dhillon for organizing this event and all the poets and musicians who participated. The Odd Fellows Hall was chilly but the audience was warm and friendly.

My new poetry collection now available from Amazon

In addition to buying directly from Kelsay Books, you can now purchase my new poetry collection, Dark Fathers, from Amazon. 

May you all know peace and happiness this night and hereafter

The best response to awe is silence.

May you all know peace and happiness this night and hereafter.

Several of my books of poetry are available from the Library of Virginia.

Several of my books of poetry are available from the Library of Virginia.

My new collection of poetry, Dark Fathers, is available at five branches of the Central Rappahannock Regional Library.

My new collection of poetry, Dark Fathers, is available at five branches of the Central Rappahannock Regional Library.

My new collection of poetry, Dark Fathers, is available at the Orange County Public Library.

My new collection of poetry, Dark Fathers, is available at the Orange County Public Library.

A worthwhile read–Review: The Trembling Answers

The Trembling Answers by Craig Morgan Teicher

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

In this very personal and moving collection, Craig Morgan Teicher explores his own biography. We feel his worry and pain as a father of a health young girl and a very sick boy. We listen to his love for his wife, his children, for the mother he lost when he was young, for the housekeeper who raised him, for the father who loved only through his emotional distance.

Some of the lines are very fine, such as:

…She lived and she grows

like joy spreading from the syllables

of songs.

Or

I could hold that rock

and rewind time and find myself

standing between verb tenses.

Or

I can divide all life

into breath and waiting

for the next breath, and

the calm in the troughs

between.

Some of the poems are complete, and touching, and real. You read the collection and imagine you are listening to a friend, pretending you know them, as much as any human can know another. A worthwhile read.

View all my reviews

A rare angular music—Review: Night Angler

Night Angler by Geffrey Davis

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

“Night Angler” is a truly fine collection of
poems by Geffrey Davis, as he meditates on the meaning of fatherhood.
His own father failed that role but finally asks for some forgiveness.
The poet himself tries to learn and be truer to the name, Father. The
title and title poems suggest a man who fishes the night for meaning and
faith and forgiveness and hope.

Dear Boy: In the beginning,

father was a fear I wanted

to call love. For years I waded

heart-deep into that doubt

for version of my name

I could, with some forgiveness,

cast before your image.

Dear Boy: Here’s my hand—

because your arrival has

mended the grave current

of time, in the beginning

I was talking to you.

The language is truly fine. The emotion personal yet universal, poetic yet deep and real.

…light creeps

all across a distinct range of mountain,

stunning plateau of birds into the original

sweetness of song. We want to understand this—

according to our appetite for pulling

a rare, angular music from the body’s

dark cathedral. Or we grow stubborn

for the wild severity of wind

plying trees. We want the vastness of that

motion, the sleep. We desire so much from more.

Davis
succeeds in “pulling a rare, angular music” from his desire and body,
singing us some of that “vastness of motion” we all want to hear— and
to be.

View all my reviews