Meet MARIE TOLLSTRUP originally from Wisconsin

Marie Tollstrup hails from Phlox, Wisconsin. At fourteen, she joined a convent and taught as a nun for ten years in the Chicago area. When she left the order, she continued teaching for 29 years in Long Beach, CA, specializing in Creative Writing, where she advised a national award winning literary/art magazine, Stylus, for 23 years. Now in retirement, she manipulates words in poetry and prose, entering contests, and to her joy wins recognition as a writer and poet. Currently, she is the contest clerk for Redrock Writer’s national Chaparral Poetry Contest and is a member of UTSPS's Dixie Poets in St. George. 

Black Swan

Obsidian as midnight,

procrastination lifts

its feathered head

and stares me down.

Cowering, I bow my head.

Stories, poems, novels

never birthed in light,

glide as ghost-witnesses.

My own twin swans

compete for dominance

my luminous self

over-shadowed by ebony.

Hollow emptiness rules.

Segmented time sifts

through my fingers.

My divided-self defers.

Faust’s two souls jostled.

Bismarck’s crowd quarreled.

Victor Hugo wrote naked,

clothes hidden by his valet.

Lifting radiant plumage,

my shy white swan,

heeding extended will,

subdues my sable beast.

Meet GARY CHRISTIAN-Dixie Poet Pioneer

Gary Christian, originally from Raymond, Alberta, Canada, is a retired attorney who practiced law forty years in Salt Lake City but now spends most of his time knee-deep in poetry. He along with LaVerna Johnson and others developed the Redrock Writers Seminar back in 1997 at Tuachan as well as the Chaparral Poetry Contest and Poetry in the Park now in its 7th year at Zion Park. Presently he serves as secretary of Dixie Poets, a Chapter of Utah State Poetry Society in St. George, and writes to his heart’s content. 

Train to Sunrise  

Evening spreads its stillness

on the prairie. Shadows roost

upon the ledges of the night

when it is ten o’clock.

The moon hangs heavy in the sky,

light spurts along the railroad tracks

in silver streaks

to guide the evening train.

Its wail laments a lonely passage

through the hours.

Its flaring beam burns holes

into the darkness.

It calls me from

the soft embrace of slumber

but will not wait and goes alone

into the empty gloom.

D. Gary Christian 

Meet JOYCE KOHLER from Heber, Utah

Joyce Webb Kohler grew up in the Southwest but has called Utah home for the last forty-five years and is in love with its mountains.  She and her husband Dale live in Midway where they see mountains no matter which direction they look, and that suits them just fine.  Joyce became involved in UTSPS at the invitation of her friend and mentor, the late Helen Beaman, an association which forever changed her life. Joyce was awarded UTSPS's Utah Poet of the Year award 2014 for her prize winning collection of original poetry entitled: Like Water, Like Bread. Contact her if you are interested in forming a chapter of UTSPS in the Heber-Park City area.

Love Interest by Joyce Kohler

I will be Ginger if you will be Fred,
Or you Valentino and me some red head.
Let's pretend I am the Queen of the Nile
and you are Marc Anthony just for a while.

With you playing Bogie and me as Bacall,
I'd teach you to whistle.  You'd give me a call.
Cast me as Hepburn and cast you as Tracy.
We could have fun, but nothing too racy.

I will play Hedy if you will play Bing.
Hope you don't mind if I ask you to sing.
But in reality, I would just settle
with you down on the farm—Ma and Pa Kettle.