Wendy Mnookin

Anthologies are a good way to read poems with different styles and concerns about a subject that interests you. Here is some information about anthologies that contain my poems.

ROUGH PLACES PLAIN: POEMS OF THE MOUNTAINS, edited by Margot Wizansky. Salt Marsh Pottery Press, 2005. Includes my poems "Stone" and "Grand Canyon."

MERCY OF TIDES: POEMS FOR A BEACH HOUSE, edited by Margot Wizansky. Salt Marsh Pottery Press, 2003. Includes my poem "Summer Rental."

PROPOSING ON THE BROOKLYN BRIDGE: POEMS ABOUT MARRIAGE, edited by Ginny Lowe Connors. Grayson Books, 2003. Includes my poem "Country Music."

ESSENTIAL LOVE: POEMS ABOUT MOTHERS AND FATHERS, DAUGHTERS AND SONS, edited by Ginny Lowe Connors. Grayson Books, 2000. Includes my poems "Spring Training" and "Water Walk."

URBAN NATURE: POEMS ABOUT WILDLIFE IN THE CITY, edited by Laure-Anne Bosselaar. Milkweed Editions, 2000. Includes my poem "Signs."

BOOMER GIRLS: POEMS BY WOMEN FROM THE BABY BOOM GENERATION, edited by Pamela Gemin and Paula Sergi. University of Iowa Press, 1999. Includes my poems "Naming" and "Polio Summer."

ARTHURIAN LITERATURE BY WOMEN, edited by Alan Lupack and Barbara Tepa Lupack. Garland Publishing, 1999. Includes five of my Guenever poems.

MODERN ARTHURIAN LITERATURE: AN ANTHOLOGY OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN ARTHURIANA FROM THE RENAISSANCE TO THE PRESENT, edited by Alan Lupack. Garland Publishing, 1992. Includes my poem "Guenever Speaks."

"Naming"

born at the end
of the Second World War

I was not named
for a great-aunt in Russia

or a grandmother
baking challan in Brooklyn

but for Peter Pan's
Wendy Darling

who flew away
to Neverland

by thinking only lovely
wonderful thoughts

"Signs"

Spring, and all over town
signs appear
on trees, on telephone poles,
written by hand, or in 14-point bold font.
LOST! 4-YEAR-OLD LAB!
HAVE YOU SEEN OUR SPANIEL?
And the pictures, grainy, off-center,
with tear-off strips at the bottom,
phone numbers kneeling.

I want to round up all the missing
from the woods behind O'Donnell's Store,
the boarded-up buildings on E Street,
wherever it is they go.
And why have they abandoned
their rugs, their bowls?

FOUND:
YOUNG BEAGLE, MALE. PLEASE CALL--

Sometimes it happens
that way.