“The Blues in Jeans” nominated for a 2011Pushcart Prize

Maria Mazziotti Gillan, Editor of Paterson Literary Review has nominated Reese’s poem “The Blues in Jeans” for a 2011 Pushcart Prize.

Final winners of this year’s prize will be announced by April 2012.

Here’s the poem:

“The Blues in Jeans”
by Jim Reese

When I found the sewing needle
in the crotch of my newly hemmed jeans,
I was troubled.
Not for the nut sack that had gone
unharmed but for my overall well-being.
My mother-in-law who had done the sewing
perhaps forgetful, perhaps not.
An instinctive shriveling
in the un-hemmed crotch
rendering my jeans somewhat roomier
than I had remembered.