Zane Grey

Here’s the first poem from my index card boxes for poems that start with the letter Z:

Zane Grey

          open at the illustration

This poem is the second verse in my “Grey Matters” solo rengay. It appeared in my True Colour art book, designed to open up like a painter’s swatch. Unlike other solo rengay, where I employ three-liners and two-liners in a specific pattern, this rengay limits itself to two-liners, with the second line of all verses indented to the right after the first. As with other rengay in True Colour, this rengay has a colour-related theme, and writing about the Western novelist Zane Grey was an intuitive subject for the colour grey (and for me, “grey” is a darker shade than “gray”). I’ve never actually read any of Zane Grey’s novels, though, so no wonder the book is open at the illustration, as that’s all I have experience with. I wrote this verse on 13 November 2014, in Sammamish, Washington, and the rengay it’s in was first published in True Colour in December of 2014. This book was one of my creative productions as poet laureate for Redmond, Washington from 2013 to 2015.

—31 May 2025 (previously unpublished)