Oddball Magazine will be publishing ongoing tributes to José Gouveia to in the hopes of raising awareness of the Joe Gouveia Recovery Fund, an effort to help offset the costs of the poet’s upcoming cancer surgery.

 

Landing at Madeira
for Joe Gouveia

What if a man fled from one country to another
and his ship was knocked off course by a storm?
How could he manage to stay alive? He’d have to
rough-hew a part of the forest to make shelter,
find a way to bring water to where there wasn’t
enough, all the while knowing he was living
on top of a volcano whose lava flow resembled
a warrior’s shield lying on the ground. And
if he had to remain there for a long time he’d
plant sweet-salt in a field of bougainvillea, learn to
make a wine that could survive for years after it was opened.

 

Barry Hellman has been Joe Gouveia’s co-host at the Poets Corner Poetry & Music Open Mic Series on Cape Cod for the past 5 years. He is a clinical psychologist, poet and workshop leader whose most recent poems have appeared in Ballard Street Poetry Journal, Comstock Review, Cape Cod Poetry Review, Still Crazy Literary Magazine, Muddy River, and Ibbetson Street. His chapbook, The King Of Newark, was published by Finishing Line Press.

Oddball Magazine will be publishing ongoing tributes to José Gouveia to in the hopes of raising awareness of the Joe Gouveia Recovery Fund, an effort to help offset the costs of the poet’s upcoming cancer surgery.