Poems

have been written about frogs—
a horde hopping across a dark
street, headlights spearing

each languid eye—
a fat Buddha humped
on a swamp log bellowing

the essence of loneliness—
so this one, about the frog I
just quartered with the mower,

its life smeared upon the green
grass bold as a Christmas
ribbon, will be brief.

Artist’s Statement

W hen I was in high school, I considered poems chunks of concrete that burdened my backpack and robbed me of time...teachers actually expected me to read them. Find an anthology of Romantic poetry. Take a look a Wordsworth’s Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey. It sits on the page like a brick—a brick that once bruised this poor student.

Yes, I’ve grown to appreciate all poetry, but I truly didn’t yearn for it until my freshman year of college. William Paterson University professor Phillip Cioffari was my Creative Writing I instructor. On the first day of class, he shared with me James Wright’s Small Frogs Killed on the Highway. I was stunned. It was short—easy to comprehend. It was about frogs. It was tangible. I could feel it. I was able to possess it. It inspired me to write my first poem, a poem that reflects my simple mind; yet, a poem that made poetry mine.