Jonathan Potter

Jonathan Potter is the author of House of Words (2010), Tulips for Elsie (2021), and Sunrise Hexagrams (2022). His poetry also appears in the Imago Dei, Railtown Almanac, and Spokane Writes anthologies, in a variety of journals, on The Writer’s Almanac and Jopomojo podcasts, and in Potter Poems, a daily Substack newsletter. At various times and places, Potter has hosted Naked Lunch Break (a lunchtime poetry open mic and reading series), moderated the Poets of the Pacific Northwest and Poetry Salon  panels at the Get Lit! literary festival, and contributed work to the Hotel Spokane, Only Time Will Tell, Verbatim, Pictures of Poets, and 50-Hour Slam collaborative projects, happenings, and exhibits. He divides his time between Washington (the state) and Québec (the provence).

• Read an interview with Jonathan Potter in Art Chowder.
• Read an interview with Jonathan Potter at The Fine Delight.
• View a selection of Potter Material on YouTube.
• Listen to the Jopomojo Poetry Podcast.
• Read the Potter Poems newsletter on Substack.
• Listen to Potter read “Turning Twenty-Five” from House of Words.
  

  Turning Twenty-Five

  Bringing me and Mom home from the hospital
  In 1965, my dad ran out,
  Hey-ho, of gas, hey-diddle-diddle,
  Son don’t cry now, it’s nothing to cry about,
  He sang at the top of the hill. We glided

  Into town on angel breath and I decided
  To be an astronaut or cattle man,
  Roam prairies undivided,
  Drive the lunar module into the sun.
  I followed my sister, down the path we’d race,

  Past Mead’s and the strange abandoned house
  To the orange brick school below.
  We moved to the city and found a place,
  Went every weekend to the show.
  Careening on skateboard into the empty pool

  And sailing up the vertical wall,
  Sixteen feet up, then into the air,
  I found myself above it all,
  Turning to descend I knew not where,
  And all those friends now gone,

  Gravity moves us not to return.
  I went to college, feigned deceits,
  Prayed to God and tried to pawn
  My very self for gross receipts—
  Which God in turn rolled up into a riddle.

  from House of Words