Here’s the third in my “Poetry for All” series of video poetry prompts. This one features “Desire, Like a Hungry Lion” by Dorothy Trogdon from her collection Tall Woman Looking (Blue Begonia Press).
Prompt 3: Desire
Desire, Like a Hungry Lion
For RB
A hungry lion is loose in the streets of May.
How difficult it is for you to know what you require
at any passage of your life
yet something sees and knows and waits
until you open your door and go forward to meet it,
to offer what has been taking shape within you.
Hold out the tempting crumbs in the palm of your hand
and quietly wait until you feel the touch of the velvet muzzle.
Look well at the fur and claw of wildness, your brother.
The stars need darkness or you would not know them.
—Dorothy Trogdon
You can hear Dorothy Trogdon reading her poem at KUOW.org.
Feel free to share this, and I hope you’ll leave me a comment to tell me know how it goes.
Poem credits:
Dorothy Trogdon, “Desire, Like a Hungry Lion” from Tall Woman Looking. Copyright © 2012 by Dorothy Trogdon. Used with the permission of the author and Blue Begonia Press.
My thanks to the featured poets for permission to use their poems, and to Sheila Farr and John Helde for essential technical help.