Welcome to Pandora's Kitchen

Poet, KidLit writer, and new to Substack. Sharing poems (old and new), stories behind them, and thoughts on writing at 85.

A lot of my friends publish with Substack, so I thought I’d put down my quill, blow out my single candle and join in. I have a new book (poetry) coming out this fall from

Red Hen Press

, and I want to get the word out. But these posts won’t just be about “Pandora’s Kitchen.” They will be mostly about poetry and writing. I thought I’d post some poems not in the new book and chat about them. I also write Middle Grade fiction with a friend of mine who is also in the KidLit business. Our first book together is just out — “A Day At the Beach.” (Clarion). I’m 85, making me one of the older poets and KidLit authors. I have a few thoughts about that too.

Before Pandora’s Kitchen

Before I dive into Pandora’s Kitchen, I wanted to take a look back at some older poems, sharing them on here, and some thoughts on how they came to be. Maybe something in them will strike a chord with you, or even spark a little inspiration of your own.

Airport

Fault

In the airport bar, I tell my mother not to worry.

No one ever tripped and fell into the San Andreas

Fault. But as she dabs at her dry eyes, I remember

those old movies where the earth does open.

There's always one blonde entomologist, four

deceitful explorers and a pilot who's good-looking

but not smart enough to take off his leather jacket

in the jungle.

Still, he and Dr. Cutie Bug are the only ones

who survive the spectacular quake because

they spent their time making plans to go back

to the Mid-West and live near his parents

while the others wanted to steal the gold and ivory

then move to Los Angeles where they would rarely

call their mothers and almost never fly home

and when they did for only a few days at a time.

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As an only and much pampered child, my mother loved it when I came back to the Mid-West. California was another country to her, as exotic as France or Italy and probably more sinful and corrupt. No matter how long my wife and I stayed on our visits, it was never long enough. I set the poem in an airport, though my mother had never flown and never would. I’d seen other grown men and women saying good-bye to their parents, turning away with a mixture of relief and self-reproach. I wanted to handle those feelings with a light touch. I usually leave the grave and weighty to other poets. I started and stopped on this poem half a dozen times until movies came to my rescue again.

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Thanks for reading,

Ron

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Ron Koertge (April 22, 1940) is an American poet and author of young adult fiction. Koertge is currently the Poet Laureate of South Pasadena, California. Koertge's honors include a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, a California Arts Council grant, and inclusion in numerous anthologies. His young-adult fiction has won many awards, including Friends of American Writers Young People’s Literature Award, New York Library’s 100 Best Children’s Books, ALA Best Book, New York Public Library’s Books for the Teen Age, and P.E.N. awards. In 2017, he was awarded a Pushcart Prize.