Monday's Poem © Barbara Pelman In It Again                                      Morning. Drag sleep from my bones, creak to the shower, fumble with faucets, each step longing to return to bed. But the day must begin, and I in it. What alternatives? A headstone on a forgotten hill, my name crossed out of phone books, an estate sale of unmarked boxes. In the mirror: dark eyes, energetic curls, skin in need of ironing. On the breakfast table: a porcelain plate, linen napkin, the coffeemaker half-filled. I open the front door let the day unravel the long scarf of details to a small knot; tuck the silence into a back pocket for lunch.

Barbara Pelman teaches English at Reynolds Secondary School in Victoria and convinces her students that there's nothing better than to love poetry. She has brought poets to the school through the series "On the Road," reads to her classes, and writes poetry when she is not marking papers. She has three chapbooks and a number of poems published in Event, Dalhousie Review, and Iambs & Trochees. She has been a featured reader at Mocambo and is a regular at the Open Mike. She is particularly interested in the resurgence of form poetry and plans to be in the vanguard of its return. Barbara won first prize inthe Federation of B.C. Writer's Poetry contest 2003, and was a finalist in the Mocambopo Poetry Contest in 2004.