Elaine Starkman

A while back poet Elaine Starkman from Walnut Creek, California, a town I just happened to live in for six years, commented that she liked my site and asked, “do you take original poetry or only that which is already published.” The answer, of course, is that I’m merely reviewing published works I’ve read and trying to encourage others to read them.

I don’t really think I have the time, ability, or patience to edit and “publish” a poetry magazine, and I’m not looking for a sudden burst of unsolicited poems, though in the past I’ve asked some local poets who are friends if they’d be willing to have me publish examples of their poems. One of the reasons I link to so many poetry sites is so that readers can find contemporary poetry.

That said, I’ve had poets leave entire poems in comments and I can’t remember ever deleting one, so I don’t really see any harm in publishing one of Elaine Starkman’s poems:


Short nights

of summer darkness
carry me back to my desk

to silence, to sweet
aloneness, in the confines

of my room
that holds its own

thought and breath
even an extra soul

Soon I’ll lie down to sleep
wrap myself in night’s velvet

fold its coverlet
about me
and turn from fading shadows

while I who love light
pencil in hand,
ride a dark omnibus

until dawn

6th draft 7 18 05 elaine starkman

You can find more of her poetry here and here.

3 thoughts on “Elaine Starkman”

  1. IT feels like a older person alone with too much thought in a confined place where there is an option to escape the drudgery if they choose…

Comments are closed.