A Bit About Me...
I live in New York City and Long Beach, Long Island with my husband
Alfred and doggie Sweetie-Pie. I began writing and studying poetry in my
golden years, the 92nd Street Y and West Side Y favorites of mine for
workshops and readings; also, I've studied privately with some fine
New York (and elsewhere) poets. To learn more about what I've been
up to, poetically speaking, that is, "Google" me and visit websites:
www.pw.org/content/ruth_sabath_rosenthal
www.poetryvlog.com/ruthsabathrosenthal.html
to see and hear me read some of my poems
Those poems I read on "poetryvlog" have also been published in various
literary journals and poetry anthologies. Here is a list of publications
my poems have appreard in:
Adagio Verse Quarterly; The Aurorean; Bibliotekos;
Birds by My Window; Birmingham Poetry Review;
Breadcrumb Scabs; Canopic Jar, Chronogram; Connectitut Review;
Creations Magazine; Cyclamens & Swords; Ibbetson Street;
Jabberwock Review; Juke Jar; Message in a Bottle (U.K.);
Mobius-The Poetry Magazine; MungBeing Magacine; Pacific Review;
Podium-92nd St.Y; Poetica; Poetry Bay; Poetry Depth Quarterly;
Quill & Parchment; Dawntreader (U.K.); Sarasvati (U.K.);
Taj Mahal Review (India); The Human Genre Project (U.K.);
Vallum (Canada)
And Again Last Night (Indigo Dreams Press, 2009) (U.K.)
Empty Shoes (Popcorn Press, 2009)
Harvest of New Millennium (Cyberwit.com, 2009) (India)
Home (Eden Waters Press, 2008)
Long Island Sounds (The North Sea Poetry Scene, 2008, 2009)
Mizmor L'David Anthology: Volume I--Holocaust (Poetica Press, 2010)
Pain and Memory (Editions Bibliotekos, Inc., 2009)
primal sanities--a Tribute to Walt Whitman (Allbook Books, 2008)
Songs of Seasoned Women (Quadrasoul Press, Inc., 2007)
The Book of Ten (Zebra Press, 2009) (U.K.)
Voices Israel 2007, 2008, 2009
in the early part of 2010, Finishing Line Press will publish my
manuscript titled: "Facing Home"
Full-Length Book
(titled to be decided) will be also be published in 2010 by
Indigo Dreams Publishing, Inc.
Several of my poems have made "commendation" lists in contests:
poems "Slipping into Red," "Transition," and "On Divining Sanctuary"
in Winning Writers' Margaret Reid Poetry Contest for Traditional Verse,
2008, 2009; and poem, "My Life--the Reel Story," in Winning Writers'
Tom Howard Poery Contest, 2007.
On October 15th (my actual day of birth) 2006, "on yet another birthday"
was nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Ibbetson Street. On November 26th,
2006 in Davis Square, Somerville MA, the Ibbetson Street/Pushcart nominees
read their poems.
My good friend (ex-poetry teacher), Sarah Hannah (a nominee herself)
read my nominated poem, in my absence -- one of the many kindnesses
she'd shown me over the years. Just 6 months after that reading, precisely
on May 23, 2007, Sarah took her own life. The following is a poem
My friend, mine is a beating heart,
a poem bursting to come forth; yours
has stopped. No writer's block
induced dormancy. Stopped for good.
Oh, that yours would still beat out poems.
No matter how dark, we'd listen,
we'd learn, we'd understand and maybe
a Sonnet with its turn moving to depths
of utter bleakness, assonance resounding
in the second stanza. No resolution fit
syllabic runs, each iambic line
symbolic unto itself, each stanza break
a whip crack, a heart breaking.
A Villanelle, whose repeating end-
rhymed lines bleed their way down
to a finale punctuated by a question
Sestina of razor-sharp repetition
echoing the i in cry—lament that pierces
through stanza upon stanza, until
reaching biblical heights of irony.
Oh, that we'd hear more from you. No
matter how dark the sound, we'd listen,
we'd learn, we'd understand and maybe
