Olga Dugan

Olga Dugan is an educator and poet. Nominated for Best of the Net and Pushcart prizes, her award-winning poems appear in many literary journals and anthologies including Litmosphere, Lived In, Reformed Journal, Spirit Fire Review, Inkwell (formerly Ekstasis), The Write Launch, Relief: A Journal of Art and Faith, The Windhover, ONE ART, Channel (Ireland), Sky Island Journal, Cathexis Northwest Press, The Agape Review, Grand Little Things, Kweli, The Sunlight Press, Ariel Chart, and Poems from Pandemia – An Anthology.

“gentrification,” “toward home,” and “the finery of flowers”

the better-off displace old families
leaving just a remnant behind
neighborhood changes fast
innovative foliage, bolstered lawns
porch, deck, people repaired and not
show it all happening at once

“A Poem for Safe Keeping,” “Convergence,” and “Morning”

because I told you
how the homeless woman
preferred over a stranger’s
offer of food, water, money
just a moment of conversation
to confirm that she exists

“Cancer: A Paean,” “Legacy,” and “The Three Nuns: A Contrapuntal for Voice and Canvas”

Abditive—that’s you,
sneaky sniper, taking us out
more than a hundred types of ways.
A name change per each organ,
tissue, cell you invade…bronchus,
lung, prostate, colon, uterus…
From the shade you surface

“A City Dweller Dwells on Nature,” “A Spirit in the Woods,” and “Of Writing and Flying”

I read somewhere nature doesn’t matter
to city dwellers—not so, did you know
flowers appeared 140 million years ago

Tulips out-valued gold in some places
Orchids draw their nutrients from thin air
and flowers, they really do have powers—

“Autumn Song,” “Wang’s Xiao Flute,” and “London Pieta–July 7, 2005”

the body disabled
is most times a cacophonous suite—
moans, a cry, a groan in fortissimos
mounting fading to and from abrupt
weakness
as misguided antibodies
rhythm forward, injure receptors
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