February 27

I never got to meet my great-aunt, Ethel Green Russell, but these three volumes of her poetry are among my most cherished possessions:

Deep Bayou was published in 1941.
Lantern in the Wind was published in 1942.
Land of Evangeline was published in 1946.

Lantern in the Wind was a family copy that I got from my dad; I had to search out the other two books.

Here is a sample:

Quaker Mother

I shall kneel weeping when they say
His blood-stained grave is filled -
But now because he died, war's prey -
Because he killed!

This is from Lantern in the Wind, in a section titled "Break the World's Anger." The book was published during World War II, and I have always been struck by the pacifist theme of this poem, and of others in the same section of the book.

She was the Poet Laureate for Louisiana from 1970 to 1973, and was only the second Poet Laureate for the state, succeeding a poet who served from 1942 to 1970.

Lubbock, Texas