ONE ART’s Top 10 Most-Read Poets of November 2025
Tag: Daye Phillippo
Two Poems by Daye Phillippo
We shared a secret,
the morning moon
and I, she who has just begun her wane
and I who am further along—waning
is not to be feared, it’s just the journey
toward being made new. Emptied to be
filled, and all, seasons on their wheel.
This morning’s sky, a faded, soft pastel
like the pink umbels of Joe Pye Weed
and the hostas’ lavender flutes, stirring
in the breeze. And out front, the pale
sweet pea blossoms, almost translucent
color of the moon, delicately edged
with lavender on vines that have, by July,
tendrilled to the top of their teepee
and now tumble over themselves, lavish
opulence of blossom and fragrance
in which I’m immersed as I clip flowers
to refresh the vases. Refuge of tendril
and vine where a hummingbird pauses
to rest, refresh herself before flying on.
*
Washing Your Face with a Pink Washcloth
Well, something’s lost, but something’s gained in living every day.
“Both Sides Now” – Joni Mitchell
Washing your face with a pink washcloth
dried on the line is like washing your face
with evening sky. Breathe it in before bed.
Blessed are those who walk to the barn
to secure chickens for the night, witness
a wide sky piled high with gray and white,
pink backdrop that didn’t last, dissolved
the way cotton candy and youth dissolve,
sugar away in the mouth, the way what you
expected this time of life to be is not,
yet, here you are, feet still on the ground,
head still in the clouds, washing your face
with sky and that song about clouds you
learned on piano when you were young,
only song you actually wanted to play.
Tonight you’ll rest your head on a cloud,
soft pillowcase fragrant with wind and
wondering, clouds and years, their colors
and shapes, trajectories, their brighten
and fade, accumulations and dispersals,
flashes and rumblings, just how much
clouds can hold back before the rain falls,
and their longstanding relationship with
wind that drives the storyline, beginning
to end. Stage right, stage left, third wall.
What will it all look like from the other side?
*
Daye Phillippo taught English at Purdue University. Her poems have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and selected by ETS for inclusion in the AP English Exam. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, The Midwest Quarterly, LETTERS, One Art, and many others. She lives and writes in rural Indiana where she hosts a Poetry Hour at her local library. Thunderhead, her first collection, was published by Slant in 2020. Her second collection of poems, Blue Between Owls, was awarded the 2024 Codhill Press Pauline Uchmanowicz Poetry Award and is forthcoming from Codhill Press.
Shadows by Daye Phillippo
Shadows
for Jan
She called to say that the shadow they saw
is esophageal cancer. A life-long smoker,
she’s not surprised, but is shaken. I ask
what I can do. Pray, honey, just pray.
Late February mud and ice, rivulets of snow-melt.
On the way up from the barn last night, coyotes,
high-pitched yip and sing from the back fencerow,
leafless trees inked on the fiery horizon,
the howls growing louder, their shrieking lope
coming closer. It’s breeding season, the males
aggressive, unhinged and one-thing.
In the dark woods, border north of the house
that slopes to the creek, the leafless trees
stand as close as soldiers shoulder-to-shoulder
or the posts of a frontier enclosure. There, a coyote,
dark shape appearing, disappearing
among trees, its narrow hips tucked under,
body low, elongated, a dark shadow, skulking.
*
Daye Phillippo taught English at Purdue University and her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Presence, The Midwest Quarterly, Cider Press Review, One Art, Shenandoah, The Windhover, and many others. She lives and writes in rural Indiana where she hosts a monthly Poetry Hour at her local library. Thunderhead (Slant, 2020) was her debut full-length collection. You may find more of her work on her website: dayephillippo.com
Waxing Gibbous by Daye Phillippo
Waxing Gibbous
We sit around the bonfire, watch the farmer
across the road pull the red auger
to yet another field, tractor growling
as it drags the heavy long-neck, slowly
down the gravel road while we stretch
beside the fire toasting marshmallows
and watching embers, the old sun settling
behind the trees like a fire going dim.
Night coming on. Jupiter rising
on the eastern horizon. Our son tends
the fire, speaks of being a Boy Scout,
but not of the possibility of deployment.
His wife holds the baby, her first bonfire.
All of us eagle eye and warn the three
older children who are, of course, drawn
to the blaze. We listen closely for coyotes
and hear a great horned owl’s lonesome
from the darker darkness of the pines.
The wise old barn cat is a shadow lingering,
edge of our circle, keeping his distance
from owls and unpredictable children
hepped on too much sugar and the thrill
of being outdoors at this hour. Stars
and a waxing gibbous moon, white light
that glows on our grandson’s blond head
and illuminates the water I pour, my cup
to his sippy cup, moonwater, I tell him,
cold and refreshing. Ahhhhhh! we say,
same time, same way after taking a swig.
*
Daye Phillippo taught English at Purdue University and her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Presence, Cider Press Review, Twelve Mile Review, One Art, Shenandoah, The Windhover, and many others. She lives and writes in rural Indiana where she hosts a monthly Poetry Hour at her local library. Thunderhead (Slant, 2020) was her debut full-length collection.
To a Black Locust on the Autumnal Equinox by Daye Phillippo
To a Black Locust on the Autumnal Equinox
Robinia pseudoacacia
This morning the weather is all you-can-trust-me, again,
golden sunlight, blue-sky chill of autumn, and yet
the black locust tree lies broken, one bifurcated trunk
hanging like an arm, useless after a sword fight, the wind
relentless yesterday, dawn to dusk, like someone saying, Turn
your little clock hands back all you want; some things
write time. A tree, for instance, ring upon ring. Destroying it?
No time at all. Black locust, tree I’ve loved, every season.
The twisting ridges of its bark, the deep fissures that reveal
the inner layer, orange wood, sturdy fence posts settlers hewed.
In spring, white, acacia-like blossoms, draping sweet fragrance,
scent like grape soda. Summer’s feathery blue-green leaves
that fold for “sleep” each night, breathes antediluvian. Nesting
for songbirds, woodpeckers. In fall and winter, its crown is inked,
whimsical and Seussian. Sentinel where the drive turns west
toward the house. This time of year I’ve loved that tree most,
its sharp calligraphy and negative space, branches that conceal
nothing and yet, hold mystery. A cardinal’s in and out.
Once, a wood duck. Once, a flock of migrating bluebirds paused
to rest their sapphire wings. Two nights ago, as if it knew
this tree’s fate, the haunting nocturne of a Great Horned Owl.
*
Daye Phillippo taught English at Purdue University and her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Presence, Cider Press Review, Twelve Mile Review, One Art, Shenandoah, The Windhover, and many others. She lives and writes in rural Indiana where she hosts a monthly Poetry Hour at her local library. Thunderhead (Slant, 2020) was her debut full-length collection.
Meanwhile the Moon is Missing by Daye Phillippo
Meanwhile the Moon is Missing
My six-year-old grandson, Sam, has run off with the moon again,
small, white plastic ball, cratered and lit from within that perches
perpetually full on the delicate fingertips of a white plastic hand
on my bookcase’s top shelf—Betty Adcock to A. Van Jordan,
Dickinson halfway between. The shelf is tall and so is Sam,
so the moon is within his grasp which is a metaphor I embrace
as in shoot for the moon! and the cow jumped over and one small step.
His fingertips are hungry for texture, so he rubs the cratered surface
the way phrenologists explored the size and shape of a cranium
to discern character and mental abilities. Tell me about yourself, Moon
his eager fingers seem to say before he puts it down, somewhere
in the house, I suppose, before time to go, but taking with him,
I hope, the delight and wonder of holding the moon in his hands.
*
Daye Phillippo taught English at Purdue University and her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Literary Mama, Shenandoah, Presence, Cider Press Review, The Windhover, and many others. She lives and writes in rural Indiana. Her debut collection of poems, Thunderhead, was published by Slant in 2020.