Laurie MacKellar

Alan is not the only poet in the multitalented MacKellar family. Here is an Easter poem from his daughter, Laurie, who serves as Librarian at the Elizabethtown Community and Technical College. Laurie MacKellar is a brilliant musician who plays violin with Foggy Dew, a hammer dulcimer group.

One of the joys Facebook has brought me has been the opportunity to get to know Laurie better.

She is participating in the National Poetry Month poem-a-day challenge and this poem is one of the results. I love its language play

Poem for Holy Saturday

It is time
to order the thyme
to border the path
to the door. It is time
to shop – catalogs popping
from mailboxes, sending
wood pulp photo shoots
up through fast food coupons;
poking past ads are corners of covers
covered in cosmos, roses,
butterfly bushes
burning bushes
and the glorious gold
of florescent forsythia
bursting forth
with the force of breaking doors,
the pages bright, reflecting the light
on kaolin surfaces. It is Holy
Saturday, Christ
is not yet risen but already
he has broken the bars,
shattered the gates,
and has in hand
Adam’s hand, leading him
up to the earth’s surface
followed by Eve
Abraham, Isaac and John. And I
cannot decide
between the dogwood and redbud;
I need bleeding hearts
for the part-sun spaces.
Some people grow grapes.
Grapes have grown
in popularity. I’d like to grow
roses, but I’m afraid
of the thorns

— Laurie MacKellar, featured by permission of the author

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Poetry lover becomes shoestring publisher