Susan Rich's Blog, page 4

Poems, Poets, and Posterity

From the ticker-tape of cable news to the New York Times obituary to the on-line tweets and postings, it seems the country is mourning the death of the beloved poet, Mary Oliver. I came of age, poetically speaking, in the late 1980's and the first single collection of poems I ever bought was Mary Oliver's House of Light at the Grollier Poetry Bookshop.

I went home to my small apartment (situated on a traffic island between Bow Street and Arrow to read her work. I owned a few other books of poetry --- Elizabeth Bishop, Edna St. Vincent Millay and Adrienne Rich (no relation) but this was different.

           There is only one question:

how to love this world.

I remember that line so well. Could a poem teach this? Was there a way to find one's place in the world so strongly that you could embrace it fully? Be a bride to amazement, as Oliver later said?

I heard her speak at Seattle University about five years ago. She was as generous a speaker as I have ever heard. She told us how she trains herself to write and how she's kept going over the long haul.

Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Write about it.

These lines are imprinted on my course syllabus and I hope, give my students the sense that poetry is for all of us. They worry so much that they are not creative enough, that their vocabulary isn't as big as the universe. I try to tell them that they just have to enjoy; just have to have a conversation with themselves. I need to share more Mary Oliver with them.

Here's a recent interview with Oliver that I read today. It's time to go out for a walk.

Extended Outlook for 2019 - Tuxedo Cats, Sabbatical Look Back, and Happiness

My black and white tuxedo cat with milk-dipped paws is fast asleep in the other room. He is more interested in actions than in words with food coming in a close second. Poetry is pretty far down his list. Getting a job doesn't even enter his mind.

Tomorrow I return to work after an extended break which had me writing full-time, traveling to Morocco, and generally feeling more myself. I exercised more, read more, ate healthier, and was a kinder friend and lover. My goal is to keep things going in this direction even as I enter back into the work world.

Tonight this poem reminds me that even when time is short, I can take 5 minutes and watch the sky, study the Olympics outside my window and check out the morning bird population which changes daily. If you are a teacher or a professor, a student or colleague---may it all go well tomorrow.



How I Would Paint Happiness

Something sudden, a windfall,
a meteor shower. No—
a flowering tree releasing
all its blossoms at once,
and the one standing beneath it
unexpectedly robed in bloom,
transformed into a stranger
too beautiful to touch.

—Lisel Mueller, from “Imaginary Paintings.”

Extended Outlook for 2019 - Tuxedo Cats,

My black and white tuxedo cat with milk-dipped paws is fast asleep in the other room. He is more interested in actions than in words with food coming in a close second. Poetry is pretty far down his list. Getting a job doesn't even enter his mind.

Tomorrow I return to work after an extended break which had me writing full-time, traveling to Morocco, and generally feeling more myself. I exercised more, read more, ate healthier, and was a kinder friend and lover. My goal is to keep things going in this direction even as I enter back into the work world.

Tonight this poem reminds me that even when time is short, I can take 5 minutes and watch the sky, study the Olympics outside my window and check out the morning bird population which changes daily. If you are a teacher or a professor, a student or colleague---may it all go well tomorrow.


How I Would Paint Happiness

Something sudden, a windfall,
a meteor shower. No—
a flowering tree releasing
all its blossoms at once,
and the one standing beneath it
unexpectedly robed in bloom,
transformed into a stranger
too beautiful to touch.

—Lisel Mueller, from “Imaginary Paintings.”

PBN for Blog Post Number One Thousand - 1,000

I still remember walking across campus with my friend Stephanie as she explained to me about this new idea in the tech world: Blogging. Why would anyone choose to write journal entries that would be shared with the world? It was like leaving your journal on the bus or better yet, giving a stranger specific access to your thoughts. What a weird idea, I thought; it will never catch on I told her.

And here I am in my ninth year of Blogging at Blog Post Number 1,000. How did that happen?

The truth is, I do remember why I started. I wanted the casual and low stakes world that blogging provides. As a poet, it's too easy to fuss over each comma and semi-colon. I wanted to see what would happen if I published work that didn't need to be polished to a high sheen. I also had a very practical reason: The Alchemist's Kitchen, my third book was about to be published and I had no idea how to publicize it. Friends of mine, Kelli Russell Agodon and January O'Neil had been blogging for years and finding real connection with other poets through the process. I thought I'd give it a try. 


Blogging allowed me to connect with other poets and writers, many of us just becoming familiar with this thing called Publicity. We did virtual poetry tours interviewing each other when our books came out and sharing poems that we loved from dead mentor poets (Elizabeth Bishop, Denise Levertov) as well as from work just appearing in journals. We wrote articles on how to organize a poetry reading for optimum success and shared information on favorite writing retreats. In other words, we were creating a network of poets who were neither academics or poet rockstars --- anyone with access to a laptop, with access to a library was invited to the party.

It still fills me with absolute delight to receive comments on a post or notice that I have readers in India or Ireland. And while it is true that I am no longer a seven-day-a-week blogger as I was in the beginning, blogging is still something I believe in and enjoy. How else am I going to share a new poem or poet with hundreds or thousands (usually hundreds) of people at once. 

And for a poem that surprises me each time, which seems just right for the holiday season I offer you

Eggplant by Peter Balakian, originally published in the New Yorker and at the moment posted on my refrigerator with a magnet from Slovenia. 


I loved the white moon circles
and the purple halos,

on a plate as the salt sweat them.

The oil in the pan smoked like bad
days in the Syrian desert—

when a moon stayed all day—

when morning was a purple
elegy for the last friend seen—

when the fog of the riverbank
rose like a holy ghost.

My mother made those white moons sizzle
in some egg wash and salt—

some parsley appeared    to continue reading click here---
Until next time and blog post 1001...

Celebrating Groundhog Day with Poetry~South Lake Union

Groundhogs listening to poetry in FebruaryGroundhog Day is a holiday that I love to celebrate. My only question used to be how? Now there's an answer. This year Kelli Russell Agodon and I will be leading a one-day poetry Mini Retreat in Seattle whether these critters see their shadows or not.

One of the wonderful things about Seattle winters is that by February, they are almost over. The Daphne in my garden will be in full bloom as will the early blossoming cherry trees one yard over. If you want a weekend getaway in February, Seattle might be just the place!

This is our 7th year offering a generative workshop in the morning and a special topics salon in the afternoon. These workshops are organized for everyone from the beginning writer to the well published poet. Each year the mix is diverse and energizing.

For 5 Interesting Facts on Ground Hog Day, click here.

Saturday, February 2, 2019
South Lake Union, Seattle

NEW! ​  Generating New Poems:
10 am – 1  pm

The Seattle Renaissance: Generating Poems in the New Poetic Climate  10 - 1 pm  
Seattle is experiencing an incredible poetry renaissance; let’s be part of the new surge of energy! We will spend the morning drafting pieces from a variety of new prompts. You will leave with the start of 5-7 new poems. Creativity and generosity abound!
 $112

NEW!    Thinking About the Next Book

Demystifying the Manuscript: Some Assembly Required  2 – 4 pm. This hands-on class includes several new strategies for organizing a book of poems based on the initial chapters of our new craft book! You will leave with new ideas for your title, section ordering (or not) and a free prepublication chapter to take-home. Book salon with your concerns answered also included. 
$112


Or let's spend the day together, you can take both classes for a discounted
​$196 total

Number of participants limited 

NOTE: Once you are registered, you will receive an email within 48 hours of confirmation of your payment as well as a note of what to bring and directions to the retreat (which is served by public transportation and lots of parking) in the South Lake Union neighborhood. Hope to see you there!

____________________________
​
TO PAY BY CHECK:
Send a check for $112 or $196 to:
Kelli Agodon / Mini Retreat
PO Box 1524
Kingston, WA 98346

To pay with PayPal and for more information please checkout our website. 

Best Holiday Present for Poets: Rewilding by January Gill O'Neil

January Gil O'Neil reading at the Old South Church, BostonTwo years ago, I wrote a post overflowing with admiration for a January Gil O'Neil poem and then added a prompt to go with it on this site.  What unmitigated joy to see this same poem in the brand new pages of Rewilding, just out from Cavaan Kerry Press.

If Sharon Olds and Robert Hayden had a love child, I think it would be January O'Neil. She employs the smooth, shiny surface of a Sharon Olds poem with the more emotionally nuanced and extended outlook of poet Robert Hayden (think "Water Lillies" and "Those Winter Sundays"). Here are two poems so you can decide for yourself.




Now on sale at Cavaan Kerry Press

On Being Told I Look Like FLOTUS, New Year's Eve Party 2016
Deep in my biceps I know it’s a complement, just as
I know this is an all-black-people-look-alike moment.
So I use the minimal amount of muscles to crack a smile.
All night he catches sight of me, or someone like me, standing
next to deconstructed cannoli and empty bottles of Prosecco.
And in that moment, I understand how little right any of us have
to be whoever we are—the constant tension
of making our way in this world on hope and change.
You’re working your muscles to the point of failure,
Michelle Obama once said about her workout regimen,
but she knows we wear our history in our darkness, in our patience.
A compliment is a complement—this I know, just as the clock
will always strike midnight and history repeats. This is how
I can wake up the next morning and love the world again.


Hoodie


A gray hoodie will not protect my sonfrom rain, from the New England cold. 
I see the partial eclipse of his face as his head sinks into the half-dark 
and shades his eyes. Even in ourquiet suburb with its unlocked doors, 
I fear for his safety—the darkest child on our street in the empire of blocks. 
Sometimes I don’t know who he is anymore traveling the back roads between boy and man. 
He strides a deep stride, pounds a basketball into wet pavement. Will he take his shot 
or is he waiting for the open-mouthed orange rim to take a chance on him? 
I sing his name to the night, ask for safe passage from this borrowed body into the next 
and wonder who could mistake him for anything but good.
Rewilding is on sale this week at Cavaan Kerry Press. It's the best present of the season.


January Gill O’Neil is the author of Misery Islands and Underlife, published by CavanKerry Press. She is the executive director of the Massachusetts Poetry Festival, an assistant professor of English at Salem State University, and a board of trustees’ member with the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) and Montserrat College of Art. A Cave Canem fellow, January’s poems and articles have appeared in the Academy of American Poet’s Poem-A-Day series, American Poetry Review, New England Review, and Ploughshares, among others. In 2018, January was awarded a Massachusetts Cultural Council grant, and is the John and Renée Grisham Writer in Residence for 2019-2020 at the University of Mississippi, Oxford. She lives with her two children in Beverly, Massachusetts.

The Joy of a Do-It-Yourself Writing Retreat

Fresh tulips is a favorite way to treat myself A friend just texted me that she is on her way to her own do-it-herself writing retreat. She rented an air b & b by the water and was happily anticipating writing for the next week. So is a self-generated retreat as good as one those that some organization awards you?

Yes, maybe better.

I have been "awarded" several lovely writing retreats across the country and even internationally (Ireland, Spain) and I have "awarded" myself many self-generated retreats as well. In recent years I have chosen the do-it-yourself type. Here's why:

1. At my own writing retreat there's no social pressure to have dinner with the group at 6:00 pm. I am my own group. If I am really working than I can simply keep going. I am not tied to a schedule. At one writing retreat I attended we were expected to show-up at the same time for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It didn't leave much time for deep contemplation.

2. At my retreat, I claim the best room! Place is important to me. I love a room with a view, most preferably, of water. I can choose the exact location of where I want to be. Usually, I choose a place that's an easy day's drive from my house. I can throw everything I might need into my car (favorite pillow, coffee cup, yoga mat...) and not have to worry about airports or luggage constraints.

3. My retreat allows for no awkward social interactions. I don't have to worry about the resident on the verge of a nervous break down or listen to the resident at dinner who never stops talking (or singing or crying). This might sound a little harsh but at a residency, my only job is to write and to read and to dream. When I am on retreat by myself I usually can spare myself a good deal of drama.

4. Here I am the only one responsible for my happiness. I'll be honest, some days the writing sucks and I really just want to go back to bed. Am I wasting my day trying to get words down on paper? For every three words that I write, I cross out at least two. But there are other days when something magical happens --- and most times --- I get one day of struggle to one day of magic. I have to show-up and be present for both. It's up to me to find my own rhythm. No distractions.

5. The false gods are gone! Too many times I've heard dear writer friends lament not getting into a residency that they've set their hearts on. And the not getting in becomes symbolic of something much larger in their minds.

Yikes---that's so many different kinds of wrong. I've been part of several editorial boards for residency programs, book awards, etc. And here is the truth: The "winning" writers are luckier --- that's all! Their work matches the tastes of the readers / evaluators. I once worked with another judge who discounted all applicants that were academics (why do they need more time off for a residency was her view). The writer could have been the next Sylvia Plath but if she was an academic, nothing else mattered.

Now in my 50's I've learned that life is so horribly short. I don't want to give anyone else the power to decide if I am going to take the time and space to do my writing. No one should have that much power. My advice to you is rent a cheap hotel room in Vegas (yes, writers do this!) or find a modest beach house --- but give yourself this time out of time. A writing retreat is not a privilege as much as it is a necessity for getting deep work done.

And with winter coming, the off-season rates are here. Take a look. Right now.

Simples: The Joy of Reading KateLynn Hibbard's New Book

Kate lyn Hibbard, Poet and ProfessorI have been a huge fan of Kate lyn Hibbard's work since her first book, Sleeping Upside Down, was published in 2006. She followed this up with her luscious collection, Sweet Weight. And now, after way too many years, her third full length collection, Simples,  published by Howling Bird Press has just been released --- a haunting collection of historical poetry inspired by women’s experiences living on the Great Plains frontier. 

This is a book you do not want to miss. And while the music of the lines allows you to feel you are floating across the page, there is also true pathos in the work. Hibbard time travels through the Great Plains employing a variety of personas: healer, teacher, locust swarm and Jewish bride-to-be. In a lesser poet's hands these characters might seem contrived but not in Hibbard's.

Trees bowed over with the weight of them and they ate---
the tall grass the wheat the corn the sunflowers
the oats the barley the buckwheat the bark      
     
                                                                (from Swarm) 

The poems accrue and create a dreamscape of life where the work is unrelenting and the landscape both awe inspiring and cruel. Hibbard's background in Women's Studies (both as a poet and a scholar) is integral to this project. The End Notes allow the reader to understand a time period and landscape that some of us, myself included, may have little experience with and yet the poems transport us:

White cambric petticoat torn from a gown,
White lace refinement on tarpaper walls,
Fashioned from newspaper, cheesecloth, and sheets,
Cut out from calico, brightened with ribbon,
  
                                                               (from Curtains)

A variety of traditional and received forms create a collage effect that keeps the collection constantly surprising in the best way. Hibbard is a lyrical private detective conjuring the lives of women whose struggles and joys are largely unknown (at least to this reader).

And because many of the poems work in sequences and I dislike excerpting poems so, here is one poem in its entirety.

Orthography, 1895

Before we came to Kansas girls like me
had to fein being vain. I spend all day
on the claim, drive horses like a teamster.
Miss Sims says my prospects have been razed, but
this place is in my veins. I'm up before 
the sun's rays pass the weather vane, feign to beat
any man at my trade. When harvest
keeps me from Sabbath, the fields are my fane.

I love this poem, maybe more importantly, I believe this poem. 

Simples opens up and complicates the lives of these women with new narratives focused on the female body and delivered in voices that are strong, varied, and nuanced.

And because we notice these things but often they go unsaid, Simples also has a gorgeous cover. 
Treat the poet in your life, treat yourself.

Thanksgiving Poem For the Ages, Especially Today

Ice Bubble Hotel in Iceland
I love how this poem shifts from awe, to what is awful, to what is benign, to what is all around us. Somehow, in magical Merwin fashion, this poem feels as if it were written right here, right now.

You can read more about W.S. Merwin and his poem "Thanks" by going to the Poetry Foundation website or you can simply read his poem here, now.

ThanksBY W. S. MERWINListen

with the night falling we are saying thank you

we are stopping on the bridges to bow from the railings

we are running out of the glass rooms

with our mouths full of food to look at the sky

and say thank you

we are standing by the water thanking it

standing by the windows looking out

in our directions



back from a series of hospitals back from a mugging

after funerals we are saying thank you

after the news of the dead

whether or not we knew them we are saying thank you



over telephones we are saying thank you

in doorways and in the backs of cars and in elevators

remembering wars and the police at the door

and the beatings on stairs we are saying thank you

in the banks we are saying thank you

in the faces of the officials and the rich

and of all who will never change

we go on saying thank you thank you



with the animals dying around us

taking our feelings we are saying thank you

with the forests falling faster than the minutes

of our lives we are saying thank you

with the words going out like cells of a brain

with the cities growing over us

we are saying thank you faster and faster

with nobody listening we are saying thank you

thank you we are saying and waving

dark though it is

Auberge Ayouze Near Asfalou in the High Atlas, Morocco

There are several more appropriate places to begin a story of beauty than in the bathroom but this isn't just any bathroom! This rose-colored space has a view of the Atlas Mountains which you can see as you shower. The photograph looks more like a still life painting than it does a literal place to wash the body. For me, this image also calls up a sense of wonder and re-seeing of the simple life which is what Auberge Ayouze is all about. "Enjoy your life" is the phrase that Idriss, the innkeeper, repeats to me often. He suggests watching the sunrise over the mountains from my terrace. And so the next morning, wrapped in a blanket, I do.



Watching the sun is a slow, meditative process. At first I am checking my watch, hurry up sunrise! And finally I relax into the morning. The star studded night sky gives way ever so slowly to the light. I watch groups of women make their way down to the olive groves.


This is the region where Lawrence of Arabia was filmed and more recently, three episodes of Game of Thrones. Take away the satellite dishes and cell towers, the world here has not changed much in centuries. I know that's a simplification of the life I saw only peripherally --- the marketplaces, the kasbah, the public baths.



I listen to the women sing as they work together harvesting the olives in the olive groves. You can hear then shaking the tree branches. Across the road from the auberge, I walk down the path to the river. When we return, breakfast is served on the upper terrace. Fresh squeezed orange juice and strong espresso, local dates and warm crepes, a selection of jams and cheese.


Before we leave, we drive to Teleouet with Jasmine and Idriss. We see the palace of the pasha and outside of it, the Jewish village which is now a ghost town. The royal movie theater is now closed but Mohamed, our guide, tells us Charlie Chaplin visited here and played golf with the pasha.

While in Morocco we have practiced yoga daily, we have met spice merchants and woodworkers in the souks of Marrakesh and strolled the Marjorelle gardens but nothing compares to our time in the High Atlas at Auberge Ayouze where Berber lives and American lives so easily intertwined. You will find the Auberge in a bend in the road halfway between Assfalou and Ait Benhaddou. Climb the stairs to the terrace and there a new way of life awaits you.