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 wood, receive, trip, and tree.

If you would like to participate in the next special poetry assignment, the new words are reach, mind, shade, and back.

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

What the lumberjack knows

Then, the swing: like lopping off
the wings of a bird. To make a thing
out of a being isn't easy work

Corinna Schulenburg
 

Trip

Fast food crows chew wood near the car, their bodies blacker than tar.
Petunias in baskets seem to float overhead,
their magenta petals fluorescent in the smoke dull sky.

Susan Bloch-Welliver
 

Boundary Rider (from the corrugated tracks of the Australian outback)

Despite his 90 odd years
his mind is as clear as the magpie's trill
plunking the gum trees outside his window.

Barbara De Franceschi
 

distillation

i wonder if he still breathed
the same way near the end
full as the moon in twilight skies

Mala Rai
 

Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve: One Year Later

Those paths are there to be followed just as
these words are, a way deeper in or out.

Jennifer Finstrom