Poetry: Selections from John Yamrus

 Gwen said

 

her name meant

face of god,

or something like that.

i don’t know

where or how

she got that idea,

but she stuck with it,

right

to the end,

right up

to the time

when she went

face to face with a guy

who swore

his name

meant:

he who devours

ham on rye.

 

 

 

she said

the

only

true language

has

no words...

and,

laying there,

on

that bed,

in

that room,

he

thought

he understood.

John Yamrus’s career spans more than 50 years as a working writer. He has published 35 books (29 volumes of poetry, 2 novels, 3 volumes of non-fiction and a children’s book). He has also had nearly 3,000 poems published in magazines and anthologies around the world. A book of his selected poems was just released in Albania, translated into that language by Fadil Bajraj, who is best known for his translations of Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Bukowski, Ginsberg, Pound and others. A number of Yamrus’s books and poems are taught in college and university courses. His most recent book is Selected Poems: The Directors (Concrete Mist Press)