Wendy Brown-Baez's Blog: Wendy's Muse - Posts Tagged "poetry"
Often poems come to me unbidden, when I am not looking. I am quiet, meditative, calm, and suddenly words pop into my mind that beg to be written down. Other times, I am nudged by stimulus that comes from a writing exercise in a group or from a feeling or thought that I want to examine, clarify or process because it is profoundly disturbing or confusing. But sometimes poems come to me out of celebration and hope that rise from the ashes of difficulties. These are transformed by the beauty of words in an effort to extend beyond my self.
The following poem is such a celebration. To know that spring will come, the real spring that will make me forget the days I cursed the blasted cold, the metaphorical spring that will smooth the ragged edges where my heart has been torn, is a gift of the natural cycles of life. To remember, as well, that Mother Bird nudges her young out of the nest so that they can fly is a way to understand something universal when we might feel kicked in the butt by life's circumstances. Enjoy!
On the Edge
I am spring. I am green with an ache to heal,
blossoms unfolding on a slender stem
and sap rising to the sky.
I am mothering that folds over you
feathers soft and warm, sings
a lullaby, teaches you gentle touch and
I am the blood that rises to tumble and
shout, the feel of bared skin and the
lazy itch, to the beach
to the lake, to the west, anywhere
cool and wet. Adventures and
a test of skill, strangers in a strange
land, perhaps fly away to Italy
or descend to the caliente country
of Mexico, live on tacos and grit.
I am the restless craving in the back
of your throat for kisses or maps.
I wave my green lacy hands
and shoo you on, push you
out the nest.
The following poem is such a celebration. To know that spring will come, the real spring that will make me forget the days I cursed the blasted cold, the metaphorical spring that will smooth the ragged edges where my heart has been torn, is a gift of the natural cycles of life. To remember, as well, that Mother Bird nudges her young out of the nest so that they can fly is a way to understand something universal when we might feel kicked in the butt by life's circumstances. Enjoy!
On the Edge
I am spring. I am green with an ache to heal,
blossoms unfolding on a slender stem
and sap rising to the sky.
I am mothering that folds over you
feathers soft and warm, sings
a lullaby, teaches you gentle touch and
I am the blood that rises to tumble and
shout, the feel of bared skin and the
lazy itch, to the beach
to the lake, to the west, anywhere
cool and wet. Adventures and
a test of skill, strangers in a strange
land, perhaps fly away to Italy
or descend to the caliente country
of Mexico, live on tacos and grit.
I am the restless craving in the back
of your throat for kisses or maps.
I wave my green lacy hands
and shoo you on, push you
out the nest.
As we sit in a circle, we are strangers to each other but I anticpate that soon we will be connected, by words, by tears, by laughter, by the revelations that come unexpectedly from this technique of writing. There is power in a circle, writing, reading, and listening with concentrated attention takes us deeper, is healing, is a hand of kindness caressing us even as the old griefs and new fears swell up to be written down and shared. One revelation I had this week-end is that in those moments of crisis when we feel most alone, when we stand on the edge and do not know if we will fly or fall, when we walk the knife edge of despair that could mean life or death, or the quality of our lives or deaths, we really aren't. Someone has experienced this, someone else has been through this, we are always part of the web of life. Will I remember this as I walk my tightrope over the abyss of anger, guilt, fear, remorse, and sorrow? Will I remember to keep my eyes on the goal where YOU, the reader, the audience, the cherished ones who care about me, are waiting with opened arms?
This is one of my writings this week-end, from a prompt of the first line of the poem Happiness
by Jane Kenyon.
There’s no accounting for drunkenness, the kind
that sweeps you off your feet
the second you fall in love.
Falling. That’s the word. Rain
kissing soft petals, a spider
steering toward dinner in his web
or your knees in the sanctuary
falling graceless and needy
onto cold marble or
maybe a wooden kneeler
damp from the peasants who were
here for mass, praying to saints you
do not recognize.
There is no accounting for drunken gratitude,
the boat that skims the waves
across a turquoise bay, as you peer
over the side to see the leaping dolphin
some shoutable tourist has just spotted
or the hand that closes over yours
as you lie in your fatal decline, withered,
ready, hearing the call of the choir
you had signed up for
the day you were born.
This is one of my writings this week-end, from a prompt of the first line of the poem Happiness
by Jane Kenyon.
There’s no accounting for drunkenness, the kind
that sweeps you off your feet
the second you fall in love.
Falling. That’s the word. Rain
kissing soft petals, a spider
steering toward dinner in his web
or your knees in the sanctuary
falling graceless and needy
onto cold marble or
maybe a wooden kneeler
damp from the peasants who were
here for mass, praying to saints you
do not recognize.
There is no accounting for drunken gratitude,
the boat that skims the waves
across a turquoise bay, as you peer
over the side to see the leaping dolphin
some shoutable tourist has just spotted
or the hand that closes over yours
as you lie in your fatal decline, withered,
ready, hearing the call of the choir
you had signed up for
the day you were born.
"Here are poems that are living, breathing things; that invite us into them, welcome us into their elegant, ethereal dance, and walk us across the threshold into sanctuary where we look inward, feed the soul's spark, commune with enlightenment, and transform. Wendy Brown-Baez creates beautiful work in this collection. It's signficant in light of women's issues. It's important. And it's effects are a blessing.
As I introduce you to Ceremonies of the Spirit by Wendy Brown-Baez, I do so first in a spirit of awe because of the natural transformative power Baez possesses as a narrator of the human condition."
--Michael Parker, reviewer for Oranges & Sardines
full review called Poetry and the Art of Empowerment & Healing on page 12 at http://www.poetsandartists.com
As I introduce you to Ceremonies of the Spirit by Wendy Brown-Baez, I do so first in a spirit of awe because of the natural transformative power Baez possesses as a narrator of the human condition."
--Michael Parker, reviewer for Oranges & Sardines
full review called Poetry and the Art of Empowerment & Healing on page 12 at http://www.poetsandartists.com
I am reading Yancy's book about prayer and thinking about my own prayer practice. I pray by lighting candles (I try to have a Guadalupe veladora on my altar) and sitting in calm silence, then articulating what is on my mind. I pray by prostrating myself and weeping and demanding help, succor, comfort, answers. I pray by admitting I don't know, when I can't seem to move along from grief, turmoil, and regret to joy peace, and satisfaction....always enfolded within huge waves of gratitude as I acknowledge my many many blessings.
I pray when I write poetry. It is the language of my heart and soul. I believe it reverberates up to God/dess' ears as much as any words I have been able to directly communicate by prefacing them with "Mother-father God". And it affects me and those who read / hear my words with the power of transformation and consecration. I know the Divine encompasses doubt and pain and frustration. And I know I am headed toward my Good. I believe in the power of words, of art, of creativity to heal and to transform. The poems that take shape on the page are prayers, flames in the darkness, the match to light my lantern. I wave it from the hilltop where I perch to catch the rays of sunrise the very moment they touch the earth and bring us back to light. Or perhaps our lit candles are the sunrise we seek....
Thanks to the Universe for language and the ability to play with language, to not only communicate but to explore the ambiguities, the mysteries, and the troubled waters.
I pray when I write poetry. It is the language of my heart and soul. I believe it reverberates up to God/dess' ears as much as any words I have been able to directly communicate by prefacing them with "Mother-father God". And it affects me and those who read / hear my words with the power of transformation and consecration. I know the Divine encompasses doubt and pain and frustration. And I know I am headed toward my Good. I believe in the power of words, of art, of creativity to heal and to transform. The poems that take shape on the page are prayers, flames in the darkness, the match to light my lantern. I wave it from the hilltop where I perch to catch the rays of sunrise the very moment they touch the earth and bring us back to light. Or perhaps our lit candles are the sunrise we seek....
Thanks to the Universe for language and the ability to play with language, to not only communicate but to explore the ambiguities, the mysteries, and the troubled waters.
My piece of creative non-fiction My Green Card Marriage was published in Wising Up Press' anthology Double Lives, Reinvention, & Those We Leave Behind. I submitted it many months ago; as we all know, it takes a while for an anthology to be put together, from the selection of each poem or piece of prose to the publication. Since then, my husband has passed away. Now both he and Michael are part of my double life that I have left behind. Now once again I reinvent myself, as a widow, as a single woman, as a poet with glorious memories and echoes of the sorrow, loss and grief inherent in the human condition. I feel Alejandro would be proud of this memento of our relationship even though I never shared it with him. I hope you will read the excerpt under my writings and perhaps consider purchasing the anthology, which is filled with intriguing, thought-provoking stories and beautiful poetry.
INTRODUCTIION:
We frown upon double lives, but laud reinvention as the perpetual rebirth of our best self. But are these two states so very different for us as we live them? Are these states so very different for the people who accompany us? The thirty talented authors gathered in this anthology explore these questions from many different perspectives through memoir, story, and poetry and raise some very specific and fascinating ones of their own: What does it mean to understand the numbers tattooed on your father’s arm are not those of an old girlfriend? What does it mean to have the language and the customs of the home be incomprehensible to the larger world in which you are schooled? What does it mean, innocent and illegitimate, to be your mother’s deepest secret? What does it mean to look back on your younger self, who did not cry at her father’s death, or who walked out of her abusive mother’s house without saying goodbye to her baby sister? What does it mean to be responsible for your brother’s death? To discover your husband has a secret sexual life, your father has another son? What does it mean to be kidnapped and develop a second self to survive the ruptures of place, culture, language? To choose a marriage that defi es our sexual conventions? To be so taken with a fictive identity that you no longer know yourself outside it? Through all this wonderful variety, another question rises and answers itself: this sharing is what it means to discover an integrity that doesn’t narrow experience, rather lets it flow through us in all its truth and duplicity, verve and sorrow.
CONTRIBUTING AUTHORS
Edward Beatty•Wendy Brown-Báez•Shireen Campbell*Emilio DeGrazia•Meredith Devney•David Harris Ebenbach•JoanFondell*Emilie George•Lynn Hesse•Eboni Hogan•Yolande House
Stefan Kiesbye•Kerry Langan•Phyllis A. Langton •Katharyn Howd Machan*Maria Nazos•Susan O’Doherty•Deidra K.Razzaque•Carlos Reyes Cassandra Robison•Mary Kay Rummel•Frank Salvidio*Nicholas Samaras•Alexandrina Sergio•Anna Steegmann*Don Thackrey•Sylvie Terespolski•Natalie Haney Tilghman•Heather Tosteson*Judith Turner Yamamoto•Devon Ward-Thommes•Christopher Willard
LIST PRICE: $16.00 To see what discounts are available and to place orders:
WISING UP PRESS BOOKSTORE
http://www.universaltable.org
ISBN: 978-0-9796552-6-5
INTRODUCTIION:
We frown upon double lives, but laud reinvention as the perpetual rebirth of our best self. But are these two states so very different for us as we live them? Are these states so very different for the people who accompany us? The thirty talented authors gathered in this anthology explore these questions from many different perspectives through memoir, story, and poetry and raise some very specific and fascinating ones of their own: What does it mean to understand the numbers tattooed on your father’s arm are not those of an old girlfriend? What does it mean to have the language and the customs of the home be incomprehensible to the larger world in which you are schooled? What does it mean, innocent and illegitimate, to be your mother’s deepest secret? What does it mean to look back on your younger self, who did not cry at her father’s death, or who walked out of her abusive mother’s house without saying goodbye to her baby sister? What does it mean to be responsible for your brother’s death? To discover your husband has a secret sexual life, your father has another son? What does it mean to be kidnapped and develop a second self to survive the ruptures of place, culture, language? To choose a marriage that defi es our sexual conventions? To be so taken with a fictive identity that you no longer know yourself outside it? Through all this wonderful variety, another question rises and answers itself: this sharing is what it means to discover an integrity that doesn’t narrow experience, rather lets it flow through us in all its truth and duplicity, verve and sorrow.
CONTRIBUTING AUTHORS
Edward Beatty•Wendy Brown-Báez•Shireen Campbell*Emilio DeGrazia•Meredith Devney•David Harris Ebenbach•JoanFondell*Emilie George•Lynn Hesse•Eboni Hogan•Yolande House
Stefan Kiesbye•Kerry Langan•Phyllis A. Langton •Katharyn Howd Machan*Maria Nazos•Susan O’Doherty•Deidra K.Razzaque•Carlos Reyes Cassandra Robison•Mary Kay Rummel•Frank Salvidio*Nicholas Samaras•Alexandrina Sergio•Anna Steegmann*Don Thackrey•Sylvie Terespolski•Natalie Haney Tilghman•Heather Tosteson*Judith Turner Yamamoto•Devon Ward-Thommes•Christopher Willard
LIST PRICE: $16.00 To see what discounts are available and to place orders:
WISING UP PRESS BOOKSTORE
http://www.universaltable.org
ISBN: 978-0-9796552-6-5
I am going to throw myself a challenge.
In November, on facebook, someone said: "Let's post something we are grateful for every day and see if we can keep it up until Thanksgiving." They seemed to think it would be hard. But if you think about all the small things that make our lives comfortable, things we take for granted such as hot water or toothpaste, it isn't hard to make a long list. And then there is the beauty around us, the way our bodies give us pleasure, our senses and our minds, art, music, and the gift of creativity. If you add those we care about, those whose lives have inspired ours, those who look out for us, the list can go on for quite a ways.
I think about those who suffer disaster and tragedy: the victims of Katrina; the current nightmare of death, destruction, grief, and despair of Haiti; the endless cycles of violence in the Middle East that impacts almost every single person's life; the rape and torture of young women as sex slaves; the children tied to the rug looms in India. And I am grateful for every breath of freedom and peace that surrounds me. Yes, I do live in the hood and there was a shooting at the Burger King where I had stopped for lunch with my grandson the week before, so don't think I am immune just because I live in America and have the rent paid.
But back to the challenge. My book Ceremonies of the Spirit is a collection of love poems. Not just romantic love, all kinds of love, love of family and special places and longing for the Divine. From erotic to mystical love. And it took me 15 years to compile those poems.
What if I were to write a new love poem every day until Valentine's Day?
I am going to do my best. I am going to post them on my blog and you can read them there (I can add pictures there).
http://www.wendysmuse.blogspot.com
I started with one written from a prompt from the website
http://www.readwritepoem.org.
I added another.
Today I just posted a third.
Check it out. See if I can inspire you to fall in love, write about love, tell someone you love about your love. Husband, wife, sister, brother, child, parent, cousin, uncle, grandma, teacher, bus driver, minister, mail man. Heck, you can say I love you to your neighbor or your dentist or your boss even. Take a chance. We never know what may happen next, what will happen to us next. Spread the love.
In November, on facebook, someone said: "Let's post something we are grateful for every day and see if we can keep it up until Thanksgiving." They seemed to think it would be hard. But if you think about all the small things that make our lives comfortable, things we take for granted such as hot water or toothpaste, it isn't hard to make a long list. And then there is the beauty around us, the way our bodies give us pleasure, our senses and our minds, art, music, and the gift of creativity. If you add those we care about, those whose lives have inspired ours, those who look out for us, the list can go on for quite a ways.
I think about those who suffer disaster and tragedy: the victims of Katrina; the current nightmare of death, destruction, grief, and despair of Haiti; the endless cycles of violence in the Middle East that impacts almost every single person's life; the rape and torture of young women as sex slaves; the children tied to the rug looms in India. And I am grateful for every breath of freedom and peace that surrounds me. Yes, I do live in the hood and there was a shooting at the Burger King where I had stopped for lunch with my grandson the week before, so don't think I am immune just because I live in America and have the rent paid.
But back to the challenge. My book Ceremonies of the Spirit is a collection of love poems. Not just romantic love, all kinds of love, love of family and special places and longing for the Divine. From erotic to mystical love. And it took me 15 years to compile those poems.
What if I were to write a new love poem every day until Valentine's Day?
I am going to do my best. I am going to post them on my blog and you can read them there (I can add pictures there).
http://www.wendysmuse.blogspot.com
I started with one written from a prompt from the website
http://www.readwritepoem.org.
I added another.
Today I just posted a third.
Check it out. See if I can inspire you to fall in love, write about love, tell someone you love about your love. Husband, wife, sister, brother, child, parent, cousin, uncle, grandma, teacher, bus driver, minister, mail man. Heck, you can say I love you to your neighbor or your dentist or your boss even. Take a chance. We never know what may happen next, what will happen to us next. Spread the love.
A poem has breath, pause, rhythm, repetition, word play, imagery, leaps of associations, structure, hyperbole, metaphor, and layers of meaning that create resonnance, take us deeper into emotional nuances, or surprise us with an unpredictable twist. And sometimes the meaning is intuited more than understood.
I asked the students in the afterschool writing workshop what they thought is the pivotal point of the poem
Why I am not a Buddhist by Molly Peacock. It starts:
"I love desire, the state of want and thought
of how to get; building a kingdom in a soul
requires desire." ...
and goes on to say:
"But why is desire suffering?
Because want leaves a world in tatters?
How else but in tatters should a world be?"
The students picked other lines but not these. I asked them to re-read and re-consider these lines. One student raised his hand. "But why does that mean?"
"That's the beauty of poetry," I replied, "Sometimes you can't figure it out logically. Of course we don't want a world that is in tatters. Sometimes a poem makes you think." I didn't want to tell him that yes, the world is in tatters because that is natural, is the unfolding of Divine Nature, is part of the suffering that comes from desire and want which make us alive and splendid, and can be uncomfortable. That Molly Peacock is showing us leaves falling from the tree, hearts breaking from grief and betrayal, shadows on snow, ashes on the hearth, jail bars, separation and doubt, all the things we want to keep whole but cannot. He is young and some things have to be discovered for oneself.
That's why I love poetry. No easy answers. A walk into the labyrinth and standing at the center, awed, humbled, a little dizzy, ready for whatever comes up out of the heart. Back out, with deep slow breaths and steps to the world again, transformed by a glimpse of what we are unable to articulate and yet will spend the rest of our lives in search of the right words.
I asked the students in the afterschool writing workshop what they thought is the pivotal point of the poem
Why I am not a Buddhist by Molly Peacock. It starts:
"I love desire, the state of want and thought
of how to get; building a kingdom in a soul
requires desire." ...
and goes on to say:
"But why is desire suffering?
Because want leaves a world in tatters?
How else but in tatters should a world be?"
The students picked other lines but not these. I asked them to re-read and re-consider these lines. One student raised his hand. "But why does that mean?"
"That's the beauty of poetry," I replied, "Sometimes you can't figure it out logically. Of course we don't want a world that is in tatters. Sometimes a poem makes you think." I didn't want to tell him that yes, the world is in tatters because that is natural, is the unfolding of Divine Nature, is part of the suffering that comes from desire and want which make us alive and splendid, and can be uncomfortable. That Molly Peacock is showing us leaves falling from the tree, hearts breaking from grief and betrayal, shadows on snow, ashes on the hearth, jail bars, separation and doubt, all the things we want to keep whole but cannot. He is young and some things have to be discovered for oneself.
That's why I love poetry. No easy answers. A walk into the labyrinth and standing at the center, awed, humbled, a little dizzy, ready for whatever comes up out of the heart. Back out, with deep slow breaths and steps to the world again, transformed by a glimpse of what we are unable to articulate and yet will spend the rest of our lives in search of the right words.
Writing is the way I love the world. Writing is the way I make sense of life, to sort through its terrors, joys, and challenges, and to reach out and connect to others. Writing is an act of empowerment as I reveal my deepest truths and struggles. It has given me courage to go on despite a descent to the darkest “night of the soul” and it has helped to rekindle my passion for life. Poetry keeps the candle burning, cracks open the darkness, transforms pain into beauty.
I am an eclectic reader from Robert Frost to Joy Harjo, from Rumi to Miguel Hernandez. I love poetry that gives me back a reflection of my heart and soul and poets who share their struggles, doubts, fears, victories and exultations. I collect poetry wherever I can to muse on and to share how the Muse can point to the blessings of living in this strange beautiful world.
I am an eclectic reader from Robert Frost to Joy Harjo, from Rumi to Miguel Hernandez. I love poetry that gives me back a reflection of my heart and soul and poets who share their struggles, doubts, fears, victories and exultations. I collect poetry wherever I can to muse on and to share how the Muse can point to the blessings of living in this strange beautiful world.
Heal the Earth
a celebration in poetry, music and dance of our connection with Mother Earth
with musical interludes by Eunice Collette,
a Blessing Dance by Amy Sabrina,
a blessing by healing facilitators Chrisma McIntyre and Kristin Burich,
and poets Wendy Brown-Baez, Nancy E. Cox,
Didi Koka, Margareth Miller, LouAnn Shepard Muhm,
Amy Unger, and Zilla Way
featuring original artwork by Laurie Langer
Saturday Oct 9th @ 3:00 pm
St Paul Central Library
90 West 4th St
St Paul, MN 55105
free!!!
a celebration in poetry, music and dance of our connection with Mother Earth
with musical interludes by Eunice Collette,
a Blessing Dance by Amy Sabrina,
a blessing by healing facilitators Chrisma McIntyre and Kristin Burich,
and poets Wendy Brown-Baez, Nancy E. Cox,
Didi Koka, Margareth Miller, LouAnn Shepard Muhm,
Amy Unger, and Zilla Way
featuring original artwork by Laurie Langer
Saturday Oct 9th @ 3:00 pm
St Paul Central Library
90 West 4th St
St Paul, MN 55105
free!!!
Wendy's Muse
what comes into my head is not always
what I expected
what I expected
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