BLOG OF THE WEEK ~ THE POETRY OF ROSEMARY NISSEN-WADE

This week, my friends, we are swooping across the sky to Australia, to visit our very own Passionate Crone, Rosemary Nissen-Wade. Rosemary shares some lovely poems with us, and will tell us about her new book, Three Cycles of the Moon. Pour a refreshing beverage (Rosemary will be having her usual unsweetened black coffee, but can offer you tea, green tea, herbal tea, or even white coffee with sugar) pull your chairs in close, and enjoy! 

Sherry: Rosemary, I always love your poems, but a handful of them in recent months especially spoke to me, and I hoped you might share them with our members.

Rosemary: Oh, Sherry, how very flattering! Thank you. My initial response when you suggest such things is always, 'Oh no, they won't want to hear about me again!'

Sherry: We are always only too happy to hear from you, my friend.

Rosemary:  Well, if that’s so – I’m always very happy to talk about poetry, even my own!

I see the poems you have chosen as three groups, each with two poems of like theme / mood.

Sherry: Let’s dive right in.

REACHING BEYOND

Softly calling

across hilltops

oceans and skies:

the memories.

Across hilltops

as on bird wings –

hear them flutter.

Oceans and skies

ripple with white –

wave tips and clouds.

The memories,

evanescent,

hint and linger.

BECAUSE YOU

Because you are music,

I sing you, even 

when you aren't here,

softly in memory.

Because you are wine,

you intoxicate me

slowly and smoothly,

the taste lingering.

Because you are ocean,

I bathe in you, plunge

and almost drown, then float

on your buoyant blue.

Because you are poetry,

I return to you again and again; 

you fill my mouth, 

I give you utterance, but –

Because you are mystery,

I cannot touch your core,

fathom your depths, recover 
from you, find your truest chords.

Rosemary: “Reaching Beyond” and “Because You” are imaginary situations where I was focused mostly on the music and imagery (though of course it is my subconscious they came from, and I have experienced similar emotions in real life).

Sherry: I especially love “Because You”. It is a gorgeous read, and allows the reader to take her own flights as she reads.

Rosemary: That’s interesting, as I didn’t have a specific "other" in mind so much as the experience, itself, of being in love. Perhaps that lack of factual detail is the very thing that allows readers to fill in the gaps for themselves.

Sherry: Let’s take a look at the next two, shall we?

REMINDERS

On the street down the hill, half-hearted fireworks 

pop and splutter like distant thunder or a gurgling fridge.

It's the fifth of November, Guy Fawkes night.

I remember huge bonfires, in Launceston in my childhood.

  

Pop and splutter – like distant thunder or a gurgling fridge –

briefly, then it's all done. Too soon, perhaps, after

the newer habit of Halloween? (Is Bonfire Night dying?)

It's the fifth of November, Guy Fawkes night –

'Remember, remember...' and I do remember

sparklers, Catherine wheels, rockets, penny bungers.

I remember huge bonfires in Launceston in my childhood,

smoke billowing in chill Spring air, our frosty breath, 

the neighbourhood dads in charge: all those certainties.

HOW FORTUNATE, DEAR READERS

How fortunate, dear readers, that you enjoy 

all these poems about my garden and my cat.

They are likely to keep right on coming.

My obsessions nowadays are quiet, insular.

All these poems about my garden and my cat

connect me to earthy, practical ways of being. 

Otherwise I might fly off, disappear into dreams.

They are likely to keep right on coming,

the dreams and flights – but so are the frangipani,

the red geraniums, my cat's games and her hungers.

My obsessions nowadays are quiet, insular.

After all, I grew up on an island; and I carry quiet

within me, an interior island of words, of poetry.

Rosemary: “Reminders” and “How Fortunate, Dear Readers” are not at all imaginary. They deal with my love of the ordinary and domestic, which I more and more believe to be the truly important moments in life. 

Sherry: I do, too. I take great delight in the lovely domestic rhythms of this stage of my life. And I love that “interior island of words, of poetry.” I most enjoy how often your cat creeps into your poems. Your familiar.

Selene

Rosemary: Yes, she is an important presence in my life – as well as an intriguing and often challenging one. I have only had her for a little over a year, but she was already nearly eight, and has obviously had a chequered history which makes her fearful and wary. She is also very sweet, and I am sure that by now she loves and trusts me as much as she can any human being, but some of her boundaries mean I have to use strategies to look after her properly, e.g. I buy special food to keep her teeth clean and her gullet free of furballs, because she would not allow the degree of handling otherwise required. So I am very much inclined to celebrate in verse the companionable times we have also arrived at. Need I add, I am quite besotted!

Sherry: That is evident in your poems. I have enjoyed watching your relationship evolve. I remember how fearful she was, at first, then how she slowly began to relax, trusting she was in safe hands (and heart!)

We have two final poems to contemplate:

SAYING GOODBYE

“It’s the emptiest and yet the fullest of all human messages: 

‘Good-bye.”  

― Kurt Vonnegut, Bluebeard

We never said that final goodbye to each other,

always thinking there'd be one more day, one moment,

until there was no time left, it had all run away so fast.

Perhaps, also, we never believed we could really be parted.

Always thinking there'd be one more day, one moment,

we spoke of immediate, practical things – the pleasure 

of a comfortable chair, the view of trees and hills from the high      window.

Until there was no time left – it had all run away so fast –

we said what was in our hearts with eyes and touch. 

Goodbye, coming finally to mind, was not in our hearts.

Perhaps, also, we never believed we could really be parted.

How wrong we were! Now the word chokes me with grief.

And how right: you being, after all, still present here, 

always with me.

BEING HERE NOW

There are two new gardenia blooms in my garden.

America prepares to vote for a new President.

In Syria they are breaking eggs to make an omelette.

Dandelions and clover appear on my lawn.

America prepares to vote for a new President

while the rest of the world collectively shudders.

Then each country turns back to its own problems.

In Syria they are breaking eggs to make an omelette.

I mean of course that we are, noble saviours.

And the children there? Can’t be helped!

Dandelions and clover appear on my lawn.

Their bright, dancing faces delight; but I must mow.
I see no bees this year, despite the scent of gardenias.

Rosemary: “Saying Goodbye” deals with personal sadness and “Being Here Now” is gloomy about global concerns. Both are more reflective than urgent.

I realise I am not writing so many sad poems any more – evidence of having adjusted to widowhood. As everyone who has experienced deep grief knows, we never get over it, but time makes it easier to handle. I have reached a place of contentment in my life. 

Sherry: I well know that we never do recover from the loss of a beloved. We learn to accommodate the grief within us, somehow, in order to go on living. I often remember the poem you wrote when you bought the new chair, after your husband's death, and walked into the room to see your beloved Andrew sitting in it, smiling his approval.

I love, in “Being Here Now”, how you switch from the global outlook to the joys of your small garden. I think that is a wise retreat and replenishment, when things look dire: the balm and beauty of nature.

Rosemary: I’m interested to note, now, that after each pair of poems my first comment (above) culminates in the word “life”. Poetry and life have always been entwined for me. Poetry is not some extra thing I add in. I’m looking for a metaphor to explain this, and I think that it's breath – the breath of life. 

"Poetry is...the breath of life"

Sherry: “Poetry is…the breath of life.” I have to agree. It is, for a true poet.

Rosemary: It’s probably worth noting that I recently spent a month exploring the trimeric form, and five of these six poems are in that form. “Because You” is the exception – essentially free verse, albeit using stanzas and repetition. I love free and formal verse equally.

Sherry: Your work is wonderful, in every form, and we are so fortunate to be those dear readers you speak of! 

Rosemary, recently you published a new book, THREE CYCLES OF THE MOON, with two friends, Jennie Fraine and Helen Patrice. Tell us about this beautiful book.

Rosemary: Some time ago a woman called Maggie Strongheart decided to explore her relationship with the moon via a daily piece of writing, and created a group on facebook so that others might join her and share their writings there. For those of us who took her up on it, it proved illuminating (pun intended) to see how our lives reflected what was going on with that little orb in the heavens. Jennie, Helen and I, being poets, of course did it in verse.

[In the photos below, Jennie Fraine is on the left, Helen Patrice on the right.]

         

     

We were so thrilled with our results that we decided to collaborate on a collection. We are very old friends in real life, and admirers of each other’s poetry. In fact I have featured both Jennie and Helen in “I Wish I’d Written This”. (If you missed these,  you can search their names among the tags in the left sidebar.)

Everything was decided by consensus. The initial selection of poems and their sequential arrangement were delightfully easy. Finding the cover illustration and cover designer, and deciding on how/where to publish took longer.  We decided to go with an ebook produced by Smashwords, as they make books available in every kind of ebook format.  Also it enabled us to keep the price reasonably low. (But not rock bottom; it’s considerably longer than a chapbook.)

Initial formatting of the book to Smashwords requirements proved daunting to us non-geeks, so we enlisted the help of our old friends ContentXDesign who had already published SHE TOO, poems by Helen and me plus two American poets: Delaina J Miller and Leigh D C Spencer. (I have also featured both Leigh and Delaina here; again, check the sidebar.) The new book, though, lists Jennie Fraine as the publisher, for the simple reason that she has self-published a number of physical books over many years and so was in a position to assign our book an ISBN number.

Sherry: Both books look absolutely wonderful! What an accomplishment! I am especially intrigued by the work arising from your moon journey. I thought that was so cool, at the time.

Rosemary: You asked me to talk about the book, and I am going on about all the technical aspects of producing it! They absorbed us for quite a long time, you see. As for the content, I don’t think I can better the blurb Helen created for our Smashwords page:

“Once upon a time there were three women, who, inspired by a fourth, set out on a month-long journey. They travelled from New Moon to Full and back to Dark Moon again, charting all the aspects and phases of their relationships with Luna, Her Goddesses, Her moods, and their own. One poet travelled across the Earth, while the two others remained fixed in the terra firma of Australia. They won the treasure of wild inspiration, and yes, at times, struggled with 'what to write', as the month went on, and on, and the Moon just kept rising. Open an eye to the telescope to view Selene, Diana, Artemis, the Rabbit in the Moon, and maybe even the Old Woman In the Moon. Move through the Three Cycles of the Moon, in poetry.”

(In my case the moon, though it undoubtedly kept on rising, was not always visible behind cloudy skies, and that made for some interesting realisations too.)

I say, in my foreword to the book, “Helen and Rosemary are witches, so moon-consciousness was already part of their lives. Jennie, who describes herself as earth-bound and pragmatic, nevertheless lives her life open to possibility. ”

Sherry: I love it, especially Jennie, who remains “open to possibility”! 
Me, too!

Rosemary, thank you so much, for sharing your poetry,  and the exciting news about the new book. Thank you as well for your wonderful and much-appreciated contribution over the years at Poets United. I feel so fortunate to know you, a true witch, and a Goddess in your own right. Thank you, and Blessed Be.

We hope you enjoyed this offering as much as we did, friends. Rosemary is amazing! Do come back and see who we talk to next. Who knows? It might be you!