Dr. Jack Bedell, Louisiana Poet Laureate for 2017—2019.
This August, the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities announced that Dr. Jack Bedell, who directs the creative writing program at Southeastern Louisiana University, would be Louisiana’s poet laureate for 2017–2019. We asked Dr. Bedell for permission to reprint one or two of his poems to accompany this announcement; instead, he graciously sent us the two previously unpublished ones below.
Bulleye
There’s nothing as still
as the gold eyes of frogs
shining in a bulleye’s light,
frozen, giving, waiting
for the gig to pull them
from shallow water.
Their flat stare knows,
past the reeds,
a sun in full glory.
Space, Release
I am teaching my son to throw into space.
He sees motion and color, releases the ball
toward what’s no longer there, always
behind his target no matter how soon
he releases the throw. His feet pat grass
in rhythm, motion and delivery
all good. His eyes, though, won’t drift
beyond now. Strange to know
how much the future presses on his heart,
fourteen years old and so looking forward
to drink or girls or driving, so ready
to haul off toward the open arms
the horizon extends just out of view.
And yet how miserable hard it is
to help him accept the notion of early.
See Dr. Bedell at the Louisiana Book Festival on October 28. louisianabookfestival.org.
