Poetic License Horoscope for April 29-May 5

Taurus (April 19-May 18): “We are strong, we are faithful/ we are guardians of a rare thing/ we pay close careful attention/ to the news the morning air brings/ we show great loyalty /to the hard times we've been through.”(The Mountain Goats) Gather everybody up, Taurus, and hang on ‘til your knuckles are white.

Gemini (May 19-June 21): Velcro your feet to the ground and wait for the mail to come. You can hope for be-stickered an, handwritten letters, on time and with stamps marked “Celebrate.” So celebrate!

Cancer (June 22-July 23): Switching from winter clothes to summer clothes reminds me of you, all lacy and bright, all glittered and optimistic. Fold up all the sweaters and throw out bedraggled boots. Keep out only the most flowered scarves.

Leo (July 24-Aug. 23): I fell in love with my wife for her Texas accent, and I am just as in love with her family for the same and other reasons. Notice the speech patterns of daily love. Notice its turns and its terms and its phrases. Memorize every consonance, each elision.

Virgo (Aug. 24-Sept. 23): “Like a jack-in-the-box/ / Like a hundred-thousand cuckoo clocks /From the Oregon corners /To the Iowa corn/ To the rooms with the heat lamps where the snakes get born.” (The Mountain Goats) That’s you. That’s your heart. Love it.

Libra (Sept. 24-Oct. 21): Oh, my dear sweet Libra, you can leave it on the field if you want to, or on the stage, or on the dance floor. Or you can carry it like a locket, like a splinter, like treat.

Scorpio (Oct. 22-Nov. 22): “The cakes were too pretty to eat. Mary and Laura just looked at them. But at last Laura turned hers over, and she nibbled a tiny nibble from underneath, where it wouldn’t show.”( Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little House on the Prairie) Do the opposite of that.

Sagittarius (Nov. 23-Dec. 22): Every city will welcome you, don’t worry. They are all full of students, and poems, and comic book shops that need staffing. They’re waiting with weddings and book parties and lifelong friends, all of them. Go there.

Capricorn (Dec. 23-Jan. 20): If today is a job interview, you are wearing the exactly right thing. Your hair is perfect and smooth. You’re wearing pretty jewelry, but not so much that it jangles. You say just the right things and remember to ask at least one question. You are so very, very hired.

Aquarius (Jan. 21-Feb. 19): Find yourself where you always do, in your to To Do list. Build the future in check boxes, in workouts and rehearsals. Study your math and hope for a more romantic horoscope next week, it’ll come back, I promise.


Pisces (Feb. 20-March 20): See Capricorn. Also: high five!

Aries (March 21-April 18): There’s a little mystery in what you’re looking for—sleuth it out! dust for longing-prints and peer around with a magnifying glass ground especially for wistfulness. Make list of possible suspects and start making calls.

Poetic License Horoscopes is a free syndicated series which appears weekly on such lit blogs as The Serotonin Factory, Critical Mass http://citypaper.net/blogs/criticalmass/2011/02/04/poetic-license-horoscopes-feb-4-10/ and The Legendary http://www.downdirtyword.com/horoscopespage and Apiary http://theapiarycorp.com/ If you are interested in adding the Poetic License Horoscopes to your lit journal / lit blog, please email me at serotoninfactory@gmail.com.

Poetic License Horoscope for April 1-7

Aries (March 21-April 18): It’s been so chilly out, it’s hard to see the little blue flowers, the blooming trees, the armies of narcissi on the median strips. But they’re there, sure as the sky is blue.

Taurus (April 19-May 18): "The eye of the storm is where I operate, I'm surrounded by chaos but I concentrate." (Brother Ali) Everybody’s been dreaming about waves, but in yours, there’s no drowning. Your breath is infallible, and your head always stays above the froth. It’s okay to pick up your feet off the sand.


Gemini (May 19-June 21): “Let me be universally true without having to be egotistically right. Let this piece find the me that I knew little about. Let the reader find the self they always wanted or was scared to know. Let this piece be a mirror that reflects YOU in us and US as kin folk.” (Sherod Smallman, Prayer Before I Write) Pal, you are a faith millionaire, a glittering handful of true verbs. You’re right to drop your defenses. Go you.

Cancer (June 22-July 23): “Every Christmas is better than the Christmas before,” says little Laura Ingalls in By the Shores of Silver Lake. “I guess it must be because I’m growing up.” Like the Christmas sequence in every children’s book series, you are the best part.

Leo (July 24-Aug. 23): “You took matchsticks/ turned them into architecture.”-Anis Mojgani

Virgo (Aug. 24-Sept. 23): “Go on, take everything, take everything, I want you to.” (Hole, Violet) The sky is full of violets, dear, but maybe you can kind of start to trust people to stick around, even after they’ve gotten what they wanted. Isn’t a purple sky reason enough to believe?

Libra (Sept. 24-Oct. 21): How many times can I tell you, you’re a map of constellations, a pre-digital navigation system, a painting in which we can tell time, just by the shadows? One more time? Three?

Scorpio (Oct. 22-Nov. 22): Bon voyage, Big Love sisterwives! May your mission boat take you to more love, Margene. May you finally master hugging, Nikki. May you continue to follow the guidance of radical Mormon lesbians, Barb. May you explore your girl-liking side more, girl-who was-also-Mac-on-Veronica-Mars.

Sagittarius (Nov. 23-Dec. 22): Don’t worry, Liz Lemon, the world will ALWAYS need you, and Aaron Sorkin, and every other bespectacled sweetheart with a pen, every walking-and-talking angel. At least I hope so.

Capricorn (Dec. 23-Jan. 20): If I am judging Apples to Apples, here are some things you should know: 1. Unicorns are trustworthy. 2. My wife will always win unless 3. Someone puts down “Love Letters,” which are almost always the best answer to anything.

Aquarius (Jan. 21-Feb. 19): To the Aquarius who seems to have every adorable social justice job: May you be inundated with the glittering thank you notes of children. May you get paid what you deserve, which is everything. May you have your own Lost-island lighthouse, where you can see the whole life of every good deed.

Pisces (Feb. 20-March 20): Get yourself some lacy presents and write yourself a Valentine like Hannah McDonald, who says this: “Let’s face it, I must be the one for me/ Because I’ve been loving me in some way or other /For 29 years going strong,/ And that’s longer than some folks stay married.”

Poetic License Horoscopes is a free syndicated series which appears weekly on such lit blogs as The Serotonin Factory, Critical Mass and The Legendary  and Apiary If you are interested in adding the Poetic License Horoscopes to your lit journal / lit blog, please email me at serotoninfactory@gmail.com.

Poetic License Horoscope for March 11-17

Pisces (Feb. 20-March 20): Happy birthday to my very favorite Pisces in the Universe, Shanny Jean Maney. In her honor, everyone should please make caramel brownies, watch Jeff Goldblum movies, and fall in love with the periodic table.

Aries (March 21-April 18): Winter is starting to loosen its grip. There’s one tulip leaf outside my window, winning the award for most optimistic. That’s you. And those really are buds on the trees, not just chill-induced hallucinations.

Taurus (April 19-May 18): To the Taurus who broke up with the guy for the right reasons: The walls of your future house are papered with sweet-but-not-too-sweet love poems. Fresh air is fluttering the perfect window treatments. Your well adjusted future children are shining down the steps like liberated angels.

Gemini (May 19-June 21): “There is no more intrepid explorer than a kitten,” says Jules Champfleury at the top of the March page of my 365 Kittens a Year calendar. This week, delve in, bravely and adorably.

Cancer (June 22-July 23):  A Cancer I know writes so beautifully about family. The trick, I think, is to let everyone in the story be human, broken, and perfect, all at the same time. That, and good line breaks.

Leo (July 24-Aug. 23): Your To Do list: Write some new political slogans. Find pictures for all of your music files that don’t have album art. Tolerate that show your wife likes. Get some good rest before a long drive.

Virgo (Aug. 24-Sept. 23): A wise cute boy poet once told me, “Don’t be embarrassed, it’s a dull emotion.” Practice being brazen, even if that brazenness is hidden for now in your pretty little notebooks, in the songs you play too many times, in the poems you carry around in your pocket.

Libra (Sept. 24-Oct. 21): To the Libra newly in love with a pink-haired lady: Well, I hate to have to share you, but I love the sound of her in your voice, the drives you’ll take between each other’s houses, all the music of long distance getting closer and closer. Share it with the other Libras, if you please.

Scorpio (Oct. 22-Nov. 22): Please enjoy this nice paragraph from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House in the Big Woods: “After the sugar snow had gone, spring came. Birds sang in the leafing hazel bushes along the crooked rail fence. The grass grew green again and the woods were full of wild flowers. Buttercups and violets, thimble flowers and tiny starry grassflowers were everywhere.”

Sagittarius (Nov. 23-Dec. 22): “Make me a vessel for anomaly.”(simon iris) Deal out your contradictions like Tarot cards and ask them for their secrets. Sort them like shiny stones or leave them unsorted like a Dutch still life, every season of flowers, all blooming at once.

Capricorn (Dec. 23-Jan. 20): Wish for a million dollars. Wish for world peace and the end of hunger. Wish for more episodes of Firefly. Wish for free love and ice cream. Wish for libraries worth of love poems. Wish anything.

Aquarius (Jan. 21-Feb. 19): “When in doubt, err on the side of the threesome.”—Dan Savage

Poetic License Horoscopes is a free syndicated series which appears weekly on such lit blogs as The Serotonin Factory, Critical Mass and The Legendary  and Apiary If you are interested in adding the Poetic License Horoscopes to your lit journal / lit blog, please email me at serotoninfactory@gmail.com.

Two Nice Paragraphs About Flowers by Laura Ingalls Wilder

I am so excited to be rereading the Little House on the Prairie series. It’s so inspiring, especially to anyone who aspires to write a clear picture of what his or her time period is like.

The juncos are hopping around the back yard, a reassurance that Spring might really be real sometime soon. Here’s more reassurance.

“All around that door green vines were growing out of the grassy bank, and they were full of flowers. Red and blue and purple and rosy-pink and white striped flowers all had their throats wide open as if they were singing glory to the morning. they were morning glories.

Laura went under those singing flowers into the dugout.”—from On The Banks of Plum Creek

(Spoiler alert? Big sister Mary is blind by this next one)

“Here’s the Buffalo wallow now.”

 “I know,” said Mary. They stood a moment, breathing in deeply the perfume of warm violets that came up as thick as honey. The buffalo wallow, perfectly round and set down into the prairie like a dish three of four feet deep, was solidly paved with violets. Thousands, millions, crowded so thickly that they hid their own leaves.”-from Little Town on the Prairie