Have Passport, Will Ramble

National Poetry Month

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 17:12:00 +0000

Along with rain showers (and early flowers) April brings us National Poetry Month. One way to honor the month is to participate in napowrimo, or National Poetry Writing Month, where the goal is to write a poem a day. I have tried this in past years--it is a challenge but also a wonderful exercise. After all, the more you write, the more you find you have to say, and the better you learn to say it. The site readwritepoem discusses napowrimo further and gives an exercise for today here.

Another way to celebrate poetry this month is to read it! Sites where you can get your poetry fix include:
Poetry Daily
American Life in Poetry
The Writer's Almanac

Finding the Writer Within

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 15:29:00 +0000

I had the opportunity to attend the second in the series called Finding the Writer Within at the Woodford County Library. George Ella Lyon gave a talk/reading followed by a workshop about writing in the voice of a child or adolescent. George Ella, an accomplished and beloved writer, is also a generous and compelling teacher.

One of the exercises was responding to a set of questions asked to draw out memories and details from our younger selves. I was surprised at the responses these questions elicited, and I was reminded that the interview process is a wonderful tool to gain access to information, about ourselves as well as fictional characters.

Finding the Writer Within continues through July, when each month a prominent local author will present a public lecture and a workshop about a topic important to them.

Opportunities for Poets

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 20:18:00 +0000

I am passing along some information related to unique ways of sharing your poetry with the world. First, this from a Kentucky press release:

The Kentucky State Parks are celebrating their 85th anniversary this year and are encouraging guests to help celebrate by getting outdoors and visit the parks. For those of you who like to write about your outdoor experiences, the parks system has a poetry contest for you.

The Kentucky State Parks 85th Anniversary Poetry Contest has three age categories – 11 and under, 12-18 and 19 and over. Any style may be used but poets are asked to use a theme that is some way related to the natural, cultural or historical aspects of state parks.

The deadline for submitting an entry is Nov. 2, 2009, with the winners to be announced by the end of the year. The top prize in each age category is a $50 Kentucky State Park gift card. There will also be prizes for 2nd and 3rd place in each age category. All winners and honorable mentions ages 18 and under will receive a free admission coupon to a state park fort, museum or historic site of their choice.

Winning poems will be posted on the state park web site.

Poems have to be in writing (two copies please) and mailed to the Kentucky Department of Parks, c/o Poetry Contest, 500 Mero Street – 10th floor, Frankfort, Ky. 40601.

There is a limit on length and all works must include a title and be the original work of the entrant. A complete list of rules as well as the official entry form, which must accompany all entries, is available at www.parks.ky.gov.

Second, check out The Guardian's monthly poetry workshop, where "Every month, a different poet sets an exercise, chooses the most interesting responses from readers and offers an appraisal of them."

Ekphrastic Poetry

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 22:00:00 +0000

As part of the LexArts Showcase Weekend, on Saturday, February 7, from 1:00-3:00 p.m., I will be leading a workshop called “Ekphrastic Poetry: Responding to Art through Poetry” at the Carnegie Center. Here’s the blurb from the brochure:

Ekphrasis is writing inspired by art -- usually paintings, photographs, or statues. In this workshop, we’ll explore ways to launch our own poems in reaction to works of art. Through hands-on writing, looking at examples of ekphrastic poems, and discussion, we’ll broaden the separate experiences of poetry and visual art by marrying the two.

Here’s an ekphrastic poem to whet your appetite.

In the morning of the LexArts Showcase Weekend, Lynn Pruett will be leading “Fiction/Collage: Words in Pictures, Pictures into Words” (10:00 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.). Both workshops are free.

The Carnegie Center’s Winter Session starts this week and is filled with many other offerings. To find one (or more) for you, check out the winter schedule.

Reflecting on the Work of 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 01:40:00 +0000

I'm going about this backwards, having looked forward to the year ahead in my post yesterday. Call it memory, call it flashback, call it the writer's business to mix up time.

At the end of 2007, I received an artist enrichment grant from the Kentucky Foundation for Women to begin writing my second collection of poems. I recently finished my final report reflecting on the activities and artistic growth of the past year. Admittedly, I was a little nervous to review the year, to examine carefully the work I accomplished...and that which I did not. The approach I took was to let the poems develop organically through the year, without thematic direction (although I had outlined expected themes in the original proposal) because you just can't force a poem to be something it's not. Although some of the themes and images did not develop, many did, and, to my delight, new themes and images surfaced. During the year, I did not always feel like I was making progress, though a couple poems immediately felt like "breakthrough" poems. With the recent introspective period, I discovered the year had resulted in many significant changes and growth in my work. Perhaps most noticeably, I see a lightness, even humor, in the new poems, which is not present in the poems of my first manuscript.

Grateful beyond measure for the many benefits the grant provided, I look forward to completing the project and to continued growth as a writer.

O Pioneer!

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 03:50:00 +0000

By way of Lori-Lyn, I learned about the word of the year project featured on Christine Kane's blog. Essentially, rather than make traditional resolutions (which are traditionally not so successful), you choose a word to carry through the year as a touchstone, a word that guides you through the year. This is a concept that appeals to me, perhaps partially because my daily work is done with words. What better instrument to nudge me into and through the changes (bidden or unbidden) in my life?

After perusing the list of suggested words, a number of them seemed like possibilities--gratitude, creativity, confidence, patience--but only one immediately rang like a bell. Pioneer. I let the word roll around within me for the last few days; more and more it seemed like my word for 2009. It is suggestive of the places I want to go this year...and of the spirit I want to embrace. It even seems like the runner-up words belong under the umbrella of 'pioneer.'

To more fully connect to the word, I looked up its definitions in the dictionary, as I often do when I'm trying to get the language of a poem exactly right (I've learned much about even the simplest and most common words by reviewing their meanings). I was reminded that as a verb, pioneer means:

1a. To open up (an area) or prepare (a way): rockets that pioneered outer space. b. To settle (a region). 2. To initiate or participate in the development of: surgeons who pioneered organ transplants.

It feels like 2009 is going to be a trailblazing year.

Winter Greetings

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 23:19:00 +0000

Well, it's official--I'm a terribly inconsistent blogger. While I have been busy with projects and end-of-the-year holiday madness, I think another reason I haven't written anything here in a long time is that I, along with the garden, have gone dormant, at least in some regard. It would seem that winter is a good time for all living things to turn inward, to reflect, and to process everything that's been gathered over recent months.

On a side note...after becoming enthralled with the symbolism of trees, I found The Meaning of Trees: Botany History Healing Lore by Fred Hageneder at the library. I have retreated into the book during these dark, cold days. One of the most mesmerizing passages I've come across is, "The Welsh goddess of the hawthorn once walked the empty universe and her white track of hawthorn petals became the Milky Way." With the hawthorn on my mind lately, I now see hawthorns everywhere, when I never noticed them before. Their red fruits decorate the branches like fairy-sized ornaments. Isn't that how it often is? The world is full and vast...if only we knew what we were looking for, we might find it among us.

May you have a joyous holiday season, and may you indulge in winter's dormancy to emerge into a healthy and wondrous 2009.

Weather Report

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 20:03:00 +0000

Steady rain today. Family and friends in Wisconsin report snow. For them, the poem "Snow" by Naomi Shihab Nye. Here you will find an interview with Nye, in which she says:

Number one: Read, Read, and then Read some more. Always Read. Find the voices that speak most to YOU. This is your pleasure and blessing, as well as responsibility!

It is crucial to make one's own writing circle – friends, either close or far, with whom you trade work and discuss it – as a kind of support system, place-of-conversation and energy. Find those people, even a few, with whom you can share and discuss your works – then do it. Keep the papers flowing among you. Work does not get into the world by itself. We must help it.
...

There is so much goodness happening in the world of writing today. And there is plenty of ROOM and appetite for new writers. I think there always was. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise. Attend all the readings you can, and get involved in giving some, if you like to do that. Be part of your own writing community. Often the first step in doing this is simply to let yourself become identified as One Who Cares About Writing!

Thoughts on the Hawthorn

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 16:24:00 +0000

Saturday I had the pleasure of attending a workshop presented by George Ella Lyon. I'm still digesting the material (perhaps more on the writing and discussion later). In the morning she shared a book called The Wisdom of Trees: Mysteries, Magic, and Medicine by Jane Gifford, which is based around the Celtic Ogham Alphabet and which attributes a tree to each moon of the year (a tree zodiac, if you will).

After the workshop, I did some brief searches about this intriguing idea. Here and here are two links that provide additional information. My point is not to focus on whether the Celtic tree calendar is based in truth or myth, but rather to consider the power of trees and our connection to them. My birth tree is the hawthorn, and there just happens to be one in my front yard. For the last two years a mockingbird has nested there. The hawthorn offers small white flowers in May and red, berry-like fruit through the winter.

I'm trying to figure out what is so special about a tree, aside from the obvious--that it gives food, shelter, oxygen--and I think, for me, it might be its physical presence, how it is rooted in the earth, grounded, sturdy, and at the same time reaching skyward, growing up and out, claiming the surrounding space. It is a model for how I'd like to live my life, connected to the past while being fully present in this moment.

December!

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 02:16:00 +0000

Somehow we've slipped into the last month of 2008, and once again I'm trying to figure out where the year went. I'm winding down the day with a cup of tea (if you're in Madison, check out the macha teahouse) and listening to my favorite holiday song.

Giving Thanks

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 14:03:00 +0000

The poem "A List of Praises" by Anne Porter.

Talent, Opportunity, Time

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 01:51:00 +0000

As one might suspect, no single factor dictates success. This article (edited extract from Outliers: The Story Of Success, by Malcolm Gladwell) examines examples of "outrageously talented and successful people" and muses on what factors shaped their success.

Here's the part that really grabbed my attention:

This idea - that excellence at a complex task requires a critical, minimum level of practice - surfaces again and again in studies of expertise. In fact, researchers have settled on what they believe is a magic number for true expertise: 10,000 hours.
"In study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice-skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals," writes the neurologist Daniel Levitin, "this number comes up again and again. Ten thousand hours is equivalent to roughly three hours a day, or 20 hours a week, of practice over 10 years... No one has yet found a case in which true world-class expertise was accomplished in less time. It seems that it takes the brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery."

The Gift of Community

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 21:14:00 +0000

This week I had the pleasure of attending the last fundraising event this year for the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning. Once again, words seem inadequate to describe how this place has contributed to my development as a writer.

The building itself is magical, not to mention the people who staff it and volunteer. Some of the Carnegie Center's offerings include writing, computer, and language classes; tutoring, youth, and family programs; and exhibits, readings, and other special events.

While I may never feel completely at home in Kentucky, the flickering moments of belonging I have experienced have been among members of the region's unique writing community, most of whom I met through the Carnegie Center. Community--a sense of belonging--is one of the Carnegie Center's greatest gifts. It is as if an orb weaver crafted an intricate web, and written into the center of the web is the Carnegie Center, all the silken strands radiating from that center.

You can read the Carnegie Center's blog here.

Marilyn Taylor - - Wisconsin's Next Poet Laureate

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 20:51:00 +0000

Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle has appointed Marilyn Taylor as Poet Laureate of the state. You can read about the appointment here.

Marilyn was my mentor in the English/creative writing department at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee many moons ago. I cannot adequately express how much she contributed to my development as a poet. I have always felt privileged to have had the opportunity to study with her, and I am absolutely thrilled about this news.

“Marilyn Taylor is committed to bringing poetry to all corners of Wisconsin,” stated Governor Doyle. “She has impressive credentials and an obvious love for her work and her state. I am confident that she will be an excellent Poet Laureate.”

You can read some of her poems here.

More Patricia Smith, Persona Poems, and a Prompt

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 16:58:00 +0000

One thing Patricia Smith does masterfully is the persona poem (sometimes called dramatic monologue). Poets.org defines the dramatic monologue as a poem in which "the poet speaks through an assumed voice--a character, a fictional identity, or a persona."

In Blood Dazzler, Smith takes on a range of personae from Hurricane Katrina to President Bush to a dog left behind. What surprised me was that the persona poems written in the voice of inanimate things could work. There seems to me a great deal of risk in speaking in the voice of the Superdome.

The Greek word persona means "mask," and some poets suggest wearing the mask of someone else--writing from a different point of view--is freeing because you are not writing your story, your vulnerabilities. However, I think to write a successful persona poem, the poet might have to make herself more vulnerable than, or at least as vulnerable as, when writing about her personal experiences. She must be able to locate in herself aspects of that other person (or thing), no matter how different or frightening or uncomfortable. Just as writing about the self reveals the other, writing about the other reveals the self. (A side thought--does this come more naturally for writers who write fiction more frequently than I?)

I found this interview with Patricia Smith (interviewed by Cherryl Floyd-Miller for Torch) where she talks about crafting persona poems. About the persona poem, Smith says:

I think the persona poem moves us out of our space, moves us out of our comfort zone where we’re almost forced to take a really hard look at another life. Whether it be something you’re just doing for the fun of it, like, you know, wow, what’s it like to be Little Richard for a day, or you’re sitting next to some woman who is clutching like twenty bags or something on the subway, you know that her whole life is in those bags, and you realize just how close everyone’s life is to your own. They may look really distant. You may say, “Oh my God, I’d never be a bag lady.” But starting to look at that persona and really examining it honestly, you realize how close we all are, and you may really be one paycheck away from that. So, it kind of forces us outside of ourselves – which we should all in a perfect world do naturally anyway. We should strive to relate to whoever it is that we meet, or we don’t meet, anyway. I mean, that’s what the human race is supposedly all about, but we don’t do that. Working in persona – if you do it enough – kind of makes that a second nature, even if it’s somebody you will never write about. You tend to take a closer look at their lives because you’re used to doing that in your creative work.

And she says:

Persona helps develop the poet’s eye. Then when you come back to yourself with that knowledge, you can write about yourself in a way that is more insightful and probing than before.

So if you're looking for something to try, write a persona poem. As Smith suggests in the interview, start from your natural curiosity. Begin from a question you want answered.

Patricia Smith's Blood Dazzler

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:29:00 +0000

I am reading Patricia Smith's Blood Dazzler, a finalist for the 2008 National Book Award. These poems tell the story of New Orleans before, during, and after Katrina.

Personally, I've found it difficult to write "political" poems (or poems that address social concerns...which raises the question what constitutes a political poem for can't every poem be considered a political poem in some sense [i.e., the personal is political]...but that's for another post perhaps). For me it is all too easy to fall into rant or lecture mode, to lose the essence of the poem.

Smith's poems are what political poems should be because first they are poems. They are musical. They are crafted (I mean this in a positive way; I mean she has considered structure carefully so the form suits the poem). They are filled with hard evidence (singular images, convincing voices). And through these means, the poems take on the weighty topic of Katrina. She has made poems that balance beauty and substance.

Here you can listen to Smith read three poems (the third, "What Betsy Has to Say," is from Blood Dazzler).

Poetry of Place

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 00:08:00 +0000

William Stafford, in Crossing Unmarked Snow: Further Views on the Writer's Vocation, said:

All events and experiences are local, somewhere. And all human enhancements of events and experiences--which is to say, all the arts--are regional in the sense that they derive from immediate relation to felt life.

It is this immediacy that distinguishes art. And paradoxically the more local the self that art has, the more all people can share it; for that vivid encounter with the stuff of the world is our common ground.

Artists, knowing this mutual enrichment that extends everywhere, can act, and praise, and criticize, as insiders:--the means of their art is the life of their people. And that life grows and improves by being shared. Hence, it is good to welcome any region you live in or come to or think of, for that is where life happens to be--right where you are.

This passage caught my attention because long have I been intrigued by poetry and poets of place. I have envied poets whose writing is steeped in a particular place (some associations in my mind include Philip Levine/Detroit, Susan Firer/Milwaukee, Frank O'Hara/New York, Ted Kooser/the Plains, Kathleen Norris/South Dakota). It seems like many poets have a city or region that influences their work.

No single place has infused my writing, nor do I feel like I "belong" to any particular place, perhaps because I have lived in a fair number of places. What constitutes home anyway? If I had to name one place that consistently feels most like home, southern Wisconsin (Madison/Milwaukee) would be it, though I suspect it has more to do with the fact that it's my birthplace and home to family and less to do with a connection to the place/land directly. Still it is the closest connection to a place I have (and yet it doesn't permeate my writing). All the other places I've lived, I've felt like a visitor. If I lived in Kentucky 20 more years, I would probably still feel like an outsider, perhaps contributing to why I feel inauthentic grounding my writing in a place.

What I take from Stafford is that if we are present to the place we are now (whether as a native or as a visitor), we can inhabit that place; we can serve witness to it as only individuals can.

Happy Halloween

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 12:28:00 +0000

"An Epiphany," by Ted Kooser.

First Bats, Now Cats: The Countdown to Halloween Continues

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 12:55:00 +0000

"The cat's song," by Marge Piercy.

Carnegie Center in the News

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 02:55:00 +0000

The Herald Leader had an article today about the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning. Read about it. Celebrate it. Support it.

Countdown to Halloween

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 11:57:00 +0000

"Bats," a poem by Paisley Rekdel.

Drink from Your Own Well

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 10:56:00 +0000

William Stafford, from Crossing Unmarked Snow: Further Views on the Writer's Vocation:

Kierkegaard said, "Drink from your own well." And I like that, taking it to mean that each of us has an individual source for our best work, and that to reach deliberately elsewhere is to neglect something essential in our writing.

So when I get up in the morning and settle down to write, I do not reach for what is timely or in style, but for something that suggests itself to me right at the moment. It can be any trivial word or even syllable, or a sound from the trees outside, or what day it is, or that the sun is about to come up--anything. And sometimes I feel that the more trivial it seems the better, for with nothing to live up to I can relax and catch onto a current within me.

Reflecting on the Week

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 02:00:00 +0000

I have been tired (as I'm sure those around me have been too) of hearing myself complain that I haven't had time to write in recent weeks. The word that frequently escaped was balance, how I've been trying to learn how to balance the work I need to do (i.e., what I'm being paid to do), the work of daily life (you know it...laundry, dishes, yard work, phone calls, etc.), and the work I need to do (i.e., my own writing). The latter is what has been compromised. It's what always gets compromised when there are time constraints and responsibilities. Notice the complaint sneaking in.

So this week I tried a new approach. I woke one to two hours earlier than normal to write. I would probably classify as a night person, certainly not an early morning person by choice, so this was tough for me. But it worked. I resisted the urge to ignore the alarm. I pushed myself from the warm bed (surely one of the Sirens in inanimate form). I went to my favorite chair in the office. I wrote. I wrote until the time I normally wake up. It doesn't matter what I wrote; some of it is garbage, some has promise. But I am satisfied, as if a craving has been fulfilled.

I'm toying with the idea of staying up an hour or two later instead of rising earlier as perhaps that would be more in line with my body's natural rhythms. But there is something I really like about writing first thing in the morning. The mind is in the perfect state for writing...a complicated blend of foggy and clear, blurred by the dreamworld and unspoiled by the noise of the real world. This state of mind allowed me to write without judgment. Moreover, I liked writing in the dark that comes with this time of year, with only light from an adjacent room--quite congruous with the early morning quiet.

Will I be able to keep this practice? Time will tell. At least this week I'm not tired of hearing myself complain. I'm just tired.

Poetry Sites

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 11:33:00 +0000

Here are some poetry-related sites that have come to my attention recently:

Poetryvlog posts a weekly video of a poet reading his or her own poetry.

Ars Poetica shares daily poems about poetry. This blog has an interesting origin; it began when Dan Waber invited five of his favorite poets to send him an ars poetica they'd written along with the names and email addresses of five other poets. The invitations grew from there.

Mark Doty's blog is a sort of online notebook for the poet. (As a side note, I think Doty has to be one of the hippest poets out there. What other poet of his reputation [if you haven't heard, his book Fire to Fire is a finalist for the National Book Award] has a public MySpace page and blog? And I may be one of the least hip poets without a reputation for using the word "hip.")

Spot of Tea

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 00:15:00 +0000

What's a writer without her beverage of choice and a little something to nourish her? For some reason, fall equals baking to me, so last night I stayed up too late and baked biscotti, adjusting the recipe to what I had on hand. The biscotti turned out to be a nice little treat for my morning break today. To be honest, though, I typically drink my tea out of a mug but I thought my mother's tea service would make a prettier picture; it certainly made for a more elegant spot of tea.

Here's my modified (and halved) recipe (I think...like I said, it was late last night) which made 16 cookies:

Biscotti

1/4 cup and 2 tbsp sugar
1 cup flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 cup slivered almonds
3 oz. egg substitute
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350F. In a mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Add almonds. In another small bowl, whisk together the eggs and vanilla. Fold egg mixture into the dry ingredient mixture. Stir until dough is stiff. Split dough into two sections. Roll/shape each piece into a log. Place the logs on the baking sheet (I lined mine with a Silpat) and flatten slightly. Make sure to leave plenty of room between them. Bake for 25 minutes. Remove from the oven, and let cool. Leave the oven on. Slice each log into 1/3" slices diagonally. Place (cut side down) on the baking sheet. Bake for another 20 minutes, until crispy.

Next time, I might increase the cinnamon and nutmeg and/or substitute almond extract for the vanilla.