The Penumbra Press Selection Process

For the second year in a row, our team has been fortunate enough to receive a plethora of compelling, captivating, and carefully crafted works. Rather than coming to a quick and unanimous decision, we had many exciting contenders for publication. The viability and print-ability of these submissions cannot be understated. Yet, we could only publish two this year, a decision that spurred on many spirited discussions about theme, tone, mood, structure, and imagery. This exciting process is one of the things we enjoy most about Penumbra and we are thankful to have had such amazing content made available to us. The poets we have selected are true stars of their craft and their poems have earned the respect and admiration of the Penumbra staff. We are delighted to present their works in the second edition of Penumbra Press.

Right away, the Penumbra Press staff was captivated by Carolina’s visceral chapbook, Extraordinary Beast. The chapbook captures love in all of its forms with each poem feeling like a different intimate conversation between lovers. Extraordinary Beast is a poetic experience that captures the essence of love’s ethereal quality. It is a chapbook that is sure to captivate readers from beginning to end.

In addition to being thorough in our selection, we wanted to be sure to curate a beautiful cover that would convey powerful images and emotions. After considerable time and careful consideration, we selected Jewel Rodriguez, an art student at Stanislaus State, to create Carolina’s cover. We felt that the message of the author was highlighted by the artist’s creation. With the inclusion of the incredible cover artwork, Extraordinary Beast is an example of the beauty in artistic collaboration. We hope you enjoy Carolina Gonzalez’s Extraordinary Beast.

Table of Contents

001 Tajinaste* Honey - 9

002 Insane - 11

003 The Flutes Are Playing - 12

004 Dreams That Save - 13

005 Bruises - 14

006 It Hurts - 15

007 Heatwave - 16

008 Lemon Pie - 18

009 Emerald Sea- 20

0010 Because I Ask You - 21

0011 Gift - 22

0012 Drops of Light - 24

0013 Tigress - 25

0014 The Nest - 26

0015 Black Train - 28

0016 Destiny - 29

0017 One Year Ago - 30

0018 Dark Feast - 31

0019 The One I Will Not Share - 32

0020 That Night - 33

0021 Pomegranate Heart - 34

0022 Delight - 35

0023 The Twilight Room - 37

0024 Frater - 38

This book—and really, everything I write—is a conversation with a lover, in which the lover changes form in every new piece; the bodies change, but the feeling stays the same.

Since I am a spiritual worker with over three decades of practice, the experience of the Divine is very tangible and present in my everyday life; that means that these poems are way less metaphorical than they seem, and that when I talk about Gods and Spirits, and about Nature as their embodiment, I do it as someone who has met them, and not as someone who imagines them.

Just as they are not metaphorical, they are not hypothetical; each one of these poems has been fully, deeply lived, from the first line to the last.

Love is the extraordinary beast that lives behind every poem in this book—the way it changes us, ravages us, blesses us, and shows us our profoundly sacred nature.

Sometimes, when you are not paying attention he looks at you like you are a spoonful of Tajinaste honey and he is tasting it his eyes smile all the time after you have been away all day he undoes your braids and breathes your hair his fingers gripping you as he inhales deeply at night, he slips a leg between yours and snugs his knee just a little bit higher his skin burning and then he falls asleep.

He makes you so violently happy that you feel the muscles in your stomach contract when you think of his breath spilling into your mouth as he says your name he is the Light as he enters your body and you give him the Night.

* Note: the Tajinaste is a type of flower endemic to the Canary Islands and the Macaronesia. The bees who pollinate it produce a unique type of honey, with a very strong perfume.

If we are insane then we are insane like two Gods are insanely making love under the sacred deadly seeping flowers insanely living what they all said could not be done insanely giving birth to a Universe so filled with luxuriance that only the Gods, the insane ones, can inhabit it.

If we are insane then we are insane like mountains, insane like thunder insane like the thought of travelling beyond time every night to wake up next to each other.