Poetry is “closest to the heart.” Through its symbols, word pictures, intuition, feelings and emotions it is a hint of history, the momentary present and a visionary tool of the future. A poem or a painting is analogous to an iceberg—10% visible, 90% hidden meaning. “The reader provides the narrative.” These poems, with the exception of five or six, were written after 2000. They show my explorations into the arts, love, people I met along the way, my protestations, introspections, and new perspectives I gained after times of change, personal problems and separations from those I love. The poems enabled me to find new strength, to harness my thoughts of years past, to live peaceably in the present and to recognize that a future of dreams and hopes can become reality.

Poetry like song is a tool of unbridled expression. It synthesizes ideas, gives them projection and can lead to change. There are young people who wish to find alternatives that will benefit the world family whether it is politically, socially, through education or inventions, caretaking the world’s resources and people or in the formation of community. …AND THE PEOPLE PRAYED And the sound went out And the echo was heard Brothers and sisters Moms and dads Family All over the world …And the people prayed The Scholar He moved away to eat his replica of a meal 100 years old. I ate my veggie wrap with feta cheese that I’d brought from home. He listened to the baroque orchestra lull the heirloom roses of gardens past. I listened to my IPod. I knew we could never meet. We were centuries apart.

Rachel Wright is an adjunct professor of education in a community college. She is a graduate of Indiana University with a B.S. in Elementary Education and an M.S. in Educational Psychology. She writes poetry, humorous short stories and is working on a history of her community as well as a novel. She has been published in magazines and journals as well as academic publications. She is also an award winning artist. Mother of six, grandmother of five she resides in a small rural community in southern Indiana. She is an advocate of community and "all things natural". In her spare time, she bakes bread, plays the ukulele and piano, paints, writes and travels.