Established 2011


The Stolen From

Anna M. Evans has trained with the National Center for Creative Aging and conducts poetry workshops at a residential center for older adults with memory loss.

These poignant and honest poems provide portraits not only of individuals living with the disease, but also of their carers, alongside ruminations on Alzheimer's, on residential homes, and even on the nature of memory itself.

“Anna Evans brings to her well-wrought poems the compassion and respect that come from having worked with the men and women she writes about. She has gone into the night mines and brought back a handful of dementia's diamonds.” ~ John Foy

The collection includes the poem "Zeitgeber," winner of the 2012 Rattle Poetry Prize Readers' Choice Award.

“'Zeitgeber' is refreshing and beautiful: 'For Iris fidgets there, among the blooms/ She says, Is this a maze? I think I’m lost.' Wow! What a powerful, and true, description of Alzheimer’s. These lines draw me right into the poem, and it never lets me go. What a treat it is to be swept off my feet by a poem! ~ T.R. Poulson

The Stolen From

"Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal."~ T. S. Eliot

All spring I have prepared themed
bouquets of poems—snow, love, Ireland,
poetry, flowers—helped the residents pluck
single blooms to press into the frozen art

for the listener who listens in the snow

of the cento. I hold the master copies to snip
into petals of lines, but when Helen steals
my papers from the table, unprepared,

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

I coax and cajole. Helen backs
away as I approach in a strange tango
of thwarted desires, and reach

I hear it in the deep heart's core

out my hand. Striking like a cobra,
Helen grabs my wrist and twists,
lighting my nerves up with shock

for all the history of grief

and pain. I fear the brittleness of her bones,
and whimper for the aides,
who come to prize her off
so I can resume my thievery:

and every stem a lengthening shadow casts

Order your copy now for $10.95 plus S&H ($2.95 for a single copy)

Alternatively please mail a check made out to Anna Evans for $10.95 + $2.95 per copy to P.O. Box 115, Hainesport, NJ 08036.

Also available from Amazon.

Official PayPal Seal

Visit the Book Store