Larry J. Eriksson
CONTACT:
Larry J. Eriksson
6105 Fairfax Lane
Madison, WI 53718
Email: larry.j.eriksson@gmail.com
Website: www.quartersectionpress.com
BIO:
Larry J. Eriksson is active in the Dickinson Poetry Series at the UU Fellowship of Door County. His poems have appeared in The Capital Times, The Peninsula Pulse, Verse Wisconsin, Equinox, N.E.W. Voices, the Poets’ Calendars of the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets, the chapbooks No Breath is Lost and What Is Hidden published by the Dickinson Poetry Series, and his own poetry chapbooks. For over 30 years, he was a research engineer and manager specializing in acoustics, noise control, and digital signal processing. He is the author of many published technical papers, chapters in two engineering books, two books on sociopolitical issues, and a business history ebook. He received his B.S.E.E. from Northwestern University, his M.S.E.E. from the University of Minnesota, and his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
PUBLICATIONS:
Chapbooks (free downloads available at www.quartersectionpress.com)
Moonlight, Moments, Mysteries, Music, MindGames, Marching, Memories, MoodSwings, Selected Poems, Moving, Magic
Books (information available at www.quartersectionpress.com)
Business Decisions: the impact of corporate mergers and global capitalism on our lives (2002)
Broken Strings, Missing Notes: strengthening democracy and seeking justice in a nation out of tune (2005)
Waves of Silence: Digisonix, active noise control and the digital revolution (2015)
Collected Chapbooks: 2010-2016 (2016)
Word Waves: Poems, Stories, and Essays (2016)
Poetry
The Wars Never Fought
Let’s celebrate...
the wars never fought,
the soldiers never trained,
the battles never held,
the heroes never made.
Let’s celebrate...
the medals never earned,
the wounds never felt,
the lives never lost,
the tears never shed.
Let’s celebrate...
the guns never fired,
the ships never launched,
the planes never built,
the bombs never dropped.
Let’s celebrate...
the speeches never heard,
the parades never marched,
the glory never won,
the statues never built.
Above our mantels,
let’s replace our swords
with retired plowshares.
Published in chapbooks MoodSwings and Selected Poems
String Theory
a dark quiet night
the violin is silent
patiently waiting
the bow awakens
slowly moving back and forth
the music begins
soon going faster
the bow moves from string to string
in clouds of rosin
a blue glow appears
as ions accumulate
and the music builds
now sparks are flying
rivers of color and light
a cascade of stars
the night disappears
lightning arcs across the sky
filling the ether
energy from strings
creating light from darkness
as the bow moves on
sound and light spring forth
pushing the edge of the void
expanding the world
Published in Broken Strings, Missing Notes, The Peninsula Pulse, and chapbooks Moonlight and Selected Poems)