#coronapoems

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Hi, I’m writing one poem a day, each for a different person in my life. I’m calling these “Corona Poems.”

The word “Corona” has many definitions, one referring to halos around the sun and moon. Another is “the glow around a conductor at high potential.” Also: “a part of the body resembling or likened to a crown;” “the cup-shaped or trumpet-shaped outgrowth at the center of a daffodil or narcissus flower;” and, a web search shows, “a circular chandelier in a church.”

Generally, corona refers to something good, something enlightening — even in better times the Mexican beer in the beautiful clear bottles.

I am scared of the creeping disease that is keeping us indoors. I have asthma and don’t want to test my body against the virus. But these poems are not about sickness. They are an outgrowth of the turning inwards that this moment has created.

I’m a writer who has generally made my living in journalism. But I started out writing poetry and bits of memoir and have been meaning for a long time to get back to that and to the novel that’s been percolating on my desk for nearly two decades. 

Now is the time to tend to this inner glow.

I am composing each poem using a fountain pen dipped in ink, written on beautiful thick paper in a large blank journal my mother gave me as a college graduation gift. I’ve been waiting for decades for the right time to use this journal. There may be cross-outs and imperfections in my scrawled handwriting, and final edits only in the clean “typed” version.

Each poem will be sent directly to the subject and posted on my website allensalkin.com If you prefer your poem not be posted online, I will remove it. You are free to share your poem.

I am also available to write a custom poem for a person you would like to honor with one. I am starting out charging $100 for these, and I will email the poem and later follow up by snail-mailing you the handwritten poem. Write to me and I will you send a brief questionnaire about that person to provide me with details I’ll need.

I am starting this on March 24, 2020.

Sincerely,