Jennet Peoples

Jennet was finishing up her Master of Fine Arts degree
from Penn State University when she died in 1998.
Here's an unusually short sample of Jennet's poetry.
She always put a lot of attention into every "line break"
(what the first and last word of every line should be).
A 1996 Academy of American Poets First Prize Winner:

     Leaves

The old man in the wheelchair
leans forward
into the warm sun,
as though he would walk
one last time; and I
lean with him
into the sparrow's sweet
stumbling music,
into the magnolia's shadow
as it lengthens
across the turned
and vibrant leaves
that Maintenance
will come to rake,
rake and burn.

     - Jennet Peoples, 1996

     Jennet X Peoples
     [an acrostic sonnet]

Joining words into lines of life and death,
Esteemed by poets, readers, writers, friends.
Noting moral flaws with mortal breath,
Not bowing down to power's means and ends.

Engaging in the study of a shadow -
The darkness left behind by writer's pens.
Xpressing what we fear and what we know,
Peering through experience's lens.

Enjoying daily discourse with the cats
Or walking with and talking with the birds,
Pleasing mice and men with honest chats,
Loving cows in farms and fairs and herds.

Every word and every creature is her kin,
So lucky are those she chooses to take in.

     -  Mark T. Shirey, Sep 1995

          A Memorial To Jennet Peoples

I feel so lucky to have known Jennet Peoples 
and so grateful to her for the joy and the challenges 
that she brought to the people in this room 
(some of whom knew her much longer than I did), 
and to many others who could not be here today.
Jennet was a dog, and a cat, and a mouse, and a bird.
Jennet was a poem, and Jennet was a book.
She was tough and funny and fragile, 
she was simple and intricate, 
and she was beautiful.
Sometimes her mind had too many puzzles, 
sometimes her brain had the wrong chemicals, 
and her life had too many complexities, sometimes.
Now that she's at peace, 
where all questions are answered or un-asked, 
I hope she will teach us to love the things that she loved, 
to aspire to the things she aspired to, 
and to work as hard as she worked.
She's gone forever, but now she'll always be OK.  
Smile when you think of her.
We are all better people for having known her.  
Thank you, Jennet.

     - Mark T. Shirey, 5 Aug 1998