Reflection

The term "outsider art" bothers me. This term is often used to classify art that is not mainstream. Who determines what is in or what is out? I love artists who live on the edge, the fringe, who use non-traditional materials—old buttons, discarded eyeglasses, stuff most people throw away, and artists who make us see the world upside down or slantwise. The processes of these so-called outsider artists influence my work. I am a scavenger poet, rummaging through art, science, and everyday stuff that happens. I salvage old love letters, leftover dreams, rusty pots, and pans to make poems with missing parts. My poems are night passengers, zookeepers, bullets. Give me a wishbone. I will set the house on fire.

Elizabeth Bishop:
No Longer Still

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Her Apples

Newtonic
fall into rivers
revert to
seeds
nymphs
fish scales
            find their way
                        where they glow
                        like rhinestones
                        vertiginous
                        change partners spin out of genesis
                        a version of God giddy
                        quick to turn
                        absence green

JoAnna Scandiffia is a gemologist living in San Francisco. Her poems are like bird nests, made with fragments randomly connected to hold the moment. She is like the old medieval monks who copied out verses in colored inks so the world could sing forever. Her work has appeared in Calyx, The Poeming Pigeon, Poets 11, Sugared Water, The MacGuffin, Italian Americana, and other journals.