Perfect Bound, 68 pages
5½ by 8½ inches, 1991
ISBN# 0-941240-17-7
$8.00
Praise for The Moon Cycle
The variety of interpretations Mihopoulos has invoked to the moon theme is breath taking. I truly enjoyed this book… Anyone with a drop of romance in his or her soul will agree.
Mildred K. Henderson – Hob-Nob Magazine
The presence of the moon in every poem moves beyond mere stage dressing and actually becomes a prime-moving catalyst firmly juxtapositioned by its individual and collective mood… The prose poem, especially, towers in both toughness and tenderness. Drama and meter of great poetry is delicately woven around the strict and straight fibers of prose. Creating what is sure to be hailed the quintessential prose poem: “Blue Moonlight”… The prose poem, in her wise hands, reaches heights rarely found but in the theater of the human soul.
Mark Anthony Rossi, Another Chicago Magazine
The Moon Cycle by Effie Mihopoulos is a poetry book that takes the reader on an endless moon ride; an exciting celestial experience. Normally a poetry book will feature poems on a wide variety of subjects, but only a true poet will write about the moon. Effie writes beyond the moon’s face, she writes inside it – the heart and soul of it. Her images are well worth the read.
Poetic Page- Madison Heights MI
About Effie Mihopoulos
Effie Milhopoulos’ poetry appeared in over 200 small press publications throughout the US, UK and Europe. Efstathia Milhopoulos was born in Chicago, moved to Greece from the age of 10 to 16, and then returned to Chicago. She studied with Ed Dorn at Northeastern Illinois University where she earned her Masters degree in Literature. In 1974 she started Ommation Press which eventually published 40 books. She was involved with Apocalypse Magazine from NEIU and published MATI poetry magazine and Salome a magazine of dance writing and critique. She worked at The Chicago Artist’s Coalition and The Chicago Sun Times. Her poems were featured on Dial-A-Poem programs and made into dramatic productions. She was an arts writer and her articles appeared in Stagebill, The Chicago Reader, Spotlight, Attitude, PerformInk, Small Press Review, Strong Coffee and Letter Ex. Effie died in 2010.
Contents
Lotus
Mercury
I Fly on Words Tonight
Carousel
Athletes
Wonderland
Clown Face
Repeat Performance
Pegasus
Moon Patterns
Auctioneer
Pierrot’s Revenge
Shadowboxing
Tracer
Whispers
Trailing the Moon
Lightweight Burdens
Jumping
New Portrait
Flashes
Favorites: Rank and File
Watching the Moon
Atlantis
I Find Shelter
Distances
Cat’s Cradle
Adolescence
On the Subject of Interviews
And Now Beethoven
St. Vitus’ Dance: Judi’s Story
Shouting
Watching the Moon Grow
The Moon Overhead
Hospitals
Pas de Deux
Pas de Deux II
Pas de Deux III
Pas de Deux IV
Pas de Deux V
Blue Moonlight
Disappearances
Sample Poems
Wonderland
the moon is a crescent shape overhead, a paper cut-out abstract, geometrical, distant and mechanical: the moon is something cool and unapproachable, a reigning queen disdainful of all others in her retinue. how she dazzles all those around her, resplendently, will all her jewels on parade. if only they were paste, so you could have a set made too. bright red construction paper for rubies, blue for turquoise and sapphires, translucent white for pearls: what a splendid selection of diamond tiaras you could make. in the moonlight it almost looks real and oh so effective. count the sparkles in each eye regarding you, all the sparkling gems in each bracelet, set in each florid pin. how the moon dazzles you with its precision, a computer far away and above you, a condescending robot that never pauses to consult you for orders, but keeps proceeding ever onward endlessly, with nowhere real to go.
Distances
the moon feasts on stars tonight
as I watch it
digests them like an overfed cat
chokes
spits them out like olive pits
bullets that cause new wounds
the moon stops moving tonight
doesn’t even whirl itself into circles
like a mad dog twirling round and round
in your absence
it stops telling me the secrets
it has always revealed,
giving me mandates like Pythea
about where and how you were
the moon stops tracing the circumference of stars,
winding its way between them
like a runner in an obstacle course
stands, instead, like a statue,
tired, even, of the least exertion.
stock-still
I contemplate it
the way we used to do
together
it shines like it always has
a pale, cold color
as if nothing has changed
as if you were still wide-eyed
under its halo
I stare at it
an accomplice without a partner
blink once
see how it dissolves
blink twice
see how your image fades also
how the moon continues to shine tonight
for everyone else
like a magic lantern
the light cutting a clear straight line
to everything they have always wanted
but concerning you and me
the moon stops moving tonight
doesn’t dance as it always has
around us.
at the most,
it makes only false starts-
until it stops completely,
a tether ball with no one to set it into motion
crowding the sky as you crowd my memory
the moon goes against the grain tonight
doesn’t follow its regular patterns
beats its path against my pulse:
instead of giving me violin accompaniment
I hear only percussion
without you here to conduct it all
everything falls apart
breaks into a thousand stars
even the moon pauses to rest tonight
trying to find you
and bring you back
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