A Poem for MotherReader & Her 48 Hour Readers

I feel like a slug because I haven’t signed up for MotherReader’s 48 Hour Book Challenge. I recently made it one of my “summer goals” to finish a manuscript of animal mask poems that I began working on in May. I know that according to the calendar summer has not yet officially arrived—but I am going to have my own personal Wild Rose Reader 48 Hour Poetry Writing Challenge this weekend. I have fourteen poems (five old poems and nine new ones) for my collection in final draft form. I’d like to write and polish at least six more poems by Monday. Wish me luck.

I am dedicating a poem that I wrote for my daughter and put in a memory book for her when she graduated from high school in 1998 to Mother Reader and Her 48 Hour Readers. My daughter loved the memory book so much she took it away to college with her.

A BOOK AND A CHAIR
by Elaine Magliaro

A book and a chair
Are nice to share
When the edges of day
Have melted away
Into the night.

A book and a chair
Are nice to share—
Touching and talking,
Reading and rocking
Into the night.