C is for Lucille Clifton: Unapologetic

It's April! Time for the AtoZ Blogging Challenge!

For those who haven't played along before, the AtoZ Blogging Challenge asks bloggers to post every day during April (excepting Sundays), which works out to 26 days, one for each letter of the alphabet. In my opinion, it's the most fun if you choose a theme.

This will be my 5th year participating.

• In 2014, I wrote about evocative words. 
• In 2015, I wrote about my publication journey and the release of my first novel. 
• In 2016, I wrote about my favorite superheroes. 
• In 2017, I wrote about the places of my heart. 

My theme this year is Poets I Love all about some of the poets whose work has touched me over the years.

For my regular readers, you'll see more than the usual once-a-week posts from me this month. I'm having a great time writing them, so I hope you enjoy reading them, too. Be sure to check out some of the other bloggers stretching their limits this month to share their passions with you, too. With over 400 participants, there is bound to be something you'd love to read.

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Poetry sometimes has this image in people's minds, a rather ridiculous one with flowing clothing, impractically bare feet, and ethereal looking half-starved people nattering on about finding the universe in a flower. I think that's part of why people don't read it enough. They think it's silly or an intellectual exercise, not for "regular" people.

This is part of why I adore Lucille Clifton. Ms. Clifton gets to the point, tells you how it is, and challenges you to dare to disagree. She was a short, somewhat chubby African-American woman who took joy in her own body and life, who felt beautiful and strong and appreciated herself. That's amazing. She's grounded and direct, which makes her stand out from other poets.

She's so self-assured and unapologetic in her poetry, so proud of who she is and how she's made, so lacking in all the self-doubt and mincing about that can be so much a part of a woman's life. She's not afraid to take up space, to take credit for herself and her own worth. A powerful voice indeed.

Those ending lines are the kicker though. Come to think of it, it's often her ending lines that leave me grinning.
I have quite a few favorite poems by Ms. Clifton. But the first one I found was "Homage to My Hips." As a wide-hipped girl myself, I connected with the poem as I struggled to come to peace with my self-image. It's even better when you see Ms. Clifton herself reading it.


Lucille Clifton Reads 'homage to my hips from BillMoyers.com on Vimeo.

B is for Elizabeth Bishop: Raw Heartbreak

It's April! Time for the AtoZ Blogging Challenge!

For those who haven't played along before, the AtoZ Blogging Challenge asks bloggers to post every day during April (excepting Sundays), which works out to 26 days, one for each letter of the alphabet. In my opinion, it's the most fun if you choose a theme.

This will be my 5th year participating.

• In 2014, I wrote about evocative words. 
• In 2015, I wrote about my publication journey and the release of my first novel. 
• In 2016, I wrote about my favorite superheroes. 
• In 2017, I wrote about the places of my heart. 

My theme this year is Poets I Love all about some of the poets whose work has touched me over the years.

For my regular readers, you'll see more than the usual once-a-week posts from me this month. I'm having a great time writing them, so I hope you enjoy reading them, too. Be sure to check out some of the other bloggers stretching their limits this month to share their passions with you, too. With over 400 participants, there is bound to be something you'd love to read.

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Elizabeth Bishop won her place in my heart with a single, perfect poem: "One Art." It's a poem I come back to again and again. It *really* speaks to me. I wrote a paper for grad school on this poem, a good one that my professor liked.

 Look at my scrawl all over that thing-I was, and am, in love with this poem. This poem is so deep and layered and amazing, I feel incoherent even trying to explain why it’s so amazing.

If you’ve ever tried to write a villanelle, then you know what a challenge it is to use the repeats well, to make sure they deepen and change and subvert each time they reappear. No one has ever impressed me more than Elizabeth Bishop with this form.

“The art of losing isn’t hard to master” doesn’t stand out on its own. It’s not one of those ooh and ahh kinds of poetic lines. But it’s the crux of this poem. Each time she repeats it, I hear Bishop lying to herself, trying to convince herself that she can learn to master losing, that if you do it enough, it won’t hurt so much. Like its a matter of warming up the muscles so you don’t pull anything on your run.

The first time, it’s a line about self help: I mastered losing and you can do it too! Here in just a few easy lessons, I’ll teach you how. She begins with small losses that aren’t too painful: door keys and time. The tone is glib and blithe.

Then the losses deepen, get more personal. That mother’s watch. But she still feigns humor. They’re just things, it’s not a real disaster.

Then they get large, hyperbolic even: houses, cities, realms, a continent! Surely if you can lose something that large, then the small losses don’t matter.

Then we get to you.

I can feel the hysteria bubbling under the claims that it’s all going to be fine. Really, the pain is so bad the poem itself is falling apart, with parentheticals and em dashes, even italics. The control is gone. And my heart breaks with Bishop’s.

What a heartbreakingly wonderful work.

A is for Adrienne Rich: Passionate Skepticism

It's April! Time for the AtoZ Blogging Challenge!

For those who haven't played along before, the AtoZ Blogging Challenge asks bloggers to post every day during April (excepting Sundays), which works out to 26 days, one for each letter of the alphabet. In my opinion, it's the most fun if you choose a theme.

This will be my 5th year participating.

• In 2014, I wrote about evocative words. 
• In 2015, I wrote about my publication journey and the release of my first novel. 
• In 2016, I wrote about my favorite superheroes. 
• In 2017, I wrote about the geographical places of my heart. 

My theme this year is Poets I Love all about some of the poets whose work has touched me over the years.

For my regular readers, you'll see more than the usual once-a-week posts from me this month. I'm having a great time writing them, so I hope you enjoy reading them, too. Be sure to check out some of the other bloggers stretching their limits this month to share their passions with you, too. With over 400 participants, there is bound to be something you'd love to read.

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Adrienne Rich is one of the first unapologetically feminist writers to come onto my personal radar. I found her work when I was a college student, studying creative writing alongside my education, Spanish, and English courses. That's when I found a lot of the poets that I still hold dear in my heart.

What drew me to Rich's work, though, wasn't her feminism. I was still awkwardly feminist then, hadn't claimed the label, even though I held the ideals. No, what I fell in love with in Rich's poetry was the bold stark statements that she made with utter sureness. They felt like proclamations, like truths.

Lines like: 

"Lying is done with words and also with silence." (from a speech-turned-essay titled “Women and Honor: Some Notes on Lying.” 

"A thinking woman sleeps with monsters. The beak that grips her, she becomes." (from “Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law") 

“It will take all your heart, it will take all your breath
It will be short, it will not be simple” (from "Final Notations")

Some poets I read for the small picture, the individual detail, the personal. Adrienne Rich I read for the big picture, the philosophy, the sweeping vista, the same way I read Ursula LeGuin in prose: writers of IDEAS rather than writers of MOMENTS.

The older I get, the more I find in Rich's work that speaks for and to me. I ran across this quote from her as I was looking at her work for this post, and I think it summarizes that philosophy pretty darn well, a philosophy that is becoming my own, as well:

From Credo of a Passionate Skeptic: "I began as an American optimist, albeit a critical one, formed by our racial legacy and by the Vietnam War...I became an American Skeptic, not as to the long search for justice and dignity, which is part of all human history, but in the light of my nation's leading role in demoralizing and destabilizing that search, here at home and around the world. Perhaps just such a passionate skepticism, neither cynical nor nihilistic, is the ground for continuing."

Why Read Poetry?

Most of the people I bother talking to are readers. Honestly, I have a hard time relating to people who aren't. But even among my reader-friends, very few seem to read poetry.

For a lot of folks, this stems from a negative experience in their schooling, a time when they were asked to read a poem written in archaic language and somehow pull out of it the esoteric thing the teacher wanted. It gives people the impression that poetry is difficult, purposefully obtuse, and assuredly not for them. Experiences like that make a person feel stupid or resentful, which can turn them off an entire art form, which is a shame, since poetry can be a light in the darkness.

Appreciating poetry, moreso than other types of writing, does lend itself to discussion of technique, style, and the tools used to convey the feelings, establish tone, and elicit emotional response. Much like visual art, though, none of that is a requirement. You don't have to understand fully everything an artist (or poet) is doing to feel something about a piece (or poem).

So, here's a few reasons why I read poetry, and think that you should, too:

1. Brevity: Even a long poem is far shorter than a short story, novella, novel, or even some blog posts. You can fit a bit of art into your day with only a few minutes for reading.

2.  Me Too!: Poetry is often intensely personal, a person laying bare the happenings and feelings of their lives for all to see. But it is also intensely universal. When a poem really speaks to me it's usually because I feel a resonance with the experience or feelings captured in the verse. It can be such a relief and a comfort to find that someone else thinks or feels what you do, and enlightening to find it expressed more articulately than you might be able to do for yourself.

3. Word Nerd: I'm in love with language. A beautiful turn of phrase or unusual description can set my head spinning in the most lovely way, like being expertly kissed on the dance floor.

4. A New Way of Thinking: Poets describe things differently than other writers (though the best of prose writing pulls from poetic imagery as well). So many poems have opened my eyes in a new way, had me thinking of something differently than I ever have before.

I'll be writing about 26 of my favorite poets and their work in April. My all-time favorite poet is Emily Dickinson. Do you have one? I'd love to hear about them in the comments below. 

AtoZ Challenge Theme Reveal: P is for Poetry

It's only a couple of weeks until April, which means it's almost time for the AtoZ Blogging Challenge. I've played along for a few years now. The idea is that you pick a theme and write 26 blog posts about it (one for each letter of the alphabet) posting them in April every day except Sundays (which amounts to 26 days!). 

In 2014, I wrote about evocative words. 

In 2015, I wrote about my publication journey and the release of my first novel. 

In 2016, I wrote about my favorite superheroes. 

In 2017, I wrote about the places of my heart. 

And now, for 2018, I am going to write about: my favorite poets!

I like to take on something new each year, a little thing I promise myself I will do every day, and in 2017, that was my poem-a-day project. Not a project where I wrote poems, but in which I read a poem every day and posted about what it meant to me. The collection is still up, and I'm adding to it when the mood strikes me or when I find a poem I really have something to say about.  (This year's 365 project is #dailylight in which I post about one good thing in my life every day). 

I really enjoyed getting poetry back into my life, and having remembered how much I love it, I'll be talking about 26 of my favorite poets for the A to Z Blogging Challenge. (Plus April is National Poetry Month, so it's just kind of perfect!)

Here's my tentative list of poets, though I reserve the right to change my mind should I think of another one I'd rather explore here on my blog. I'm cheating a little bit by letting myself use the letter for *either* the poet's first or last name. That really helped, as there were some pile-ups on certain letters!

Adrienne Rich

Bishop, Elizabeth

Clifton, Lucille

Dove, Rita

Emily Dickinson

Ferlinghetti, Lawrence

Gluck, Louise

Hughes, Langston

Irwin, Mark

John Donne

Kumin, Maxine

Li-Young Lee

Michelle Boisseau

Neruda, Pablo

Oliver, Mary

Poe, Edgar Allan

Qabbani, Nizar

Robert Browning

St. Vincent-Millay, Edna

Teasdale, Sara

Unamuno, Miguel de

Vallejo, Cesar

Walt Whitman

XJ Kennedy

Yusef Komanyakaa

Zaran, Lisa

So, here's hoping you'll join me in exploring some great poets and their words, as well as checking out some of the other wonderful themed collections in this challenge.

Iterations of Frankenstein

When eighteen year old Mary Shelley had a bad dream that turned into a book, she couldn't have imagined the cultural phenomenon that would emerge from her pages. She created an entire genre: science fiction. The ripples that she started are still spinning out two hundred years later.

Frankenstein is one of those stories that everyone just *knows*, even if they've never read it. It's been adapted in hundreds of way, re-imagined, used in homage, served as inspiration for so many pieces of art of one kind or another. Clearly, we're not done with this story yet.

My first introduction to the story probably came through the celebration of Halloween and all the masks and television specials featuring some version of the monster. The version of the monster enacted by Boris Karloff was already imprinted on the world well before I was born: square head, visible black stitching, metal bolts on the neck, greenish flesh, stiff walk and all. I can't remember when I didn't know that iconic image.

I eventually saw all the old movie versions on cable television: Karloff's, Chaney's, Lugosi's, Lee's. I drank in Young Frankenstein and the monster's romp with Abbott and Costello. I loved Lurch, Herman Munster, and all the cartoon versions of the monster from Scooby Doo to the Groovieee Goolies. The monster has been played for horror, for pathos, and for laughs, and he's effective in all those roles. If a story is riffing on Frankenstein in some way, I'm sure to give it a try.

I was in college before I read the original book, and like many a reader, I was astonished at the difference between the monster Mary Shelley wrote and the one we know from popular culture. The more sensitive and articulate creature has been making a resurgence. I recently watched the Penny Dreadful television series and The Frankenstein Chronicles, both of which give the monster voice.

I've read it a couple of times since.

I'm still not sure what it is about this storyline that draws me in so. Is it the mad science elements? The abandonment pathos? The misunderstood nature of the creature itself? Maybe it's something deeper, something I feel at a more symbolic level, something about motherhood or the nature of creation or the boundary between life and death.

Any other fans out there? What's your favorite version of the story?

IWSG: Celebration Time

It's the first Wednesday again, which means it's time for the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop. The March 7 question - How do you celebrate when you achieve a writing goal/ finish a story?

Be sure to check out our awesome hosts after you see what I have to say:  Mary Aalgaard, Bish Denham,Jennifer Hawes, Diane Burton, and Gwen Gardner!

So, this is one I'm kind of bad at. 

My to-do list is always excessively long, and that can mean that I don't take time to celebrate what I've finished. Instead, I just turn left and pick up the next item on my list. 

But I do go back and reflect from time to time, and it can be a real boost to see what I've actually done, especially if I was too busy to appreciate it while it was happening. For example, I was feeling like I hadn't been productive as an author in 2017, until I wrote my end of year reflection and realized I'd done quite a lot, actually!

In fact, it's one of my goals for 2018 to celebrate more, to pat myself on the back for a job well done. That's part of what's so great about this blog hop. The commenters are always so supportive and kind, coming with a heart to help and encourage. There's not enough of that in the world, maybe especially in the writing world, where the work can be solitary. 

A few ideas for celebrating accomplishments: posting a happy dance video about the good thing, going out with someone you love for your favorite gastronomic treat, letting yourself write your play project as a rewarding for having the discipline to stick with and finish your other project, calling your sister (work for me, anyway), giving yourself a little non productive time to goof off completely. 

How about you? How do you celebrate the good things in your writing life or other creative endeavors?