My late husband and I lived in Malta from April 2005 to May 2006, returning once or twice a year nearly every year thereafter until the pandemic struck. I wrote the three poems below—all three based on Maltese Christmas legends—in celebration of our first Maltese Christmas. WHY WE PUT TINSEL ON THE TREE For the…
Author: Sheryl Loeffler
I am a Canadian writer and musician.
My poetry and creative nonfiction have been published in literary magazines and anthologies in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Austria, and Japan.
In April 2005, I moved to Malta, at the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, returning to Canada in May 2006.
In May 2014, A Land in the Storytelling Sea, my book of poems, prose poems, and photographs born in and about Malta, was published by FARAXA Publishing, Rabat, Malta.
In 2015, I was elected to membership in the League of Canadian Poets.
For two months in 2017, I was resident at The Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow, Eureka Springs, Arkansas, USA.
In 2019, I was nominated for a 2020 Pushcart Prize.
Remembering Martha
Remember that girl in high school? The one who had everything? Beauty. Brains. Athletic ability. Rich parents. The straight-A student. President of / Captain of Everything. One of the so-called popular girls. Popular meaning envied, I suppose, because girls (and boys) like her were inaccessible, unobtainable (meaning as friend or girlfriend) by those who weren’t…
Human Cityscape
24 April 2018. The day before the day before my last day in the office. I wanted to get a shot of the view from my office window, my cityscape, a view of the former new courthouse, the federal tax building, and an early 20th-century house (converted into apartments, a massage therapy clinic, and a theatre rehearsal space called Edna). But it’s raining….
Latest Publication
I’m pleased to have had three poems published in the inaugural edition of eMerge, an online platform for established and emerging authors and artists who have a connection to The Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow, Eureka Springs, Arkansas. My connection? Two fantastic months at the colony, January and February 2017. And a finished, book-length manuscript. Here’s…
Iced Tea
A few days ago, I accompanied a vegan colleague to a vegan café, where she ordered lunch (a vegan club sandwich and iced tea) and I ordered iced tea. I’d already eaten. A handsome, young man with round glasses brought us our drinks—bright red liquid floating on pale yellow. That’s not iced tea, I said….
A Blast from the Past
I found this post, written after 16 December 1984, as I went through old papers this weekend. The Men and Boys of St. John’s College, Cambridge, England, sang an Advent service of lessons and carols at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in Kitchener on Sunday, 16 December. My husband was one of the choir’s sponsors, so…
Sour Grapes?
I entered four poetry competitions between July and December 2015, all held by the same Ontario poetry organization. I entered because the competition themes were imaginative, the entry fees were low, and the competitions had a regional feel to them, in spite of the fact that they were open to all Canadians. I thought that…
Limping towards Infinity
Many thanks to Zonta Kitchener-Waterloo for a Women of Achievement Award! I would like to thank Elizabeth Clarke for nominating me and Brenda Halloran for interviewing and introducing me. News coverage of the banquet and award ceremony, 17 February 2016, follows: http://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=811338. Brenda Halloran suggested that I read a poem. Keep it light and joyful, she said, and…
Gifted (continued)
I’d lived for four months in hope. But no is as much a part of the publishing process as yes. She gave me incredible gifts in the three hours of our meeting. The meeting itself—rejecting publishers never meet the writers of their rejected manuscripts—was a gift. I don’t drive. She picked me up. That was…
Gifted
It was something I said I’d never do—I’d never pay a reading fee, never pay a publisher money, inevitably, to reject a manuscript I’d submitted. In the no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, yes—which is what my path to publication has looked like—that’s a lot of thrown-away $10s and…
A Sculpture
Last June, Douglas Haas, my husband, commissioned Waterloo artist Lloyd Walker (http://www.lloydwalkerdesign.com/Welcome.html) to create a sculpture celebrating the May publication of my book, A Land in the Storytelling Sea, in Malta. It’s an extraordinarily beautiful work–the loveliest gift I’ve ever received–standing 26″ (66 cm). A writer sits at the edge of her chair, poised…
A Land in the Storytelling Sea available Saturday, 6 December 2014
Ten copies of A Land in the Storytelling Sea will be available for purchase on Saturday, 6 December 2014, at Christ Lutheran Church, 445 Anndale Rd. (at Lexington), Waterloo, ON, from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Sheryl Loeffler 