Christopher J. Jarmick: Stir
Christopher J. Jarmick is a poet, art lover, and bookstore owner in Kirkland, Washington. Stir
explores what stirs us up: relationships, love, memories, family, death, politics, pop-culture, and
religion. Some poems go into the forest, some into the past, some into dreams, some go
Hollywood, and many poems reveal in unexpected ways. There are a few genre-bending poems,
and a couple dozen of his signature “Poem Starters” too. You wouldn’t be wrong in finding
many poems witty, thoughtful, quirky, and/or darkly humored. Enjoy.
The Truth of the Larch
The larks
in the larches
bird-songing
a symphony for
mountain goats
among the dazzling
golden yellow plumage
in the mountain wilderness.
Almost too bright
for human eyes
for two weeks,
this show is fit for the gods,
if you hike up the trail
to witness it.
I remember that fall
when we believed
it could last.
Christopher J. Jarmick was raised in Bloomfield, New Jersey, and Poughkeepsie, New York.
He was a Los Angeles-based producer/screenwriter, editor, and director of PBS documentaries,
music videos, and nationally syndicated TV. Several of the documentaries he worked on
received awards. He relocated to the Pacific Northwest (in 1994), worked as a radio producer,
and began curating readings and special events in 1998. He has owned BookTree—Kirkland,
Washington’s only independent bookstore—since 2016. There is a free writing workshop,
reading, and open mic every first Saturday at BookTree. Check it out! Previous poetry
collections include Not Aloud (MoonPath Press, 2015), Ignition (2010), Poems for the Working
Class (chapbook) and the novel, The Glass Cocoon. Chris is the proud father of Natasha, Natalia,
and Christina and has four grandchildren.
Visit Christopher's page at WorldEnoughWriters.com
Buy Stir online:
Thomas A. Thomas: Reverence
There is something sacred about Thomas A. Thomas’s second collection of poetry, Reverence.
These are poems of both bereavement and beauty as the poet insists that nature’s dazzling
presence and the blessing of having loved will prevail over the most profound grief. In a
recurring series of road trip poems, Thomas drives into the deep night of death, where the
roadkill of a deer foreshadows that of a brother, a father and a wife. Yet, we are traveling
beneath “the currents that move the stars” and “bright meteors / trailing tails of blue” as the poet
imagines beyond “death’s dark territory…to that one light.” With Reverence, Thomas offers us a
piercingly hopeful vision of the world where “dawn is a door opening in the sky…and we
become a door too, opening in our own, sweet urgent eternity.”
—Heidi Seaborn, author of tic tic tic
The Way
The way meadowlark
called me from tent,
as if from my lost childhood.
The way sunlight slanted
through susurrous grasses,
as if to call my bare feet.
The way he found peace
in his solitude and sorrow,
lonely boy beneath a bird.
The way meadowlark answers
the question, seven decades deep:
dear boy, yes everything,
every last thing,
is waiting,
for you.
Thomas A. Thomas, born in Illinois, spent a lot of time off by himself in
the woods, prairies, and fields, day and night, in all seasons. Thomas found his way to the honors
program at the University of Michigan, where he completed a bachelor’s degree of his own
design. At UM, he studied with Donald Hall, Gregory Orr, and workshopped some poems with
Robert Bly. Thomas later got a dream job as correspondent for a rock ’n’ roll and jazz magazine
interviewing 1970s bands, and after a couple of years of madness in New York City, he found
his way to the Pacific Northwest, where he has made his home since 1981. He is a board member
for the Olympia Poetry Network and his poems, photos, and videos appear in print and online,
in such places as MacQueen’s Quinterly, FemAsia Magazine, Vox Populi Sphere. Thomas is a
Pushcart Prize nominee and his collection My Heart Is Not Asleep (published by MoonPath
Press), was a Finalist in the Washington State Book Awards.
Visit Thomas online.
Purchase Reverence online:
