Jackie Langetieg

CONTACT:
Email: jackieblang77@gmail.com

BIO:
Jackie Langetieg is retired from state government. She is a recovering alcoholic and since giving up the drink has mined all those years as fodder for writing. Memory is still serving her, so you may see a sensual poem or two in her books. She has been involved in literary activities in the Madison area since 1988, was president and treasurer of The Writers’ Place Board of Directors, and involved in the city’s first book fair. Her first writing accomplishment was at the age of eight when she wrote a “newsletter” using a push-letter child’s typewriter. She writes poetry and prose and has been published in many journals and anthologies as well as the WFOP Calendar since 1988 with few exceptions. She has five books of poems and a memoir. She has given birth to two boys, one of whom is deceased. She lives in Verona, Wisconsin, with her son, Eric Alver, a former standup comic, and two cats, Missy and Joey.

PUBLICATIONS:

Snowfall, 37 poems of family in love, loss and living. Ghost Horse Press/Amazon (2021) $15

Letter to My Daughter, 37 poems of love and loss. Ghost Horse Press/Amazon (2019) $15

Filling the Cracks with Gold, a 220 page memoir of “coming of age” stories. Ghost Horse Press/Amazon (2019), $15

A Terrible Tenderness, a 56 page collection woven of dreams and memories. Ghost Horse Press (2013), $10

Confetti in a Silent City, a 66 page collection, Ghost Horse Press (2008), $10

And Just What in Hell is a Stage of Grief? a chapbook of 41 pages. Poems relating to grieving the death of the author’s 33 year old son. It is printed on slick paper and includes color photos. Ghost Horse Press (2008) Limited availability: $25

White Shoulders, a chapbook of conversations between a daughter and her mother, Cross+Roads Press, Editor and publisher, Norbert Blei, (2000) Limited availability: $25

Include $4 S/H for each order

Poetry

I Never Knew

It’s 3 a.m. and I’m sitting in the dark
room lit by a string of rainbow lights
left over from Christmas. I leave them
blinking to emanate the stars||

I never knew I loved the night so
quiet, broken only by furnace sounds
and creaks and groans of timbers
breathing.

I never knew I loved the odor of frying onions
knitting into beef like an argyle scarf—not
seeing the length, but expecting the pattern>

I never knew I loved the feel of wool slipping through
my left hand on the way to my right hand making
a series of knots into-a-chain-into-a-thing of beauty.

I always knew I loved beauty of sky,
rise and set of sun, drama of thunder storms,
a swell of tiny black birds like a school of fish,
swerving and sweeping through an ocean, and

that I loved the ocean suck and crash of waves
running toward the rocky shore like skipping
children chased by foam, giggling and
leaving shell-like footprints in the wet sand,

that I loved shells—the intricate swirls and lines—
each a personality of its own, home for crabs, secret
treasury of nacre and pearly iridescence.

Originally published in Blue Heron Review

Not Even a Bartender
Viewing Half-Past Three (The Poet) by Marc Chagall, 1911

Quarter to three, blank page, new gel pen
waiting for (Godot)
no, a poem to strike my brain so I can write it down.

Three o’clock, peppermint schnapps, Cheetos, blank page
Green with envy of another’s new book
lovely metaphors, twinkling and tinkling glass of ideas

Three-thirty, vodka shooters, cigarette butts, blank page
Cat is questioning behavior, head bumps and purrs
walks away, miffed.

Five-fifteen, wake from stupor nap, mouth terrible, head ouch
scribbles, wet marks, ashes on page, abstract art—poem there?
Coffee, coffee, coffee. Sentence: If only I’d . . .

Six a.m., words flowing from mess on page, Ekphrastic poem.
If only I’d told you I love you
that last time
You wouldn’t be standing me up in my misery
while trying to find you in my mind, transfer
you from my heart
glue you on this page, tell you now.