Bodega poet selected in love poetry contest

Towns Correspondent Andrea Granahan was one of the poets whose work was just selected by the Healdsburg Literary Guild in a recent love poetry contest for Valentine’s Day. She will participate in a reading 1:30-3:30 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 10, at the Bean Affair, 1270 Healdsburg Ave. in Healdsburg. The poem will be part of an anthology.

Granahan is a Bodega resident, journalist and travel writer. She is a former resident Poet In The Schools and former publisher of the Bodega Bay Navigator newspaper. Her websites are MeanderingWithAndrea.com and quirkutopia.com. Here is the winning poem.

Paris PDAs (Public Displays of Affection)

They are shameless, these lovers.

They revel in their bodies, heedless of us all.

Their hands in each other’s jeans pockets

Feel undulations of sweet flesh

As they meander and gaze

At each other in rapture.

Entwined on grass in the park

They spread, like dew, their passion.

Like divers, they delve deep

Into the abyss of a profound kiss.

A unity that does not regard,

And even fails to see, ordinary life.

Ordinary life that unfolds about them

With tolerant affection.

A boy pushes his toy boat in the pond with a stick.

A small girl holds a glass of cold chocolate

Safe, feeling treasured.

An old man covers his face with a newspaper

And naps on a bench.

A fruitmonger indulges an old woman

Who wants a peach, a perfect peach.

He searches his crates to find it.

And the lovers have yet to come up for air.

An older couple walking their dogs

See them, and their hands reach

For each other in familiar tenderness.