Patrick Trombly
Patrick Trombly re-emerged as a publishing poet in 2025. His poems have been published or are forthcoming in Roanoke Review, Connecticut Literary Review, 1922 Review, The Closed Eye Open and other journals as well as anthologies, in three continents. His first short story is forthcoming in Resonance. One of his poems was recently short-listed in a PHIL LIT Journal contest. Patrick writes about the relationships among humans, nature and the spiritual - in this case, a stag has sacrificed himself and his lineage to spare the lives of a doe and her fawns, by staying back and making himself an easier target for the tiger who has been tracking them. He does not tell the doe why he is sending her ahead - so as not to scare her or the fawns - and thus, they are unaware of his sacrifice, and the doe is unhappy with him. The stag is not only self-sacrificing but also self-conscious, and aware of his place in the metaphysical order, and in the order of the forest, and both orders are related. This construction of the relationship between the natural and the spiritual was and is common among Native Americans, and among the Udege - who are widely believed to share a common ancestry. There is no reason to think that this construction is not accurate or that animals do not have some level of consciousness - people, particularly in the West, tend to dismiss the idea because animals do not speak in a formal language, or write, for example, poetry. Patrick's response is that they are the poetry.
