Elsie Pankowski

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" height=95 BGCOLOR="#CC99CC" TEXT="#080000" background="006265f1ezuady.png"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Times New Roman" ><B>FootHills 2012</B></FONT><B>  </B><B> </B><B>|   </B><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="FootHills 2012"><U><B>home</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="FootHills 2012"><U>FootHills 2012</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id13.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Books 2012"><U>Books 2012</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id14.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="FHP Poets Alphabetically"><U>FHP Poets Alphabetically</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id35.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Tom Jones"><U>Tom Jones</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id36.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Mary Jackson"><U>Mary Jackson</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id37.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Rick Kearns"><U>Rick Kearns</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id39.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="ElvridgeThomas"><U>Elvridge-Thomas</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id40.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Edward Dougherty"><U>Edward Dougherty</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id41.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Lynn Ciesielski"><U>Lynn Ciesielski</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id42.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Dexter Roberts"><U>Dexter Roberts</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id43.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Grant Clauser"><U>Grant Clauser</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id44.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Libertys Vigil"><U>Liberty's Vigil</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id45.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Robin Linn"><U>Robin Linn</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id46.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="W. 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Her welcoming is one of clear vision with a fine ear for the music through language that real poetry becomes. In her sonnet, Light and Dark, she states, “We set off upon our course despite / the certainty that in the end we part.” True, but also in the end, beautifully written poems as in <I>Their Voices Call in the Dark</I> will make for us connections that will last a lifetime and lifetimes more.     </div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> John Holbrook, author of <I>A Clear Blue Sky in Royal Oak</I></div> <bR> <div> Elsie Pankowski's work is full of sudden surprises and deep insight. </div> <div> Not only does she pay careful attention to the smallest things</div> <div> but when she springs a remark at you it makes you sit up in your chair and grin. </div> <div> She's a quality poet who takes a serious look at the ways of the world, </div> <div> so essential to the mind of the poet and the ear of the reader together. Who else can say,</div> <div>              <I>“Those technicolor hours when time was a vehicle to ride.”</I></div> <div> She knows the land, by hand. She knows the horses and the barns and rivers, </div> <div> the endless exhausting work, the chicken coops and grandmother's shed, </div> <div> dusty haylofts, pigeons stirring in the cupola.</div> <div> She doesn't miss a thing. Her sharp eye and considerable experience inform us of her landscape</div> <div> in a voice sure and true. <I>Put a woman in gloomy rooms</I></div> <div> <I>                                             in a prairie town, </I><I>she says, </I><I>make the wind wail a blue ballad.</I></div> <div> There's a gun case in her drawer. A mute phone she watches, and she spends</div> <div>                                                                               <I> the</I><I> </I><I>dragged-out night</I></div> <div> <I>                                                                              wide-eyed in a snarl of sheets,</I></div> <div> <I>                                                                                reliving her mistakes.</I></div> <div> She puts me there. She brings me into the landscape she so unerringly portrays</div> <div> and not an extra word in it. </div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> Sheryl Noethe, Poet Laureate of Montana</div> <bR> <div> From the book:</div> <bR> <div> <B>HOLDING BACK THE DARK</B></div> <bR> <div> My mother bakes bread</div> <div> in the kitchen. Where a breeze</div> <div> stirs daisy curtains at the sink,</div> <div> she washes spoons and bowls</div> <div> and sends me to the cellar</div> <div> for potatoes from the bin.</div> <div> My bare feet track wooden steps</div> <div> down to damp earth floor.</div> <div> In weak light, I sort through</div> <div> leathery lumps, breaking away</div> <div> white-worm sprouts.</div> <bR> <div> Beneath my toes, a salamander,</div> <div> dragon of my dreams, moves</div> <div> and scurries off beneath a shelf</div> <div> of canned pears. I run to tell</div> <div> about the beast that lives below:</div> <div> dragon without fire, creature</div> <div> of the dark. My mother listens,</div> <div> window sunlight glowing on her hair,</div> <div> the aroma of warm bread circling</div> <div> around her, then slays the dragon</div> <div> with her smile.</div> <bR> <div> <B>AFTERWARD</B></div> <bR> <div> Sometimes I'm sure you're here</div> <div> and, if I turn fast enough, I might</div> <div> catch sight of you. </div> <bR> <div> The phone rings. I still expect you </div> <div> on the other end, wanting warmth </div> <div> like a traveler wandering in the cold.  </div> <bR> <div> My hands slip into the familiar shape</div> <div> of your leather gloves and your</div> <div> presence fills me, joins me.</div> <bR> <div> In my recurring dream, you have</div> <div> stepped out on a shaky wire stretched </div> <div> across a chasm. I call out: </div> <div> <I>Don't do this...don't do this...</I></div> <div> but you always fall.</div> <bR> <bR> <div> Elsie Pankowski lives in Great Falls, MT and has been a telephone operator and a partner in an excavating company. She is a five-time First Place winner of the Mary Brennan Clapp Memorial Poetry Contest, open to all Montana poets. She has produced two chapbooks: a <I>Sunrust Featured Poet Chapbook</I> and <I>Gathering Stones</I>, published by Pudding House Publications. Her poetry and short prose have appeared in several hundred publications.</div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>Their Voices Call in the Dark</B></div> <div> <B>is an 80 page hand-sewn paperbook with spine - $16.00. </B></div> <bR> <div> TO ORDER:</div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id11.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Ordering By Mail"><U>To order through mail click here.</U></A>     </div> <bR> <div> ON-LINE          <A HREF="id11.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Ordering By Mail"><U> </U></A>                              </div> <bR> <div> From the US      <B> <form target="paypal" action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post"> <input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/sc-but-01.gif" border="0" name="submit" alt="Make payments with PayPal - it's fast, free and secure!"> <input type="hidden" name="add" value="1"> <input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_cart"> <input type="hidden" name="business" value="fhp@foothillspublishing.com"> <input type="hidden" name="item_name" value="Their Voices Call in the Dark"> <input type="hidden" name="item_number" value="12-10"> <input type="hidden" name="no_note" value="1"> <input type="hidden" name="amount" value="16.00"> <input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD"> </form>  </B></div> <bR> <div> From Canada      <B> <form target="paypal" action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post"> <input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/sc-but-01.gif" border="0" name="submit" alt="Make payments with PayPal - it's fast, free and secure!"> <input type="hidden" name="add" value="1"> <input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_cart"> <input type="hidden" name="business" value="fhp@foothillspublishing.com"> <input type="hidden" name="item_name" value="Their Voices Call in the Dark"> <input type="hidden" name="item_number" value="12-10"> <input type="hidden" name="amount" value="16.00"> <input type="hidden" name="shipping" value="2.75"> <input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD"> </form>  </B></div> <bR> <div> From Other Countries           <B> <form target="paypal" action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post"> <input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/sc-but-01.gif" border="0" name="submit" alt="Make payments with PayPal - it's fast, free and secure!"> <input type="hidden" name="add" value="1"> <input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_cart"> <input type="hidden" name="business" value="fhp@foothillspublishing.com"> <input type="hidden" name="item_name" value="Their Voices Call in the Dark"> <input type="hidden" name="item_number" value="12-10"> <input type="hidden" name="amount" value="16.00"> <input type="hidden" name="shipping" value="5.00"> <input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD"> </form>  </B></div> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>