Susan Yount was raised on a 164-acre farm in Southern Indiana where she learned to drive a tractor, harvest crops, feed chickens and hug her beloved goat, Cinnamon. Soon after receiving her BA from Indiana University in Photo-Journalism, she married a physicist and moved to Ohio. While attending Kent State University, she worked at the largest flour mill in northeast Ohio. She and her husband recently moved and built a home on the south side of Chicago. In the middle of the upheaval she found time to give birth to a bouncy baby boy! She is the Editor and Publisher of Arsenic Lobster Poetry Journal and works fulltime at the Associated Press. She is a graduate student in poetry at Columbia College in Chicago. Her poetry chapbook, House on Fire, is forthcoming from Tilt Press and her poems have appeared in several print and online magazines including Elixir, Red Fez, Wicked Alice, Verse Daily and The Chaffin Journal. Susan is a 2003 recipient of The Lynda Hull Memorial Scholarship in Poetry.

October 2009

7 2009

Say something if you see something but I want to be something. Too easy.

Some things to be:

No one.

One red haired girl with shiny golden purse—the only redhead at the station—brown line.

Pink line at 9:30pm on the dot.

Bottle of red wine not empty.

The Yount Cabinet.

I am lost.

8 2009

I finally got out of bed at 6:45. Dirac was soon to follow with his Kitty, Henry, the new kitty called ‘More Kitty’ and the Book That Eats People.

I’m at the office now and it’s quiet—George is at the annual meeting—Peoria this year—presenting the PowerPoint that I have been preparing this past month. Thank God I didn’t have to go. This is like vacation at work. Only 30 new emails. Everyone is at the meeting and the weather outside is like that night at Candle Box ~ I’m wearing pigtails. Melanie Coffee just complimented me.

8:25 : Reviewing the ‘Newspaper Order Status Report’ and I can listen to music.

Things to do at work 10/08/09—

~PAR visit ~ clear students with security (check)

~Freelancer payments

~Month’s worth of filing

~Enter regional Sports & CER skeds

~Nordgren’s expense reports

~Review timesheets (tomorrow)

Andrea, the new girl from London, is very nice. Took a Clariton D this morning. Zyrtec waiting. 812-555-5555

Email #30: Hi from Bagdad — Texas plans to cover.

Flash of light at 10:13 am

Right eye affected.

Unable to see half of anything. Mark Carlson & Melanie Coffee offer to help me home. Mike meets me at the train on Wash & Wells.

Home. 10:40-2:00 resting in a darkroom. Only 15 mins of intense pain where eyeballs might pop out. No vomit. Dirac home from his swim.

3 – typing poems, replying to email, video games (city of heroes)

Dirac napping.

6:24 cooking chicken dinner for 3

calling mom to discuss her visit this weekend & father’s migraines.

8:23 Daddy reads to Dirac (Kitty Hat) and I write

9:02 Dirac to bed.

10:45 Sex. Finish poem. Shower. Sleep.

9 2009

Friday back at work. Coffee almost done. Everyone asking how I feel ~ better thanks.

Shawn’s aunt would see flashes and get headaches and now she is half blind. Yeah, I should see a doctor. Yeah, I’ll go next time.

Things to do at work. See yesterday’s list.

~this morning, entering freelancer payments.

11:00 system freezes

12:43 reviewing timesheets

1:12 entering regional sports skeds

2:42 entering CER desk skeds