ILLUMINATION
Upon viewing the painting, Personal Rise,
by artist, Stan Padilla
A woman dreams face up to the universe,
wishes for the return of her ancestors,
hears the murmur of their voices.
Through open windows they spill in,
pour down on her as stars.
The moon in the east window fills her with power,
and her strength increases with earthshine.
Sudden radiance, her heart crystalline.
A whirlwind of ancestors spins her into the air,
gravitational forces pull on her.
Find her-
among a constellation of shiny stones.
This poem was previously published online with other work from the Escritores Del Nuevo Sol Ekphrastic Poetry Workshop.
TRAVELING MY YARD DURING TIMES OF PANDEMIC
Under a lowering sky,
light shifts through tree branches,
pierces deep shade.
A gravid doe under the Blue Oak.
Emergence from amniotic shell,
placenta of plenty, the breath, the bleating,
a coming of life,
spotted, tawny, long-legged.
View from the bough,
a moment of union with doe and fawn.
Beyond these dark days,
my heart fed with divine immunity.
Lara Gularte
Lara Gularte lives and writes in the Sierra Foothills of California and she is El Dorado County Poet Laureate 2021-2023. Her book of poetry, Kissing the Bee, was published by “The Bitter Oleander Press,” in 2018. Her forthcoming book, Fourth World Woman, published by “Finishing Line Press, will be available January 2023. Nominated for several Pushcart Prizes, Gularte has been published in national and international journals and anthologies. Her poetry depicting her Azorean heritage is included in the The Gávea-Brown Book of Portuguese-American Poetry, and in Writers of the Portuguese Diaspora in the United States and Canada. She is affiliated with the Cagarro Colloquium: Azorian Diaspora Writers, at the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI), California State University-Fresno. In 2017 Gularte traveled to Cuba with a delegation of American poets and presented her poetry at the Festival Internacional de Poesia de la Habana. She’s a proud member of the esteemed, “Escritores Del Nuevo Sol.” Gularte is a creative writing instructor for Arts in Corrections at Mule Creek prison.