daretocareforahare

DARE TO CARE FOR A HARE

Poetry Contest to Benefit H

Out of over one hundred poems submitted from all around the globe, including Canada and Singapore, the judges, poets C J Sage and J P Dancing Bear, have chosen Kip Colegrove’s poem, The House Rabbit, as FIRST PLACE WINNER!

C. J. Sage edits The National Poetry Review. Her poems have appeared in The Threepenny Review, Verse Daily, Smartish Pace, Weber Studies, Chautauqua Literary Journal, and other magazines. She is author of And We the Creatures: Fifty-One Contemporary American Poets on Animal Rights and Appreciation.

J. P. Dancing Bear lives in Northern California. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in hundreds of publications including Shenandoah, Mississippi Review, Cimarron Review, Poetry East, North American Review, Atlanta Review and others. He is a founding editor of Disquieting Muses and was the Editor-in-Chief of Disquieting Muses/DMQ Review for five years. He is now the editor of The American Poetry Journal. Bear is the owner of Dream Horse Press.

Kip and his wife Julie Fisher are both Episcopal clerics residing in Nebraska City, Nebraska. They have three rabbits: Bridgit, a seven-year-old Dutch mix, who was the inspiration for this poem; Tucker, a four-year-old American Fuzzy lop; and Roo, an eight-year-old Flemish Giant. They are House Rabbit Society members, but the nearest chapter to them is the Kansas City, Missouri where they visit as often as possible. Kip and Julie say, "We just love rabbits. I don't know why. We just do."

Kip has requested that his portion of the contest proceeds generated by the sale of the

broadside be donated to HRS National Headquarters to be distributed to the areas in most

need of funds for saving rabbits. He has also generously donated his $250 prize money

to the Missouri House Rabbit Society.

If you would like to order Kip's poem, all proceeds help support House Rabbit Society

This beautiful handmade letterpress broadside (suitable for framing), can be ordered by sending $15.17 which includes tax for California residents, or $13.95 for out-of-state residents, to Speed Bump Press, 48 Avon Road, Berkeley CA 94707. Include your name and complete mailing information. [does this include shipping to any US location? what about cost of packaging/cardboard/mailing tubes?] International residents please inquire about shipping.

Jack Rabbit in Winter

by Jodie Appell

Though I wait for him on the cold hillside,

he does not appear. Rain trails down

my legs as I scan the brush for a glimpse

of fur. In late winter, so may things

go into hiding. I look skyward, hoping

for an opening in the gray cloak above me.

Maybe wherever a wild hare goes is where

one's spirit goes when in need of shelter.

I imagine them together in a warm burrow.

They talk of spring, when they will leap

through tall grass, unassailed by storms,

danger or indecision, racing down

to the shore to watch boats meander,

weightless on the bay.

But now it is all icy stillness.

Though I've left walnuts and oats, I can't

even find his tracks in the soaked earth.

If he would just show me a sign

that he is alive, with his great legs,

his noble ears that can probably

hear me now, looking for him.

Something moves. A sound, slight as petals

brushed by the wind. Someone slips

into my small realm, a creature who knows

his way, certain of his step.

I can't see him but I know he's there.

I stand in the rain, in this place we now share.

We are safe here, on winter's ground,

each of us listening for the other's presence.

And that is enough.

The House Rabbit

by Kip Colegrove

We do not need to go to Mars,

or sift for gold in our imaginations:

the Others we anticipate are here,

the aliens we have wished to welcome

and wondered if our hearth were wide enough.

This rabbit, for example, in the hallway,

her eyes so like and unlike ours,

deep and wide and dark as late creation

desperate to gather back its light:

we recognize a constellation we would name.

But in those depths, beyond our nomenclature,

the living spark of hopeful wariness

that makes us us and others them

exfoliates the invitation:

I've come to your world; come to mine.

We cannot storm creation with our words

and hope to leave a happy residue.

The Other has its own requirements,

its own affections, needs and challenges,

and we are neighbors only by compassion.

The Rabbit and the Frogs

by Judith Goldhaber

The Rabbit was an apprehensive fellow,

living in a constant state of manic

depression; his own shadow made him panic,

the scent of foxes turned his legs to Jell-O,

and if he chanced to hear a bull moose bellow

his body trembled with a shock galvanic.

The power of his fear was so volcanic

even his closest buddies called him yellow.

Crouched in the reeds along the riverside

the Rabbit contemplated suicide,

but when he plunged into the swirling tide

a troop of green frogs scuttled off, bug-eyed

with terror. As his chest puffed up with pride,

the Rabbit thought, "I'll live with dignity

now that I know that someone's scared of me!"