poetry of love judge

Our judge for the Carol Bessent Hayman Poetry of Love Award is Dr. Marcia L. Hurlow, a professor at Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky, since 1983. Her poems, short stories and creative non-fiction have been published in more than 300 literary journals. She has won national and state-wide fellowships in poetry, including the Kentucky Al Smith Fellowship, twice.

She shares this story about the first poem she ever fell in love with:

“In my little hometown, if you had to stay after school for an activity, you needed to walk home or have your parents come get you. The high school locked its doors at 5 p.m. My family lived out in the country, and my dad had complicated work hours, so after orchestra practice, I walked to the local public library to do homework until someone could pick me up. One evening they were particularly late, so after I finished my homework, I headed to the poetry section to look for something I hadn’t read before. Theodore Roethke? Nothing by him in my textbooks. I sat down and started reading his Collected Poems, starting with his juvenalia. Such musicality and imagery! I read on, amazed by the beauty he portrayed in nature. And then…I had just turned sixteen…I read “I Knew a Woman”. It was perfect–vivid and musical (I found myself swaying as I read it!) and sensual. I didn’t know a poem could be so sensual! Maybe that was why it wasn’t in my English textbook. I read it again and again, with new thoughts every time. One strong thought was “How can I get my boyfriend to write me a poem like this?” Now, decades later, I look at that poem with all kinds of emotion and a bit of envy. Some day I would love to write such a beautiful poem.”

And here is how she describes her ideal writing day:

“My ideal writing day is really my ideal writing morning. A nice breakfast and a long walk with my dog in the woods, then home to my husband and office upstairs. After spending time reading literary magazines or books of poems, I take a look at recent poems and tinker with them, then I read a bit more and with everything going well, if I haven’t written a new poem by 11:30, I give myself a prompt of some sort–a form or an imitation, usually–and tell myself I can’t have lunch until it’s done. Usually, what I think is “done” that morning is just a draft of a beginning, but that gives me something to work on another day.”

On the theme of romance, she sent this poem to share:

FOR OUR ANNIVERSARY

I know every choice I make
limits the next possibility.
Every choice of yours, my love,
spins mine around like a wheel
in Las Vegas. Compatible:
we always roll the dice the same

direction on the green felt
of the future, we agree
on the flick of the wrist, order
of fries, hang-gliding vacation,
application for tenure
and sloe-eyed rescue from the pound.

“Compatible” makes the first choice,
the rest, a comet tail of chance.