The Yakima Coffeehouse Poets, a nonprofit formed in 2014 to represent the interests of poets and poetry lovers in Central Washington, is the organization behind this monthly poetry column, which runs the first Sunday of every month. It features inland Washington poets and poems selected from Poet’s Brew and the monthly Yakima Coffeehouse Poets open mic.
Learn more about the organization at www.yakimacoffeehousepoets.com and www.facebook.com/YakimaCoffeeHousePoets.
About the poet
J Murphy is a lesbian writer living in Yakima. While growing up in Arizona she developed a passion for outdoors and frontier living. Prior to her college career, she worked maintenance at a private camp on South Mountain near Phoenix, AZ. From this, her writing is still heavily influenced by nature and the senses. She received her Ph.D. in English from Georgia State University but really, she’s always wanted to be a librarian like her grandmother. You can find her stories and poems in publications like The Superstition Review, Breakwater Review, and The Kenyon Review, among others. Currently, she is shopping around a constellation of multi-length stories examining heteronormative influences on lesbian cultures. Her recent creative projects focus on poetics of the body and a novel about the D. B. Cooper skyjacking. She teaches writing at Yakima Valley College and lives and writes from her West Valley apartment.
"Valencia"
The summer fruit hangs inside a red net soft
in late season. The browning bruises apparent.
Yet he peddles them anyways. Hangs the web
of orange orbs into the road and yells, naranjas.
Their navels turned inward and splitting slightly
open. But I am in the mood for a tangelo.
Some darker fruit, easily peeled and slip
the mouth opened even seeds swallowed whole.
But sometimes, when the fruit is especially ripe,
the rind will curl over the counter taking the roaming shape
of Venus. And the nectar falling from her lips
like sea foam churning against the rocks.
Or is the rind more like the skin of a tortellini
pressed tightly around the index, also devoured.
- J Murphy
Inspired by "After The Haw Lantern" by Seamus Heaney
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