Moonlight Musings

Today I'm handing over to a guest – my new real-life friend, Sarah Temporal, who describes herself as poet, performer and teacher – because I thought what she had to say in a recent blog post would interest you as much as it did me. I am always fascinated by discussions of process. (Not to mention that she refers to both Natalie Goldberg and Kate Tempest, whose work, in different ways, is dear to my heart.)

What comes first: rhythm or words? 
© Sarah Temporal 2017

I had a great question from a punter after my performance at M-Arts last weekend. (You can watch the live performance here).

“When you’re creating a poem, do you start with the words or the rhythm? Do you write something and then make it flow, or does the flow dictate what you write?”

The answer, of course, is not straightforward, and that’s what makes it an excellent question. I have had so much fun investigating this very problem that I wanted to share it with you.

Many of the great slam poets around today, such as Luka Lesson, Omar Musa, and Kate Tempest, came from a hip-hop background. These extraordinary wordsmiths can tell you loads more about ‘flow’ than I can; they have spent countless hours, weeks and years honing their skills rhyming, freestyling, laying words over beats or vice-versa. When they deliver a poem with only their unaccompanied voice, they bring an expert sensibility of rhythm and flow, which makes their work so much more complex and compelling to listen to.

It’s like the difference between plain handwriting and calligraphy: there’s an extra layer of expressiveness which is just beautiful to immerse your senses in.

I didn’t come into poetry from hip-hop, but I grew up learning music from a young age. I’m sure that has had a big impact on the way I use language to compose poetry. As a kid I spent equal amounts of time every day practising guitar, which my mother taught me to play, and burying my nose in books. So by the time I discovered slam poetry at the age of nineteen, the fusion of spoken language with the qualities of music just made sense to my music-trained brain.

Like many writers, I keep copious notebooks, which no one else reads (see Natalie Goldberg for the value of letting yourself write junk, and lots of it). I’ll comb through these when I’m looking for ideas, and often what jumps out is something that has an interesting sound, as well as an interesting sentiment.

There’s sometimes a weird moment when I realise that some little line I’ve written has lodged itself in my brain like a catchy guitar riff, pestering me to make a whole poem so that it will have somewhere to live!

So when I’m composing (and ‘composing’ may be a more apt term than ‘writing’), I’m focusing as much on the sound and rhythm as I am on the meaning of words. When I speak a line of poetry out loud, I’m trying to become aware of the physical sound of the words: the cadence, the tone, whether it seems to burst forth with explosive energy or coil slowly around the tongue; whether the line wants me to take my time or get carried away. It’s not always simple. 

Sometimes the meaning is clear but the rhythm isn’t working. Sometimes too much rhythm diminishes the meaning. And sometimes the particular mood or energy of the piece just takes a really long time to reveal itself. The challenge for any poet who performs is to strike the right balance of sound and sense.

There’s no point having lots of verbal tricks if you’re not saying anything meaningful; and likewise, no point in performing a great poem if there’s nothing for the ear to enjoy. It’s a fine balance, challenging, occasionally maddening, but ultimately so rewarding when you share it with a live audience.

If you’re interested in trying slam poetry yourself, please sign up to follow my SlamCraft series. 

This link takes you to Sarah's website, where you can also click on her blog etc. Also check her "Flight to the Heart" on YouTube – poetry with music, and the poem itself very musical, demonstrating what she says above about the way her musical training has influenced her writing.

Just now she's been appearing in one of a local series of "The Vagina Conversations" (based on Eve Ensler's famous "Vagina Monologues") at Byron Bay. Her husband posted proudly on facebook this morning of his joy in hearing audience members last night "raving about how good 'the poet' was". Wish I'd been there!

Moonlight Musings

Flow

Today I'm handing you over to a guest presenter, Australian Sarah Temporal, who has appeared here once before in the same capacity. As soon as I read this article on 'flow' at her blog, I was excited by it and asked if I could use it. I didn't find it until quite some time after she posted it, but it's not a topic that will soon date.

Sarah's primarily a spoken word poet – though I think her writing also works beautifully on the page – and she means this post from her blog to focus on oral performance, or 'slamcraft'. However I think the concept of flow is also important to the poem on the page, imparted and experienced visually.

Of course, ideally a poem will work both ways, and I know that many of us, in addition to blogging, contributing to literary magazines, and publishing books, do also attend poetry readings whenever possible, recite our work on YouTube, or add SoundCloud presentations to our blog posts. So, either way, I trust you'll find something valuable in Sarah's ideas.

I'm going to send you over to her blog now, with a quick click, because her article is interspersed with videos and things which you'll get a much better experience of there. Go!

Then, you may very well wish to leave her a comment there, but please come back here too and share your responses with us all.

Material shared in ‘Moonlight Musings’ is presented for study and review. Poems, photos and other writings remain the property of the copyright owners, usually their authors.

Moonlight Musings

The Medium and the Message

You'll notice I don't say (as Marshall McLuhan did) that the medium IS the message.  Poetic messages are surely more subtle and multi-layered than that!

But perhaps I do mean something like it. I'm interested in how (and even whether) we write in different ways when we intend the results to be read in a paper book or journal, to be heard from a stage, or to be accessed in a blog.

One could differentiate further and examine presentations on YouTube compared with SoundCloud readings, or delve into whether the ebook experience is different again. But for now, let's look at just those first three categories.

Perhaps the question should rather be whether an individual poet writes differently for different media. It may be that some do, some don't. Or is it a more-or-less unconscious process which we're scarcely aware of?

(Oh, surely not the latter! A poet unconscious of every tiniest nuance? I don't think so! Yet ... if it was unconscious we wouldn't know, would we? We could be fooling ourselves; influenced, yet blithely unaware of it.)

Well, some of this is an old conversation. I expect we all know by now that any poem written for the page CAN be spoken effectively. That is, unless it depends a lot on visual arrangement, which of course some do. Similarly, any poem written to be performed can be read on a printed page; though some might have to depend on special typography to convey the full impact – capital letters, extra spaces....

Sound vs Sight

Sarah Temporal and Thomas Keily, whom I've featured here (check the links if you missed them) write for oral presentation, whether on stage or on video (both do both). They write very specifically for that medium. Such powerful poets! I can't imagine their stuff not working as well on the page – but I'll never know, as I encountered it spoken first.

Thom Woodruff (Thom the World Poet) has also been featured here in the past. I chose the poetry very carefully – and it was appreciated – as I have known some people who have only seen his work and never heard it to be dismissive of it. That surprised me at first. Again, I am used to hearing him recite it. I had to try and look at some of it with new eyes, getting out of my mind as best I could the memory of him chanting and almost singing the words, emphasising rhythms and cadences which are less obvious on the page. I could see how the poems might lose something that way.

Sight vs Sound

Then I think of another friend who only reads her work aloud at book launches, where it's pretty much obligatory. Otherwise she assumes people will be seeing it without sound. (Or only with the mental sound we all bring to words in our heads.) I know she tries her work aloud before regarding it as 'finished', as we are all advised to do. For any of us, that might turn out to be a little different from the sound in the head (and then it may depend whose head!). But essentially she is writing for the page. Her writing is  highly accessible, but one's enjoyment can be enhanced by lingering, even re-reading.

There are yet others who very much write for the page, and frequently present their work at live readings too. They want their poetry to impact people both ways, but it may include complex metaphors for savouring and pondering rather than grasping immediately.

Much may depend on the audience. Readers and listeners are not necessarily passive recipients; they can bring something to the event too. For instance, I expect that people who attend a lot of oral presentations must develop a better 'ear' for layers of meaning.

I think Mary Oliver, many people's favourite contemporary poet (mine for one) succeeds equally both ways – but perhaps that's rare.

Blogging

And then there's the now huge tribe of bloggers, to which we all belong. These reflections began when I suddenly noticed a little thing of which I'd scarcely been conscious: that I was writing not only for accessibility but in the expectation that the poem would be glanced at quickly – that this is how people read online. Such an expectation is death to subtlety! It also tends to discourage length.

This may well come from the fact that I myself often have to choose between skimming other people's poems hurriedly or taking a long time to get around to reading them. 

We have wonderful poets blogging, and I love reading their work. Furthermore, reading poetry has always been one of my greatest pleasures. Yet I have to make that unwelcome choice as I don't have time to read and savour all the good poetry I'd like to. I suppose it's a good thing that I'm never going to run out of poetry to delight in. On the other hand, I hate to miss out on any of it!

I imagine other people have the same problem. Sometimes people's comments reveal that they haven't fully understood something I've written, or have actually misconstrued it. That could of course be a fault in my writing! But I occasionally get the impression that people are reading quickly because they have more to read, rather than taking time to grasp intentional complexities and ambiguities.

It's not their fault – how are they to know these things are there unless I flag them? There are people from whom we expect depths, so we allow for that; but perhaps my poems are usually so straightforward that there's no expectation of anything else? (Perhaps more copious process notes would handle it?) 

For myself, I find I'm better not reading other people's poems late at night. Things which seem obscure then can be perfectly transparent in the morning! The fault is not in the poems but the state of my brain.

So should we dumb down our work, or should we demand more of our readers? 

I don't want to dumb down – and I certainly don't notice anyone else doing so, nor would I wish that. I think, though, that I was starting to do it unconsciously. After all, I do want my poems to be understood! 

This makes me wonder if there will come a generation of blogging poets who keep it all very simple and immediate. Good poetry can be written that way; even great poetry can be written that way. It wouldn't necessarily be a disaster. It might be something that would just happen, spontaneously, over time. If so, it will probably become apparent to future generations rather than to ours.

But I hope it doesn't happen. I love listening to a piece that knocks my socks off right in the moment, but I also enjoy poems which make me think and reflect. I love diversity in poetry, and that we get in abundance from the blogging poets.

What's your take on it all?

Speaking of Thomas Keily, he sent a message about his feature last week, which I have included in the comments there (see link in this post, above). He also said some people have asked about sound recordings, so he has included in his remarks a link to some of the 'ecstatic erotica' and would welcome feedback.

Moon image © Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2015.

Other images in Public Domain.

Poetry Pantry #391

Zaragoza, Spain

Greetings, Poets!  It surely is a sad week in this country with another school shooting having taken place.  Sometimes it is hard to get one's mind off what is going on and sit down and write poetry. But perhaps poetry can help something in some way.  We can hope.  We live in hope.  And then again there are the Olympics which perhaps lift our spirits as we watch athletes from all over the world compete.  Oh, and the photo above is a Wikimedia photo...beautiful, I think.

Thanks to all of you who participated in last week's Midweek Motif - "Word" presented by Sumana. Next week the Midweek Motif will be "Voice" presented by Susan.

I hope you didn't miss Rosemary's Midnight Musings, in which she features a friend of hers - Sarah Temporal - an active slam poet.  I really enjoy the variety of articles Rosemary presents!

Come back on Monday for Sherry's feature which includes Poems of the Week by three Poets United poets!

Now with no further delay, let's share poetry.  Link your poem below.  Say hello in the comments.  Visit the poems of others who link.  Look forward to seeing you on the trail!

POETRY PANTRY #487

Lone Cone as seen from the inlet

Nancy Powis photo

Chesterman Beach in living colour

Nancy Powis photo

Frank Island on Chesterman Beach

Nancy Powis photo

Tofino has sunsets spectacular enough to strike you spellbound. The three photos above were taken by my friend, Nancy Powis, who lives on the inlet in Tofino.  The village is on a peninsula - on one side, the wild west coast, on the inlet side, the more placid waters and mudflats. Nancy graciously allowed me to post these beautiful shots. Our writing group has held two writing retreats at Nancy's beautiful home, where the tranquil view out the window inspires our writing. Thank you, Nancy, for these beautiful sunsets - such stunning vistas!

We hope you caught Friday's Moonlight Musings, a discussion on the importance of "Flow" in poetry, written by Rosemary's guest presenter, Australian poet Sarah Temporal. It was an interesting article.

On Monday, we will enjoy poems of peace, written by Susan Chast, Sumana Roy and Gillena Cox. We hope you enjoy these meditations on peace: what it is and what it isn't. On Wednesday, Sumana's prompt at Midweek Motif will be: Dance. That might get our toes - and pens - to tapping!

As it is Sunday, you know the drill: keep the coffee hot, and coming. Let's dive into the Pantry and enjoy all that is shared. Leave us a few words to tell us how you are and don't forget to visit your fellow poets. We all love comments. Smiles.

Wild Fridays: Thought Provokers

Imagination

We need to review our past to fix the broken cast that we all need to heal

The seal that is always broken that needs to be forespoken

To make everyone awoken

That our imaginations are limitless

If we come together it will be bigger than ever

If we collide as one, when we are done

We can see what we have become

Before one expression can lead to depression

The pressure of being yourself has made you feel left behind.

Being kind is not a self act, it’s a selfless movement

This containment needs to be released as if it was our relief

From our so called ugly self image

Our disapprovals our negative thoughts

I’m not being figurative, the damage of us hurting ourselves

Has changed us as a whole as if someone made the wrong fold.

Now tilt the container.

Do you feel a sense of calmness and relaxation?

As if that fracture has been repaired but left a scar.

If you don’t that’s OK

All you have to remember is time isn’t now and you’ll feel it one day

But sometimes that’s what keeps us going of the fuel to power our minds to steal our sadness away

To conquer our imaginations

Don’t stay how you are now

Work on yourself even if that means bending yourself down to pull others up

Because if we all do that then who will be down?

When you look at your property do you realise that others are living in poverty?

In school there are people who think they are cool

But what they don’t realise is that in a time scale smaller than a cup

Starting from the word 'sup' makes the ones the majority thinks aren’t cool feel lower than a stool.

Don’t be a fool to be proud of someone who is down and think it’s hard

That is how it is now

What we all need and know is that this generation can quickly turn foul.

– By Jasmine Logan

It's a time when the young are speaking up with powerful voices. Sherry gave us a great example in her last 'I Wish I'd Written This', featuring Shane Koyczan on bullying.

I admire the way this poem, too, while deploring the nastiness some young people can engage in, also urges the positive values of kindness and imagination.

Jasmine Logan, pictured sharing this poem at a recent 'Poets Out Loud' event in Murwillumbah, Australia, is 13 – the youngest participant in these local readings. Soon to turn 80, I may well be the oldest. 

A very confident performer, Jasmine came in second to me in one of our recent slams; I beat her by only 0.2 of a point. It was the only slam I've ever been in, so I was pretty chuffed to win; but, until the announcement, I was actually sure she had it won, and I told her so afterwards. Now the oldest and youngest local poets have become friends, and I asked if she would let me share her words here. 

At this stage she is very much writing for performance, so you need to 'hear' the sound and the rhythm as you read her words – or even better, try them aloud.

In the photo, Jasmine is wearing the colours of the Australian Aboriginal flag. I asked her to explain what the t-shirt says, because I was sure that otherwise someone would be bound to ask. She replied:

'Free the Flag', the t-shirt says.

It’s because the Aboriginal artist (Harold Thomas) has sold the flag to a non-Indigenous company who are Aboriginal art frauds. Now they have got rights to use it while everyone else has to pay. We just want to use our flag like every other Australian.

You can read the history of this flag – one of the officially proclaimed flags of Australia – including the situation she mentions, here if you're interested. (I think most Australians are already aware.) I asked her if she would like to say something about being an Indigenous Australian. She said:

Being Indigenous has made me really connected to culture and this land, although it comes with a cost. It is so upsetting to see people climb Uluru and Wollumbin.

[These are sacred mountains; the second is local. The indigenous custodians have recently ended the climbing of Uluru.]

Jasmine also finds it upsetting to contemplate the Stolen Generation.

My cousins were stolen, and my dad, aunties and uncles had to hide in my nan’s house until it was safe.

Here is one of Jasmine's most recent poems, on this subject:

Staring back at me was the Stolen Generation

I looked in the mirror and found a great mystery
Staring back at me was my people's history

Its name was a generation stolen

Sad event with children taken away

Many aboriginals had fallen

Mums are home anxiously every day

Terrified and NO parents of their own

Forbidden to learn about their people

Strange people around, feels like you're alone

Silence all around, besides one beetle

Forced to sing for the boss, they were made slaves

NO dreams, they were made to be maids when they grow

Least they tried, run back because they were brave

Blindfolded taken feels like it is slow

Mixed heritage identity unknown

Imagine that’s you. See! Are your minds blown?

She says: It breaks my heart to know how much racism there is in Australia ALONE, but I’m proud to call myself Indigenous.

May her strong voice be widely heard!

Material shared in this post is presented for study and review. Poems, photos, and other writings and images remain the property of the copyright owners, usually the authors. This photo of Jasmine is © Sarah Temporal 2019.

Note:
Sanaa's 'Wild Fridays' title is too good to waste – even though Sanaa herself won't be using it any more. Instead, she and Magaly will be taking turns to host our Sundays, now that Mary and Sherry have stepped down.

We think the title fits the way all sorts of topics pop up on Fridays, in random order. So we're making it the overall title, now, for all the Friday posts. This banner is Sherry's photo of wild waves in her glorious home environment, used with her permission – an acknowledgment of our original Wild Woman of Poets United! 

Ros

Thought Provokers

Thomas Gesses 1899

    A kiss goes from mouth 
to mouth, and then away. Venus turns
on her axis, every 243 days. Mae West starred
in a movie, called She Done Him Wrong.
We cry over spilt milk, and onions. Crying is
the language, of the eyes. A ring, is a hole with
a rim, around. Tom asked a girl, if she'd marry him.
–She said, No.—Sketches, squiggles, scribbles,
gnashes, and twirls. An omelet, is a crash.
After the heart, nothing but, a labyrinth.
Folly is a Man, biting stones. (Folly is a Man who
can't find a girl). Folly is a man, who can't
walk home. Tom threw a rope, over a beam in
the toolshed, and hang himself. His father
saw the shadow / struggling in the light, ran out, and
cut him down. Tom was charged, with "attempting to commit
suicide." (There is no substitute, for blood).
The father came to the Court (to lend
support), and told the Judge, as a Fool thinks
so does a bell * clink. A page is, both
sides of a sheet of paper. Surely a stutter
causes, no offence. Kepler reconciled Astronomy
with Physics, and then it was Tom's turn
to lay out the cards. He said, past tense, means
never again (so help me God) — the Father, the Son, and
the Holy Ghost. The liver of a Lion (for a cub), was
a vain wish, for a young man. The Judge
then said, every Jack has his Jill, and when
a drought comes, all good trees have to
just tough it out. He then sent him home, to
    get on with his Life.

– П. O. (Pi O)

from FITZROY: the biography 
(Melbourne, collective effort press, 2015)

I have become rather wary of posting poems with a lot of Australian vernacular, as they are not always well understood by people from other countries. (We think we all speak English, but....) This poem is even worse, very strangely punctuated and full of apparent non-sequiturs. However, I'll risk it again, because what Pi O is doing is well worth drawing to your attention.

It is from a very thick volume (740 pages) which my son and I were delighted to find when we went book-shopping together during my visit to Melbourne last November. (My son has a great appreciation of Pi O's poetry too. We each bought a copy; and, for any Melbourne people who may see this, the bookshop was Readings in Carlton.)

Pi O is among other things a great chronicler. In this case he chronicles, through its people, the history of the inner Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy, where he grew up – after coming to Australia from Greece with his family when he was three. 

His brief Wikipedia entry describes Pi O accurately as "a Greek-Australian, working class, anarchist poet", and goes on to say: 

His work ranges from standup-type rants to 'conceptual' page poetry and concrete poetry, with a heavy emphasis on wordplay and capturing the vitality of everyday speech. Thematically, he commonly portrays the issues of non-Anglo-Celtic working class life. 

He uses typography, among other devices, to convey the nuances of speech patterns. In a previous thick volume, Big Numbers he set out to capture the flavour of migrant speech. Not having grown up in the same area, I found it challenging to understand the dialogue – and as the book is mostly dialogue, it remains rather difficult for me. This one, beginning way back in a time when the citizens of Fitzroy were mostly of Anglo-Celtic origin, is easier for me.

I'm not sure if it would be for non-Aussies. But give this poem a try. Some of the commas look as if they are grammatically in the wrong place. Indeed, grammatically they often are. But read it aloud, pausing at those commas, and you'll get the sound of the speech patterns. For the same reason, sound out the emphasis on the words in italics.

(Note: I think "An omelet, is a crash" means that "omelet" was slang for "crash" – as "crash" is slang for "vehicle accident"– at the time when the poem is set. It isn't now.)

He must have done a huge amount of research. The subjects of the poems are real people and events. Some of the people are public figures; most are ordinary folk like Thomas Gesses, who for some reason got into the news and/or police reports. Their brief biographies, told chronologically from the late 18th to early 21st centuries, add up to a biography of this working-class suburb itself. (Working-class until recently.) 

Not an autobiography as such, it would be background material for one – and does in fact include some autobiographical pieces in their correct chronological place in the record. (And so it should. He too is one of the people who form the story of this suburb.)

It's a fascinating record. In a way it's a pity to take one poem out of context like this, as what they all add up to is greater than the sum of the parts. This is one of the shorter poems; some go for several pages.

The thing I find most thought-provoking is the poetic style. Pi O has always been interested in accurate renditions of whatever he observes, even if there are differences in the ways particular kinds of poems make their impact. In this book the pieces seem very factual, with a documentary style of telling – as you see in this one poem. But then, what are all the interpolations in the story?

Well, it's a long time since I was in touch with Pi O, so I can't ask for his personal explanation. But it seems to me that the events of the poem are set against a background of the mass consciousness of the day: the way people thought about things, their preoccupations, the level of their knowledge of what was going on around them and in the wider world, and the sort of information which people took for granted about their world in that time.

I like the way the personal details and the broader picture are interwoven. We know more about Thomas's life because it has been given its social context. For instance, the movie She Done Him Wrong came out in 1933, when Thomas would have been 34 years old. So it's not there just as commentary on his romantic situation, though it functions as that too; it's part of the mass consciousness which formed a backdrop to Thomas's personal circumstances, and perhaps shaped or at least influenced them in some ways.

The Wikipedia entry on Pi O further says:

His first published book, Fitzroy Brothel, was released in 1974. From 1978 to 1983, he was involved in producing the radical poetry magazine 925. After the publication of several more collections, his 740-page epic poem 24hrs was published in 1996 by Collective Effort Press.

He is a fixture of Melbourne's performance poetry scene and has edited an anthology of performance poetry (Off the Record) for Penguin. His most recent book is Big Numbers: New and Selected Poems (2008). He currently edits the literary journal Unusual Work.

Obviously it hasn't been updated since 2008. However it does also list in the Bibliography another anthology he edited: Missing Forms, a concrete poetry collection. These days "concrete poetry" is often understood to mean what is also called "shape poetry". That is indeed one kind of concrete poetry, but this anthology also includes much more startling ways of arranging words pictorially. Pi O has always been innovative and cutting edge – sometimes a leading force amongst others with similar convictions; in his maturity doing some things which, as far as I know, are unique.

I've discovered that collective effort press has a facebook page where if you scroll down you can find a photo of the adult Pi O as well as another of his poems from Fitzroy. This would be a place to enquire about buying copies of his books, if you don't live near any bookshops that stock them.

The Sydney Morning Herald interviewed him about this book, resulting in a much more interesting account of his life and work than the Wikipedia entry. If you do a Google search for "Pi O poetry" you'll find other interesting material, such as a spoken interview on national radio, various other interviews and articles, and some visual poetry.

And I just found out that a brand-new friend, poet Sarah Temporal, has written a lovely homage to Pi O in brilliant Pi O-influenced verse and her very own beautiful prose. Here it is; don't miss it!

Material shared in “Thought Provokers’ is presented for study and review. Poems, photos and other writings remain the property of the copyright owners, usually their authors.

POEMS OF THE WEEK BY ANNELL, WENDY AND ROSEMARY

We have three beauties to lift your hearts today, my friends, written by  Annell Livingston, who blogs at SomeThings I Think About, Wendy Bourke, of Words and Words and Whatnot, and our own staff member, Rosemary Nissen-Wade, whose new blog is entitled Enheduanna's Daughter.  Each one speaks to the way the beauty of nature uplifts and restores our spirits. We think you'll love them.

Annell, in front of one of her paintings

at an exhibit in Santa Fe

TAOS, WHERE THE RED WILLOWS GROW

Early Feburary
The golden dried grasses
Along the road
Reach for me

Silvery grey skeltons
Of leafless trees
Reminience of old lace
Still mourn the passing of fall

In the morning
Snow on the mountains
Like powdered sugar
Dusted on cupcakes

The afternoon sky clear and blue
Like the sound of a bell
Or like water...
You can see all the way to the bottom

The red willows grow along the Rio Grand
Whispering in winter’s chill
Like your words for Hayes
“Meet me in the mountains”

You carried his body there
Later, returned with a hand carved marker
I wonder...did you go there
Was he waiting
Wagging his tail in greeting

A boy and his dog
Who can say
When it comes to life and death
Or perhaps, it is the intention

Wish or dream
After death in the “who knows?"
Will you meet again, the ones you loved
On a distant shore, in a foreign land

Follow your heart
To the edge of the world
And there you will be
Where the red willows grow 


Sherry:  The imagery in this poem is so beautiful, Annell. I can see it, the red willow, the boy carrying his dog into the mountains. 

Annell: I am honored that you want to use my poem.  

The word “Taos,” is a Native American word, which means, “where the red willows grow.”  You see them a lot here, especially, "where they can put their feet In water.”

We have had a very dry winter this year...and one day it snowed, and I was struck at how the scattering of fresh snow looked like powdered sugar, dusted on the mountains.

Thinking about the mountains, I remembered when my nephew’s dog, Hayes, died.  He loved his dog, much like your relationship with Pup.  He carried his body to the mountains.  The place where they had spent so much time together.

Later, he carved a plaque, that read “Meet me in the mountains.”  He returned, to place it there.

He died suddenly, not long after.  I couldn’t help but wonder, did he return to that place?  Did he find his dog there, waiting?

The poem circled around..."back to the place where the red willows grow.”  The “edge” of the world, Taos, New Mexico.  The beginning and the ending......

Sherry: Just so beautiful, Annell.  I share the wondering: will we meet our dear ones again? I have to believe we will. I love "Follow your heart to the edge of the world." Thank you for this glimpse of beauty, of the desert, and beyond. 

When Wendy wrote the following poem, it really spoke to my heart. By this time of life, as seniors, we have seen so much, lived through so many hard-won human rights. The discouragement of witnessing things we never dreamed would happen in North America, and having them go unchallenged, strikes such weariness in our hearts, in what are supposed to be our “golden years”. This is another form of grief, and a deep one for so many of us.

But I love how Wendy begins to lift our spirits halfway through the poem, as she takes solace in nature, and reminds us to do so as well. Let’s read:

~~~THIS DAY~~~

another day of burgeoning
earthly burdens … I grow older
… and it is as though …
the last drops of tranquility
are trickling from my heart …

such are these inglorious times …
and yet … I cannot believe …

that we are born … we endure …
we gather wisdom … we are moved …
we love … we nurture a soul …

only to arrive … miserable …
at journey’s end … only to eschew
that which is all around us ...

no … it cannot be so …
look here ... in the light of day …

see how the mighty fir trees
sway … their ruffling boughs,
green and buoyant against
a splendorous sky …

and there … a glaucous-winged
gull soars … higher … higher …
with stunning flight of grace …
towards mesmeric spirit clouds …

all this … and more … there …
to fill the heart with joy

~ ~ ~ this day ~ ~ ~ 

"Wispy Promises" by Wendy Bourke

Sherry:  This poem expresses how I have felt all through 2017, such discouragement over human foibles, while still uplifted by the beauty of nature, and of the human spirit, as well, as some principled souls speak out. We can do so much better than this. And we must.

Wendy:  The poem ‘this day’ is about grief of another kind.  It came out of an intensifying feeling that I find myself grappling with, in these troubling times … and that is:  a growing sense that the state of the world is worsening – and not improving.  Indeed, I think there is a widely held belief emerging, that we are approaching a dark place, on this planet, from which we will not be able to turn back. 

Over the course of human history – even in the darkest hours – it is my sense that there was, at least, a glimmer of shaky confidence that … we will persevere over this … we will heal … and we will go on.  It was kind of ‘a given’ – even in times of war – that good would prevail and life would return to ‘normal’.  That optimism … that hope … is no longer evident to many.  I, for one, have found myself searching for hope … for that which lifts me up.  I find it – always – in the beauty … and the power … of nature. 

The fact that we have to pause, and seek out, positive life-affirmations, does not lessen their impact or their value when we find them.  The act of ‘owning’ those moments that fill the heart with joy, rather than coming upon them, serendipitously – may, in fact, be a good thing.  Perhaps, we value it more, and are inspired to work harder on climate and political initiatives, to insure the survival of our beautiful earth, when we consciously seek it and revere it.    

In truth, all any of us have, are the moments we cherish in memory and the moment in which we are living.  All we can do is cherish the moments … live each day thoughtfully … and proceed with peace and hope in our hearts.     

Sherry: This is true, my friend. And thankfully, Mother Earth continues to bestow her incredible largesse on us. Thank you for the beauty of this poem. As I read, you lifted my heart back to hope. 

And now, to close on a high note, let's read Rosemary's glorious "Love Song to the Earth", to remind us just how generous Mother Earth really is. In spite of our poor stewardship, she continues to heap upon us, for our delight,  her blue skies, sunrises and sunsets, autumns and springs.

Love Poem for the Earth

Planet, you had me at hello.
It was love at first sight and then some.
The minute I opened my eyes
on you, gorgeous world, just that glimpse
in my newborn gaze was enough.

Enough, and a feast. As I grew
I found out more and more to love.
Oh, you expansive, abundant beauty!
"Infinite variety?" Shakespeare knew
less than he thought. Infinite variety is You.

Do I need to count the ways? The rivers
and meadows, crags and oceans, the trees
and birds and tigers and dolphins and bees?
And the moods! The sunsets and moonrises,
storms and stars and perfect autumns ...

Mind you, the eternal summer's
a bit much lately. Lovely Earth,
what are you doing to us? Oh –
we did it to you? No no, not me, I didn't.
It was them, all the others. Don't punish me!

Don't punish us. Let us live and love you.
Tell us it's not too late! You say that love
speaks louder in actions than words?
You sound like my Grandma. Well, as for me,
of threescore years and ten, I've had a few more.

Planet mine, ground of my being,
Earth of my heart, my dear, my delight,
my long, long love, great light
of my tiny life: seventy summers
were little room to feast on you –

to drink you in through eyes and ears
nostrils, hands and tongue. And so
I'll go about the woodlands, and the sands,
walk on your mountains, bathe in your rivers
while I can; giving thanks. Giving thanks.

[With acknowledgements to William Shakespeare, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, A.E. Housman and Anonymous, for some small borrowings.]

Sherry: Sigh. This fills my heart with joy and gratitude, Rosemary. Mother Earth is so incredibly beautiful. How did your poem come about?     

Rosemary: I wrote this poem specifically for an upcoming occasion: Love Poems for the Earth : a free afternoon of Dangerously Poetic Music and Poetry, in Murwillumbah. (Their facebook page is here: Dangerously Poetic)

The singer is a friend of mine, lovely to listen to. The "Dangerously Poetic" group is based in Lismore, another town in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales (Australia) where I live.  They do "pop up" poetry events all over the region and this time it's our town's turn to host them.

I thought it would be fun to do something in the open section, and when I looked through all my stuff I didn't find anything that said quite what I wanted. Lots of poems about specific aspects of the natural world, of course, but I decided I needed something more. Also it is a long time since I did any performance, and although one CAN perform anything, poems written for the blogosphere are not necessarily crafted quite the same way. So, all in all, I decided I needed a new one.

And of course, what it says is true: I HAVE been in love with the earth all my life. I know I'm not alone there, especially amongst poets – hence the theme of the evening.

I'm also quite nervous; it's been SO long since I did any spoken word stuff. This particular group of poets is from another town in the region, so can be regarded as "local" but too far away for me to want to drive it very often, if at all. The same applies to other poetry events in the region. Anyway, I know from experience that some nerves help a performance, but I'll be relieved when I'm out the other side of it all.  Perhaps after the event I’ll let you know how it went.

Sherry: Yes, do, Rosemary! I am sure you will be brilliant!

*****

Sherry: Rosemary got back to us before this feature posted, to let us know how the event went. Fill us in, my friend! We are all ears. Was it wonderful?

Rosemary: Yes, it was a great night, on the balcony at the local cinema. It was a lovely warm evening, with a rainbow (but the actual rain held off). We were entertained by a beautiful singer; there were two featured poets; then, after a short interval, the open section – 10 readers, allowed two minutes each (so I could only do this one poem).

Sarah Temporal, whom I featured in a  recent Moonlight Musing, also read in the open section: her "End of the Road", which some of you heard via that Moonlight Musing. We are both seasoned performers, but were a little nervous beforehand – which is a good thing, because one needs that bit of adrenaline. And we both got lots of applause, and many compliments afterwards. During my poem, people laughed, or hushed, or murmured agreement in all the right places. Can't ask for more than that!  I rarely perform nowadays; it was good to get behind a mic again.

Sherry: I am so happy you performed your beautiful love poem. I knew it would be well received. How could it not?

Thank you, Annell, Wendy and Rosemary, for your poems, and your wonderful presence in the blogosphere, and at Poets United. We appreciate you so much. 

We hope you enjoyed these offerings, my friends, by these three talented poets. Do come back and see who we talk to next. Who knows? It might be you!