The Chrysalis Project seeks poems for an anthology about caregiving for any form of dementia. Simultaneous submissions and previously published works accepted as long as the writer holds rights. Submit up to 3 poems/5 pages of poetry.
The Chrysalis Project seeks poems for an anthology about caregiving for any form of dementia. Caregiving can be paid or unpaid, full time or part time, hands-on or long distance, physical or emotional support. As the population continues to age, more and more of us will find ourselves caregiving or receiving care. Tell the world, what they don’t know--yet. Caregiving is a transformative experience and we look for work that reflects the full range, whether loving, trying-to-be-loving-but-not-succeeding, joyful, grief-stricken, guilt-ridden, expert, incompetent, tragic, comic, exhausting, irritating, frustrating, enlightening, depleting, elevating, rewarding. As this anthology is about caregiving, it should be present in the poem, either explicitly or implicitly.
Deadline: September 30. For complete guidelines, visit https://chrysalispoem.wixsite.com/mysite.
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sorry to miss your deadline. I'd like to submit a poem previously published in Chest
Driving for Alzheimer’s
Every Thursday I take my father for a ride.
View more“I’m lovin’ it,” he says,
as we zoom down the interstate.
“I’ve never seen such a stretch of woods,” he says,
“mile after mile and not even a house.”
I resist telling him they don’t build houses
along limited-access
sorry to miss your deadline. I'd like to submit a poem previously published in Chest
Driving for Alzheimer’s
Every Thursday I take my father for a ride.
“I’m lovin’ it,” he says,
as we zoom down the interstate.
“I’ve never seen such a stretch of woods,” he says,
“mile after mile and not even a house.”
I resist telling him they don’t build houses
along limited-access highways.
The trees wave and slap high fives at our wake
like well-wishers along a marathon route.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been
on this stretch of road before,” he says,
though we’re only a few miles from home.
I imagine driving him nonstop
cross country, just to hear the child’s delight
in his eighty-seven-year-old voice.
The “oh my Gods” as we speed
through the flatlands of Kansas;
both of us hanging onto the immediacy
of wind tunneling through wheat fields.
Or the “I’ve never, ever seen anything like this”
as we skirt the sculptured glory
of Monument Valley.
And what would he think of the flat,
dry deserts of western Texas,
or the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
I’m certain the Grand Canyon would be
the biggest ditch he “ever, ever” saw,
everything witnessed with
the same unbridled hedge against cynicism.
Perhaps I’ll get sponsors to pledge
View lessso many cents per mile to finance the trip.
We could raise awareness of Alzheimer’s,
and he’d love the ride, at least until
he started missing the familiar world
he’s inhabited for the last fifty years,
pining for a night in his favorite easy chair,
covered in blankets to ward off the slightest summer breeze.
But it would be worth it, just to hear
him each day, repeating over and over,
“Gee Bill, I’m really lovin’ this!”