In an ongoing series, the editors, former contributors, and readers of Eclectica have been invited to write a poem containing four pre-chosen words. The words for this issue are long, west, moon, and news.

If you would like to participate in the next special poetry assignment, the new words are build, ground, hungry, and light..

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(These are excerpts—click on the title to view the whole poem)
 

Seven Degrees This Morning
 
Each year
winter does this to me, buries me in waves
of seamless dismay
 
Judy Kaber

 

Paper Crane
 
the death of society was held softly in the hands of a child
who wanted to turn it into something sweet, some soft art of love
 
Landen Parkin

 

Celestial Bodies
 
school is my god—
an easy exclamation for a girl from a godless home
 
Patricia Haney

 

Short Days Long Nights Cyclical Annual
 
i tell you it has not escaped
me how worship sounds
like warship
 
Erin Kirsh

 

Airport Motel Haibun
 
Planes fly over that never seem to land.
Winds seem to never blow in from the west.
 
David Mathews

 

Turkey Vulture
 
My amore's eyes this evening shine
with glints of the half-risen moon
 
Stephanie L. Harper

 

Badlands
 
We didn't stay at Roy's Motel because money didn't grow on trees.
Nights, my father found a churchyard and slept on the lawn.
 
Antonia Clark

 

The Fallen Caryatids
 
It seems so long
since you left Chicago in darkness and it isn't
even noon
 
Jennifer Finstrom