Plea for an Imaginary Amphibian
Poem - by Gene Twaronite
“but nothing is real/until it can be sold”
--W.S. Merwin, “Journey”
What is the price of the Milky Way?
Think of a number.
Any day now black holes
will be sold like donuts
and dark matter
the ultimate investment opportunity.
Just imagine an alternate universe
that could be yours.
Everything is on the table,
even the things we thought were
non-negotiable.
But can we not keep some creatures
from this marketplace?
Let us keep at least our
imaginary friends and toads.
Gene Twaronite
Trash Picker on Mars, poem, Issue 22, March 1, 2013
Wizards at Heart, poem, Issue 35, June 1, 2016
The Next Big Thing, poem, Issue 43, June 15, 2018
The Persistence of Pheromones, poem, Issue 48, September 2019
The Yellow Snake, poem, Issue 49, December 2020
Future Portrait of Dark Matter, poem, issue 55, June 2021
Plea for an Imaginary Amphibian, poetry, Issue 56/57, Fall/Winter 2021
Gene Twaronite is the author of four collections of poetry as well as the rhyming picture book How to Eat Breakfast. His first poetry book Trash Picker on Mars, published by Kelsay Books, was the winner of the 2017 New Mexico-Arizona Book Award for Arizona poetry. His newest poetry collection Shopping Cart Dreams will be published by Kelsay Books in 2022.
Gene’s poems have been described as: “ranging from edgy to whimsical to inscrutable … playfully haunting and hauntingly playful.”
A former New Englander, Gene now lives in Tucson. Follow more of his poetry at genetwaronite.poet.com
Get to know Gene...
When did you start writing?
Started keeping a journal about fifty years ago, a discipline I’ve not been able to maintain.
When and what and where did you first get published?
Beginning in 1980, I began writing short essays for various regional alternative newspapers and shoppers, and continued doing so as I moved across the country. My first commercial success was in 1987, when my fantasy story “The Glacier That Almost Ate Main Street” was published by Highlights for Children.
What themes do you like to write about?
Humor—especially the absurd kind—invariably creeps into my work, in one way or another. There is a strong element of the absurd in most of the writing. The question of Why are we here? holds a particular fascination.
What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why?
How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work?
I have always been especially drawn to science fiction and fantasy writers who create such convincing worlds that you feel as if you could live in them. They have inspired me to write two novels and dozens of short stories, in which I have tried to do the same. Lately I have found that it is possible to create entire new worlds within my poems. That is my main creative challenge: to create convincing new worlds of thought within my works. And if I can get people to laugh in the process, even better.