Sue shares a poem for her dad's eulogy, celebrating his life as a physicist, father and patriarch of the family. Here's the written poem with a photo.

A hilarious description and discussion of the wild ride of menopause sparked by Deborah's poem "Hot Flash". We remember what it was like, and how life is good on the other side. The show notes are here, and the written poem is here.

Exasperation with the welling chaos just beneath the surface of our orderly lives animate this pun-filled poem that encapsulates the annoyance of dealing with the persistence of ants. Persist-ants.

Show notes are here, and here is the written version of the poem by Sue

A random prompt led from 'Food Delivery' to the loneliness caused by addiction to biased news and painkillers. We talk about both crises in America and about the narrative poetic form. Show notes with links are here. The print version of the poem with art work is here.

Deborah reads her Tanka Japanese form poem that starts off about one thing and turns to something much darker. A tiny and powerful heroic love story, based on a real story that you can read in our show notes, as well as the written version of her story and the prompt for today.

Sue and Deborah read and chat about poems they've written inspired by art, both about boats, the sea, and life's journeys. An Open Mic participant - Juniper "Beaux" Sanchez shares a beautiful poem and her art work "Story time". We hope you will also get out there, maybe to a local museum, looking for art that inspires you, then send in your work to us. Here are the show notes with links to poems on the page with the art work - particularly worth checking out for this episode, plus more information on stuff mentioned during our conversation!

Ekphrastic poetry is poetry inspired by art. Today, Johanna Ely, poet laureate emerita of Benicia, CA reads and discusses two poems from paintings - "Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Rose" which ends up with a discussion of sensuality and mother godesses to the Virgin Mary, followed by a wander down a back alley in the mysterious tiny town of Locke in the Delta lands of the San Francisco Bay - "Back Alley, Locke, CA. The show notes include links to ideas shared in the chats. See the links to read the poems and see the artwork that inspired them.

'Ars poetica' refers to any poetry or prose that considers the art of poetry, especially poems that step outside of themselves to consider their own genesis and nature. Today, Sue’s poem 'Ocean' describes her creative process, and Deborah’s interleaving of two poems in 'Sanctus' is an example of poems that step outside of themselves. Lnks to ideas mentioned in the episode, as well as the printed works on a page with orignal artwork are in the show notes.