Vanessa Shields's Blog, page 57

Q&A WITH JANE CHRISTMAS! Author of ‘Open House – A Life in Thirty-Two Moves’

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This is Jane Christmas. Jane writes memoirs. Her newest book, Open House – A Life in Thirty-Two Moves, had a quiet yet important release yesterday (March 24, 2020). Jane lives in England with the love of her life and their dog.

I met Jane over twenty-five years ago (we were five-years old…I kid. I kid.) She came to Windsor to promote her new book, which at the time was The Pelee Project (her first memoir). I had the opportunity to interview her in her hotel room. I was nervous. She was (is) big-time. A journalist, a mother, strong and independent, Jane was everything I wanted to be when I grew up. Our first conversation began that fateful day and has continued over the years. We’ve stayed connected as each of our writing lives have blossomed. It’s been an honour skipping alongside Jane’s incredible successes, and every once in a while, getting close enough for a tea and a hug!

Open House – A Life in Thirty-Two Moves is Jane’s fifth memoir. At the end of our Q&A, you’ll see a list with links to all her books so you can buy and read each one! As a memoirist, Jane is the real deal. Her quick wit, vulnerable reflections, and open-hearted sharing about her real-life experiences sets her apart. Reading her books is like being in the room with her – sipping tea (or wine), laughing, crying, debating, listening, loving with her. Though she jokes about never writing another memoir after each memoir is published, it’s clear that one of her writing gifts is to ‘write what you know’. This is a line of advice that moves in and out of our writing lives like the scent of each new season on the wind.

Spring is springing – and with it, the publishing world has released Jane’s newest memoir. The cover makes me smile. (You too?)

Here’s what her new book is about:

“My attitude toward houses is the same as it is toward books: you can never have too many. To prove it, I’ve moved 32 times. Those who have been to England know what a delicious smorgasbord of homes the country offers … until  an overcooked housing market ruins the appetite. We viewed 60 homes in a stonking-hot market in 2017, and when house-hunting fatigue hit us, we surrendered to a Victorian terrace house that was overpriced, in need of a total renovation, and that we didn’t even like. As we glumly hunkered down to the task of fixing it up, my mind began churning over all my past homes; the ones I grew up in and the ones I owned, and it got me thinking about where this addiction to homes and to moving began. This memoir isn’t so much about renovating a house as it is about what happens when we run from our past and try to renovate it; how events that occur during the course of our lives can make us uncomfortable settlers, forever craving to restore something we lost long ago.”

(FYI – Stonking is a British term used to emphasize something that’s vast, impressive, over-the-top.)

I can tell you that our email interview is stonking. Let’s begin, shall we?

VS: Congratulations on your brand-spankin’-new book: Open House – A Life in Thirty-Two Moves (Harper Collins, 2020). Your big release day was March 24th! How are you feeling about having another book enter the world? (This is your sixth, correct?)

JC: Why, thank you Vanessa! It’s a pretty surreal experience this time around. It’s my first “dry” book launch (“dry” in the sense that there were no people around except my husband and our dog to celebrate it … and neither are particularly fond of Riesling.) This is such a weird, eerie, frightening time with COVID-19 swirling across the planet.  I hope your family is well and safe, and that goes for anyone who is reading this. Takes something like this for us to appreciate our good fortune, to remind ourselves of our priorities. Like everyone else, I’m constantly checking in with my kids and friends to make sure that they’re safe, and that they are following government protocols and restrictions. In the scheme of things, the release of a new book is pretty low on the totem pole, except for the fact that it might act as a helpful distraction to the house-bound. Oh, I just realised something: a book about houses being read by people who are house-bound! What great timing, eh?

VS: Because we’re living through an unprecedented time of self-isolation right now, I’ll ask you one question in relation to this strange time: how is your creative process affected by this phenomenon?

JC: I hope this does not sound callous, but I am loving this time of silence and consumer enforced suspension. The fact that the entire planet has effectively shut down, that the hype about “what you need to buy now” or the latest celeb gossip, it’s kind of created a level playing field for once. We are all in this together, and none of us is immune to this virus. So on one hand the silence and peace has actually calmed my creative process. On the other hand, I am not sure it’s benefited from it. I’m working on a new manuscript and for the first time EVER I became stalled within minutes of opening it up. I don’t know whether I’ve lost interest in it, or whether my head is too focused on the state of the planet, or what, but I am stalled. No worries. I’ll try again tomorrow or another day.

All to say that disturbances in the Universe do affect my writing.

I’ve had weird dreams lately, and poor sleep, and both those factors do not serve any work well.

VS: When did you get the idea for ‘Open House’? Do you remember your ‘pitch’ to your agent/publisher when you wanted to start writing?

JC: I did not do a pitch. I started writing Open House on January 1, 2018 and gave myself six months, a lot less time than I normally spend writing a book. I love houses so the topic is always in my head, and the writing came naturally. My agent read the manuscript, liked it, lowered it into the publishing pond and two publishers bit. One was HarperCollins’ imprint, Patrick Crean Editions. Patrick loved the story, and he wooed me with his enthusiasm. He had recently worked with Esi Edugyan’s on her award-winning Washington Black, so I was pretty chuffed that someone of Patrick’s calibre was keen on my work.

VS: Did you always want to write non-fiction/memoir books? Tell us about how you’ve become immersed in this genre.

JC: Memoir was not my first choice, but it was the most natural choice.

I began writing slightly humorous first-person stories for the newspapers I worked for, and people responded well to them.

When I wrote the series of columns on Pelee Island for the National Post it was a mercenary act. I was truly exhausted from the hectic life in Toronto and I needed to get away before I had a breakdown. But I also needed the dough, and I didn’t want to burn my journalism bridges, hence the offer to chronicle my lifestyle sabbatical. Once the columns were published and were well-received, a good friend asked when the book version was going to come out. I thought he was mad. I had no intention to write a book, nor did I have the faintest idea how to write one.  But he was adamant that there was a book in those columns, and he created a proposal package that, bless him, he sent around to publishers. That’s how I got my first book contract. After that, the other memoirs followed easily. To be honest, I can’t see myself writing another memoir. Then again, I say that after each one that I write!

VS: What other writing projects are working on? Do you read the genre you’re writing? (If you’re working on memoir, do you read other memoirs?)

JC: There are two questions here, so I will tackle first the second question. I love reading memoirs. I love the form, and I love reading other people’s stories.

That’s the inherent attraction to memoir: peering into another person’s life and learning from another’s perspective about navigating aspects of life with which you might be struggling. Memoirs are about insight and resilience, and they are educational as well as inspiring.

I also read other genres, mainly fiction, especially historical fiction, because I’m writing a work of historical fiction right now. Reading various genres helps my writing because I pick up ideas on how to articulate those thoughts I am struggling to explain. An author once told me that she was working on a book and reading like mad. And I thought, ‘Why are you reading when you’re writing?’ And then I got it.

You just learn so much from reading widely, and you get a deeper sense of expression that informs your work. Poetry, fiction, biography, memoir. Everything offers a chance to learn to be human, and to improve your skill as a writer.

I’m currently working on a novel—historical fiction. I’ve been writing and shaping and refining and editing it for about 6 years. If I’m not working on that, I work on some other writing—another novel, an essay. I’m also helping a few friends write the story of their rapes to help them process the trauma and see themselves more as the victor than the victim of that damaging experience.

VS: Tell us about your creative posse – that is, those folks (living or passed) who give your daily encouragement and inspiration.

JC: Gosh, I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t have a creative posse. I’m a pretty isolated writer. I’m in touch with you, Vanessa, and we have inspired one another and bitched to one another about the business and life in general, but in terms of a writing buddy, I don’t have one. I am very shy about my writing, an odd confession from one who writes memoir. The only person who reads my writing before publication is my agent. I really want to expand that aspect of my writing though—I want a posse!!—but at the same time I feel guilty about intruding on someone’s valuable time to say, ‘Hey, read my work!’ Still, I must work on pulling together a literary posse.

VS: What is a day-in-the-life of Jane Christmas the writer like?

JC: Haha! Stand by to be bored! I’m awakened at 6 or 6:30 by our Yorkie Pluto who wanders over to my side of the bed and launches himself against the mattress for his morning stretch. I used to wake up at 5 or 5:30 to write, but now we have a dog, and my writing routine has changed. By 6:45 Pluto and I are out the door for a walk. During this period of self-isolation we are allowed out for exercise once a day so I truly value that morning walk. We’re home by 7:15, I get Pluto his breakfast, and I make mine. I take a quick look at emails, listen to the news, make tea, and then I write till noon. After lunch, I check emails again or FaceTime with my kids or friends. After that, it’s back to writing or reading. At 4:30, I close my laptop and join my husband for a chat, a read of the paper, or as is the case lately catching up on TV updates concerning the virus. After the 6pm news, I cook dinner, we watch TV or read. By 10:30 or 11 I’m in bed and I fall asleep quickly.

There are a few volunteer gigs I do throughout the week, which sadly have been suspended due to the virus: On Mondays, I mentor a woman who is learning to read. She’s about my age (mid 60s), and it is hard to imagine one going through life and raising kids without learning how to read. But she is making great progress. On Thursdays, I do a shift at a local charity shop in the morning, and take a Pilates class in the afternoon. I also bake squares each week for our local pub’s Sunday roast dinner, the proceeds of which go to a hospice.

My baking is strictly Canadian—I do Nanaimo bars and butter tart squares—because no one here in the UK has heard of either delicacies.

My butter tart squares have earned the name “The Erection Special” after some guy said they were so delicious he actually became aroused. It’s an image I would have preferred not to have in my head.

VS: Do you enjoy having a book launch/tour? How do you feel about this part of the writing life – getting ‘out’, doing readings/events, and meeting fans?

JC: My book tour for Open House was cancelled/postponed due to the pandemic. It’s hoped some of these can be rescheduled for October. It feels weird not to do the dog-and-pony show, but it is also a blessing. I’m not comfortable with self-promotion. It’s an exposure I do not welcome, which sounds strange coming from a memoirist. But many writers feel the same. We’d all like to be Elena Ferrante and have our books come out and sell like gangbusters without us having to do one interview!

While I am uneasy with book tours, I recognise the obligation to get out there and stand up in public and read my work. It’s a sort of creative accountability. An assertion of authorship. It is fun to meet fans and engage with readers; it delivers a lovely buzz.

I’ve had some really kind letters and emails from them. It takes courage and time to write to an author whose book you liked or didn’t like, and I honour that by responding to each one. There are authors who don’t write back to fans because they say they’re too busy. How arrogant! How hard is it to write, “Thanks so much for taking the time and effort to write to me. Glad you enjoyed my work and that you felt moved to tell me so.”  The bonus of some of these interactions with fans is that a few of them have become lovely friends. How cool is that?

VS: What book(s) are you currently reading that you’d like to suggest we read as well?

JC: I have been on a reading binge for the last few months. We’re not quite three months into the year and I’ve read about two dozen books. Off the top of my head the memorable ones are: Little, by Edward Carey; We Are Completely Beside Ourselves, by Karen Joy Fowler; Olive Kitteridge, by Elizabeth Strout; The Year of the Monkey, by Patti Smith; Albatross by Terry Fallis; and Golden Hill, by Francis Spufford.

VS: Are you a member of a writer’s group or book club?

JC: I’m too self-conscious to join a writer’s group, and I have not yet found a sympatico book club that suits my schedule and temperament.

VS: Writers are always asking other writers about ‘advice’ – do you think it’s a good thing to ask for advice? Why or why not?

JC: Do you mean asking advice from other writers about something you’re working on? I see no reason not to ask. But it wouldn’t be something I’d do. I’m very conscious about sucking up someone’s time. But I do get asked for advice and I am happy to offer anything I can.

VS: Do you have an agent? Do you think it’s a good idea to try and get an agent?

JC: These days, I’m not sure many writers can reach publishers without an agent. It’s a shame. Many literary agencies operate like doctor’s offices—rosters of hundreds of clients and scant individual attention. You’re just one in the herd. You certainly don’t get the sort of career-building guidance and plotting that you are led to believe you’ll receive when you sign with an agent. That level of attention kicks in only when you are super successful—when you least require it. It’s very frustrating. I apologise for sounding cynical, but there you are.

VS: Is there a place in the world you’d love to go to and write? Have you been there yet? If you have, tell us about it. If not, what is your writing goal when you get there?

JC: Several years ago I was in San Gimignano, Italy. I saw a hotel and immediately thought, “This is exactly the place I would love to write.”  It’s still a desire.

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VS: Why do you write? A big, deep question!!

JC: It’s part therapy, part desire to be heard. I was ignored growing up, or rather what I had to say was never heard. And so I developed a distinct lack of comfort with self- expression: I either withdrew into silence or I yelled and swore. There was no in-between. My parents chided me for being either over-emotional or mousy and dull. There were many contradictory messages during my childhood.

Memoir writing has been a way for me to process my past and to understand myself, to make peace with who I am. And it’s given me a bit of a platform where I can be heard now.

I actually wrote Incontinent on the Continent as a way to get my mother to listen to me without talking over me and swatting away my ideas. She read it and wanted to sue me, so not exactly the outcome I wanted. When I wrote And Then There Were Nuns, I really wanted her to read it as a way to atone for some of the bitterness in Incontinent. By then, I had a better understanding of the psychology of my parents, and I wanted her to be aware of that. I offered to let her read the manuscript but she said she’d wait until the book came out. She died before it did.

VS: Who is the one person you always want to read your books? (Alive or not!)

JC: There are three people – my kids. The hope is that if they read my work they will glean something about their own history and psychological makeup. I would have loved my dad to read my books but he died before I became a published author.

VS: Finally, what is your favourite curse word?

JC: I’m trying hard not to curse any more. It’s not attractive, especially at my age. My husband does not use profanity; neither did my father. When I became acquainted with nuns and lived in convents during my discernment for religious life it was a relief to discover that many nuns and priests swear. People who possess little patience or whose self-expression has been stifled fall naturally into swearing. I try to exercise self-control, but if something or someone gets up in my grill, the word that bursts from my lips is, “Fuck!”

Thank you, Jane, for your humour, honesty and wisdom! I have to agree with ‘Fuck’ being a really powerful curse word. It’s efficient, at least for me. Though I try to only swear when my kids aren’t around. That’s a whole other conversation!

In any case, readers, I’m sure you’re excited to purchase all of Jane’s books, so here are the links I promised you! (Please note, the links I’ve provided are only options. It is the perfect time to order these books through local bookstores and/or request them from your local libraries. Supporting writers means supporting bookstores and libraries! If your library doesn’t have the book you want, simply request it, and they will get it. This also puts money back into the writer’s pocket via the Public Lending Right. Thank you!)

A Journey Just Begun

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The Pelee Project

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What the Psychic Told the Pilgrim

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Incontinent on the Continent

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And Then There Were Nuns

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Open House – A Life in Thirty-Two Moves

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To follow Jane’s amazing book and writing life, be sure to go to her personal website: www.janechristmas.ca

Stay tuned for book tour updates. Jane hopes to be in our neck of the woods on Pelee Island in the fall! And don’t forget to connect with Jane via Goodreads or love letter. Like she said, she’ll write you back!

Thank you Jane! Can’t wait to read your new book!

Chocolate Cake

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Well, we made it to three o’clock and our first day of the Shields Family School is complete. As you can see, the kids have vanished. I’m still writing away.

It’s been a good day. Yes, I got dressed, put on a real bra, brushed my teeth first-thing, and put on actual clothes. (Though I could hear my joggers whimper when I didn’t choose them this morning.)

We followed our schedule including breaks. We did yoga and dancing for our physical fitness. We ate lunch together. It has been very productive day so far.

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I baked a chocolate cake last night because I was craving it like nobody’s bid-ness. She’s a little messy, but damn she tastes good. If I ever opened a bakery (which I’ve actually dreamed of doing), it would be called something like ‘The Ugly Baked Goods Co.’ or ‘Messy Delicious Baked Goods’. Definitely business names that give me permission to not bake perfect-looking treats.

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I’m well into ‘The Chilbury Ladies Choir‘ by Jennifer Ryan. It’s soooo wonderful and exactly what my reading heart needs. The next book I think I’ll read is ‘The Woo Woo’ by Lindsay Wong (she’s Canadian – woo woo!). And of course, I’m still reading friends’ writing/manuscripts, so there’s no shortage of things to read here.

I’m feeling pretty good at the moment, however, three o’clock is often an energy turning point in my day. I chalk it up to all those years in school…and now that I’m pretty much going to school again (!), I know this late afternoon lull is gonna keep on keepin’ on.

I hear that our premiere will soon announce full closures on everything except essentially needed business/places. Full lock-down has arrived. We are in the second-act of this wild movie-like human experience. How long will it last? What will the climax be? What will our heroes (that’s us, yo) have learned? How will our characters arc?

Thank you to everyone who has been reading my blogs and sharing thoughts on reading and writing. It’s helping me feel connected. Please keep it up!

Tomorrow

Tomorrow I will get dressed.

I will brush my teeth first thing in the morning…not sometime after dinner when I run my tongue over my teeth and they feel covered in wool sweaters.

I just made ‘x’ marks on two March calendars to show how many days have past. Never has a month felt so bizarre.

The kids will not be going to school tomorrow, yet we are starting the Shields Family Home School. From 9am to 3pm, we’re ‘schooling’ at home. Learning and working together complete with nutrition and physical activity breaks. We simply must.

Tomorrow will be the start of a new kind of schedule.

Everything has changed since last Sunday.

I can feel the energy shifting as people return home from vacations. Virus cases will continue to rise. As I write it, as I read it in my head, as I hear it…my brain thinks it’s a novel I’m writing…and at the same time knows it absolutely is not. A 2015 video of Bill Gates ‘calling’ this pandemic as the next big human challenge to face is making rounds as is a voice recording of a woman talking about what to do if you get the virus. Facebook messenger has become a den of ‘keep it going’ gifs an links – everything from virtual hugs to getting more ‘followers’ for women-run small businesses.

It. All. Feels….Strange.

I’ve seen picture of families meeting virtually – members reaching across the globe. We have a virtual dinner date set with a friend this week. People are still communicating. It’s lovely but it’s also making my skin crawl…in a way that it doesn’t understand why it’s not closer to other skin.

I had a brief conversation with my neighbour. We stood apart, the fence separating us…but gosh, was it something to hear her voice, hear her laugh, see her eyes.

Yes, tomorrow I will get dressed – refuse the t-shirt and joggers. Lift up my girls with a proper bra. I will put deodorant on. My rings, necklaces, earrings.

And that’s all I’ve got for now.

The Blind Man Loves Anais

The Blind Man Loves Anais

By Vanessa Shields

 

Dessa is green apple: crispy bitter sweet

Charlie is brown bark: rough soily natural

Anais is blue water: wide flowing changing

 

He is in love with Anais

having caressed her skin 

with the eyes of his fingers

(that she so generously offered

without hesitation)

skin on skin was electric

shooting life into edges 

tips

on his body he didn’t 

know existed 

the result was 

a literal spark

 

Anais loves to swim

in his darkness 

she is a water spider

guiding him to sea

 

Submitted to online poetry contest: https://penableme.wordpress.com/2020/03/19/thursday-poetry-competition-3/

Mass Observation – Let The 2020 Archive Begin?

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This is why reading is soooo very important – it enlightens us in ways that are necessary for our ability to remember. Last night, I started reading ‘The Chilbury Ladies’ Choir’ by Jennifer Ryan. It’s a story about the reformation of a choir in small town England during World War II. (It’s much more, but that’s the log line!) Some magical things to point out: a) I have no idea how I got this book. Did I buy it long ago? Did someone give it to me? I don’t know. b) I started reading it as an ‘escape’ from this wild reality we’re living through. How bizarre is it that an escape into a world war is an escape?! The implications of what we’re doing to cope with our current reality is mind-boggling. 3)I learned about a happening called ‘Mass Observation’ – the writing down/recording of ‘real-life’ experiences of ‘ordinary people’.

Mass Observation (from ‘Mass Observation 75 years on: the extraordinary in the everyday’ by Benjamin Jones, The Guardian)

Mass Observation was founded 75 years ago [this article was written in 2012] in 1937 by the South African poet, communist and journalist Charles Madge and two English eccentrics: the filmmaker and polymath Humphrey Jennings and the anthropologist and self-publicist Tom Harrisson. Formed in the aftermath of the abdication crisis, Mass Observation sought to bridge the gap between how the media represented public opinion and what ordinary people actually felt and thought.

This was done by taking the then-novel step of asking them. Mass Observation asked people to keep diaries, record their dreams and respond to questions on anything from public love-making and Neville Chamberlain to newspaper horoscopes and the rise of fascism.

I was struck by the existence of this…and immediately felt compelled to write about it. The truth is that with the many layers of social media, we are already participating in a form of mass observation. Videos from Italy of people playing music from their balconies, memes of self-isolation jokes, virtual options for everything from meetings to art classes to dancing…we’re definitely a collection of ‘ordinary people’ sharing our observations about the COVID 19 pandemic. Is it akin to a world war?

That’s a tricky question… I certainly don’t want to ignite this comparison/conversation. No, my intention is for us to consider how our ‘observations’ have changed over time – from how we observe to how we share these observations. Folks in the 30s-60s, wrote diaries and letters to record their feelings and facts about what they were experiencing. It’s 2020, and the media is a robust as ever – reaching into personal forms of social media and personal observation like never before. It feels sometimes like there is no line between ‘media’ and ‘me’. It all gets rolled into the ‘scrolling’ of ‘news’.

What are you doing to record your personal experience with this pandemic? If you’re home from work – how does that make you feel? If you’re home from work but still need to work? How is that going? I keep seeing posts/videos about not being able to get work done as at-home life is just too full of challenges from kids to pets to domestic duties. How are you managing food? Money? Time? Sleep? Friendships? Is this heightening your libido or making it drop? Are you communicating more with family or less?

There is no doubt that as this virus sweeps the planet, we are all feeling differently about ‘life’ than we did before…and perhaps, if you’re like me, somewhat unsure of actual feelings…I am distracted by this kind of blankness – is it the fear of the unknown? I am having trouble prioritizing. How can I work on planning classes/workshops/events when I don’t know when we’ll be able to have/attend them? I have anxiety about going to the grocery store – which I had before, but it’s shifted from an ‘ugh, I don’t want to do groceries’ to ‘oh no…we need toilet paper and there isn’t any. do I have hand sanitizer? I can’t touch anything…will there be a lot of people? I should go alone…’ and on and on.

I’m writing in my journal every day. Mostly facts about what’s unfolding. And lines and lines of ‘what the hell is happening to me? Our world? And existential questions like: is this a cosmic occurrence forcing humanity to stop, pay attention, respond, reflect and evolve? I keep writing: I don’t know, I don’t know – over and over.

And so, friends, how will how we record what’s happening now affect our future? The near and the far? Should we be consciously preserving our responses to what’s happening? If so, how? Should we collectively ‘name’ our observations and gather them in some special archive?

Thoughts?

A Nice Little Win!

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A wonderful email to open on a cloudy Wednesday morning:

The winner of Penable’s 2 poetry competition is….

Vanessa Shields!!

Victoria Abah said, ‘She brought the poem to life. Love the use of the mermaid and the description of crisp cold water. I know that feeling all too well.’

Congratulations Vanessa! Here is what she wrote that had stunned the judge and me:

Part-Mermaid

By vanessa shields

I know I am part mermaid

when I deep-dive into

the crisp-cold water

of lake erie

my hands stacked

my arms outstretched

my torso curving to meet

the gentle bends of

the sandy bottom

my legs tight-muscled

my feet pointed

pumping

the water propelling

me forward

my skin slick

with memory

my breath

reaching

for

home

Well done for winning Vanessa!

Penableme has consistent poetry writing contests! I’ve been posting about the site as I’ve been submitting…as part of the submission process is to share your submitted post! *Smart*

How is everyone holding up?

This is a wild, wild time.

Need to travel? Read a book! Here’s a list we’ve started through GWR!

READING LIST HERE!

What are you reading? Are you listening to audio books? Are you watching more movies?

One thing that will help us trudge through this unique time is sharing how art is living in our lives!

Keep reading! Keep writing! Keep sharing!

KEEP LOVING!

Part-Mermaid

[Because writing and reading are keeping me grounded in the wild madness that is swirling around us.]

Part-Mermaid

By vanessa shields

I know I am part mermaid

when I deep-dive into

the crisp-cold water

of lake erie

my hands stacked

my arms outstretched

my torso curving to meet

the gentle bends of

the sandy bottom

my legs tight-muscled

my feet pointed

pumping

the water propelling

me forward

my skin slick

with memory

my breath

reaching

for

home

 

To submit your own poem:

https://penableme.wordpress.com/2020/03/12/poetry-thursday-competition-2/

the dustings – a poem about dreams

Submitted by Vanessa Shields

Submitted to https://penableme.wordpress.com/2020/03/05/poetry-thursday-competition/

the dustings

by Vanessa Shields

the wind shows herself

by leaning her shoulder on

purple coneflower petals

they receive her caress

push deeper into earth

spread roots like stories

and so dreams lean into the soft shy

underparts of our arms – a vulnerable

garden made of skin

we are sturdy flowers – coralbells 

in bloom for flitting hummingbirds

weigelas – low-maintenance stunners

embracing butterfly whispers

moving secrets from the wind

on their scale-strong wings

and so dreams choose us

by the dustings of

wind’s secrets

exclaimed on

verbena lips

excavated in

the shadows of

the thriving coleus

lift up your arms –

sentient dreams bloom

Poem for a Contest & The Contest!

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A blog reader sent me a link to a poetry contest he’s having…deadline is on Tuesday! Because I’m hot to submit these days, I’m trying hard to say yes to entering things that show up in my life!

Here’s the link, if you’d like to enter too!

https://penableme.wordpress.com/2020/03/05/poetry-thursday-competition/

how to submit:

Submitting your great poems is pretty easy.

Type your poem in the comment section OF THE WEBSITE LINK ABOVE! Add your name and click send.
Write the poem on your own blog or website then publish it and send us the link for it in the comment section OF THE WEBSITE LINK ABOVE! Add your name and click send.

This blog is not the blog to enter on…! I’m just being a share-er! And submitter!

Happy Friday!

Want to find more places to submit?

A go-to is Poets & Writers website. They have a mega-database!

Dream Poet for Hire Marshall James Kavanaugh

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While my family and I were in New York City in January, we visited Washington Square Park. It’s a hot-spot for creatives, often the gathering place for buskers, musicians, wild fashion, weddings and serious games of chess. On this particular day, we had the pleasure of meeting poet Marshall James Kavanaugh aka ‘@DreamPoetForHire‘. Marshall is a traveling poet who writes poetry for people via his trusty typewriter. All he asks is that the person gives him a theme to write about. On the day we met, our family had just finished a tour at NYU so education was on our minds. I asked Marshall to write us a poem about education/learning.

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A few minutes later as I stood in the brisk wind admiring Marshall’s typing skills and getting excited about his poem, he had written this:

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We were thrilled with his poem! Naturally, I got his contact information and promised that I’d write him a poem too! When I returned home, I sent him an email and he promptly responded telling me that he’d like me write a piece on the theme of ‘ars poetica’. Full transparency here, friends, I had to look up the meaning having heard the term but not being sure exactly what it meant!

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Goodness, I forgot how great it felt to write ‘on-demand’ for someone. It’s such an invigorating feeling…a complete creative hit, if you will. And knowing that someone like Marshall exists – a true-and-true, modern-day ‘rucksack revolutionary, traveling poet, well it makes me feel so good about the world! About the arts! About the power of poetry!

I simply had to invite Marshall to be on my blog…indeed, he agreed to answer some questions so he can tell us about his life as a poet and all-around, super-cool creative human.

Marshall’s words are extremely inspiring, vulnerable, hopeful, spiritual and peace-full. You are forewarned.

What are some of the most difficult themes/topics to write about? Have you ever cried/gotten emotional whilst writing? 

Of course. When I began setting up and doing public poetry, I intended to get my name out there, share a few poetic conversations, encourage others to be just as excited about poetry as I am, but the thing I didn’t realize at first is how such a simple setup can become an open channel for just about anything to come in.

Poetry is a tool that communities use to grieve and commiserate with one another. It’s how we memorialize those who have just entered this plane of existence as much as it is how we process those who have passed on into the void beyond us. It’s how we move on from heart break and get through a rough time of emotional turbulence. The poem and therefore The Poet can become the mode of catharsis to move through and beyond this tempest of emotions. It’s how we find the words to describe what we are experiencing in this thing called Human.

I think I first was forced to face this as my role as The Poet when I was living in Taos, NM, a very spiritual place with a community that embraces the tough steps of personal and communal shadow work. The town was reconciling an epidemic of teen suicide in the local high schools. We followed marches, prayer circles, ceremonies led by indigenous and non-indigenous community members to heal as a town and empower the youth to move through this dark time.

One day, I was approached at the farmers market where I set up each week by a mother who had lost her son and she wanted a typewritten poem that embodied his spirit while he lived and now that he had passed on. At first, I was obviously overwhelmed with the responsibility and perhaps writing the wrong thing or getting too personal. These are topics we typically as a society do not share with one another, especially not with complete strangers.

But it was through this experience I learned that a poem is more than just the words it is composed of. It is like a key wherein which two people can connect and relate separate worlds, ideas, and personal stories.

The tears fall maybe when a perfect line hits its mark, but in all circumstances there is this exchange of getting closer to what it means and feels like to be human. There is no wrong thing that you can write, because we are all finding our way in the dark and each one of us is the light.

What poetry do you read? Do you read contemporary poets? Do you have any favs?

I’m a big fan of Saul Williams. I like how his poems are visual as much as they are spoken. Obviously, as a fellow traveler and rucksack revolutionary, I grew up being very inspired by the Beats, specifically Jack Kerouac, Gary Snyder, Bob Kaufman, Lenore Kandel, etc. I think I wouldn’t have realized poetry could also be a lifestyle without their example as a generation of creatives living what they wrote about. More recently I’ve been majorly influenced by the works of John Trudell. For me, his indigenous identity harbors a perspective that really breaks through the insanity of western imperialism and the society that holds us all hostage, as well as our Mother Earth, to offer clear and concise solutions to the global challenges we face. It’s a love center that uses the whole Earth as its ground to spring up from.

How do you feel about publishing? You’ve self-published some chapbooks, is that correct? Is it important for you to have your poetry live in this way: bound in a book? Why or why not?

I actually co-run a small press called A Freedom Books that is based in Philadelphia, PA. We’ve published various collections of poetry, short stories, essays, and even plays by a constantly growing collective of authors from around the country. Personally, I have had published several hand-bound chapbooks, a paperback collection of travel haikus, two paperback collections of short stories, a collection of essays, and over the years, dozens of one-off zines and other small releases. I also have about 7 other writing projects in various stages of completion, including 3 novels, a novella, another collection of haikus, and several collections of essays that link protest to earth worship. For the novels, I am in the process of working out a publisher for a much wider release, but with all the other projects I like to keep it local.

I like the idea of how a book retains a permanence beyond its creator so that someone you may not know will one day find it on a book shelf or out on the street in the gutter and pick it up to take home with them to read. I like that long after I am dead, I will have readers who will find something in my books that they can relate to and maybe even will help them process the struggles they experience in their own lives.

I think books take on their own lives and I love wondering where they end up in their journeys. Who they connect to. How they inspire. I think about the books I have read over time and how they have touched so many lives, stirring whole worlds in our minds to come to life. I can’t wait to see what readers find me a long way off from now and what they think of the worlds I have jotted down for their entertainment.

Can you list all of the places you’ve set up your typewriter to write poetry? Do any places stick out as super special? Why?

I’ve set up all over the country from New York to New Orleans to Santa Fe to LA and even Seattle. Anywhere where there is live music and an outdoor art market, I’ve probably spent some time typing poems. I mentioned I’m a beatnik, so I really like the idea of paying homage to the writers that crafted that movement by setting up near their sacred sites, maybe even getting lucky and attracting their ghosts to haunt me as I write my poetry. I’m like a devotee on a pilgrimage through the American Dream, but I’m not seeking the Beloved, I’m only trying to catch up with my old friends found in books who passed on before I even read them. Places like Washington Square Park in New York City or outside City Lights Books in San Francisco spark this kind of romance.

I can feel Jack peering over my shoulder, and hear Neal rattling off a mile-a-minute story about his latest adventure. The words get really frenzied and the typewriter takes on the cadence of a full jazz orchestra.

Sometimes I truly get lucky and someone who has actually met Jack in real life or spent some time studying under Ginsberg will come up off the street and see something in me where they know that I know that life is really all just a bunch of poetry and we have a conversation there on the spot like it’s time immemorial and I’ve crisscrossed from the 2020s into the 1960s, and usually I’ll have to shoo them away at some point because their meandering conversation is driving away business, though I don’t really want to see them leave because their stories are so dreamy.

Lately, out of thin air, I’ve been having this same experience in Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, which isn’t a historical beatnik hangout by any means. Actually it’s quite the opposite with luxury apartments and expensive restaurants surrounding it. But it’s as if the 12 years I’ve lived in the city and all the years I spent seeking beatniks elsewhere were all for naught, since now the beatniks come on down to the park and find me, and they got some of the greatest stories. Like for instance this one guy, Beat Brad aka George Bradley from New England who just celebrated his 84th birthday and got arrested with Bob Kaufman in San Fran one time in the 1950s when he worked at a coffee shop across the street from City Lights, and who hung out with Henry Miller, and ate peyote in New Mexico and all these other wild things. He just keeps showing up and talking and I just keep taking it in because, Boy oh boy! What a wild story! Who wouldn’t want to hear it?

How does this lifestyle affect the rest of your world? How often are you traveling and writing as the dream poet for hire? Do you have another job?

I’ve been a full time poet for 5 years now. But even before that all my income went into making art, travel, and performing poetry.

I don’t think the artistic life should be secondary. I think to be a poet, you actually have to be a poet. All the time. You can’t take breaks. I don’t think typing poetry on the street has changed my lifestyle all that much. It feels more like the actualization of me becoming me.

Before there was wasted time. I was selling my self for someone else’s profit half the time just to have enough time and money to chase the dream. Now I’m living the dream. I just finished up a Saturn returns, so perhaps in another 25 years I’ll be having my midlife crisis and wondering what the hell I did with my life, but for this moment I feel like I am actually leading the life I want to lead and the only issue I run into is that there is not enough time to do all the things I want, so I wish I had started earlier on all of it.

I’m always on the road, even if I’m at my home in Philly, and that’s a big part of it too. That’s part of the dream life. I got this duality of being a big home body, but also always being restless to get back out there and start traveling and so I’m usually traveling once a month at least out of the city, sometimes on bigger trips across the country or abroad, but I’ve never liked traveling like a tourist, so I really try to sit where I’m at and live like the locals do until at some point I feel like a local and I have all these local friends and now I have all these place all around the country if not the world where I want to go back because that’s where my community lives and I want to spend time with them before time runs out. It helps that I’m a performing artist. I usually go on book tours at least once or twice a year. Sometimes for only two weeks. Sometimes for three months. And yeah, part of it is to spread hype for a new book I wrote or work out a new performance.

But mostly I have all these friends all over the place and I’m really trying to see them and hang out and get inspired again and hoping to link up because really dreamy things happen when you get a bunch of dreamers in the room and they all start working on their dream labors together.

Plus I really wouldn’t be anything without these friends I’ve made. My literary peers. My artistic generation. And some of them even know each other and don’t have the same situation like I do to travel as often. And so I do my best, like a great Bard, and I travel between all the villages and connect all the stories and share the great news between these distant realms making it all feel a little bit closer to home.

How do you afford all the traveling? (If this is too personal a question, you don’t have to answer!) Can you talk about how ‘money’ fits into this lifestyle? 

More than money, I think what limits a person’s ability to do the things they want to do is the idea of scarcity. For almost a decade I have been meditating on bringing abundance into my life. The fun thing with abundance is that it is more a matter of perspective than actually a solid, concrete thing that’s value can be measured at any one moment compared to another.

Obviously, to fill the gas tank you need to come up with $20 somehow because that is the currency of abundance that this society operates from, but so many other interactions with the world can be money free.

When a person comes to the point where they can be broke and still feel the ever-presence of abundance all around them, I think that is when you break out of the fear of scarcity and start to engage in bigger leaps.

Personally, it has taken baby steps to get to the comfort level that I am at with money or lack thereof, and though I’m not quite there yet to buy the dream house or retire on some property in the woods, I wouldn’t have gotten to the current level of self-sustainability without trusting that no matter what odds I face, I have the abilities to overcome them. I understand that I have certain privileges in being an able-bodied, white male who grew up in a lower middle class family, and these have given me a little bit of a starting point to experiment in this lifestyle choice, but I think a lot of what held me back in my younger twenties wasn’t a lack of money, but a lack of trust in myself that I could get through life without it.

When I write poetry on the street, there is often an exchange of money, and this comes from a different conversation that we as a modern creative collective are having where it’s important that an artist is always valued for their work. Part of that is a need for the artist to value themself as well by expressing this value, for lack of something better, in a common currency. In countries like Canada or the UK they have grants for artists to do their thing and find their stride, while offering a service that beautifies their surroundings. In neoliberal capitalist-dystopias like the United States, an artist must rely on a business model where they sell what they create. Honestly, I’m not yet fully comfortable when I am forced to use poetry money to buy something like groceries or pay for rent. But I look at this income as another baby step towards a greater model of sustainability, where the money earned writing poetry stays in the field of poetry and is laundered towards supporting other poetic projects. For now, I treat it like a grant, where a percentage is to subsidize my living expenses, another percentage is to be saved, another is to subsidize my travel expenses for book tours or personal vacations, and finally a last portion is to be used to work on poetry collaborations like publishing other writers or taking them on tour with me.

How do I afford this grant to live the life as a poet? I dance my butt off in the office on the street and do what I can to do what I love.

And when that’s not enough, I’ve been especially grateful to find a community all across the country that has supported me in my journey, so much so that when I get back home I’m able to return the favor and offer what I can of mine to support them in theirs.

Have you ever felt afraid being out offering people a poem? 

When I first began typing poems in public, I was absolutely terrified. Scared someone would come run me off, or worse that someone would tell me my poetry was awful. I had performed on the stage as a spoken word artist for years, but this was a whole other type of stage fright. Unlike a poetry reading where I could feel safe and held, this was the open street and anything could happen. It took me years and an experience of not having any other choice to commit to the idea that I could do it full time. There’s that scarcity mind, always on the grind. Even when I finally committed, it had to be through a pseudo-confidence that I faced my fear and became the Dream Poet that I am today.

Traveling around the country with it has helped me adapt to what the audience wants. In Texas, they’re curious and want to know what you got going on. In LA, they want to be hustled a little. In New Orleans, the streets speak to an energy found at carnivals with jazz musicians tooting along while the poets pitch their wares like barkers.

The whole thing is a practice of stepping outside of oneself. It can be emotionally exhausting. It can also be totally enlivening. I still sometimes find an inner voice telling me how crappy a poet I am and how this person smiling, standing in front of me awaiting patiently for their poem is just playing along out of some form of pity. But this self-defeatist inner monologue makes great practice to get me back out into the world sharing my heart, serving my purpose. If I am my greatest critic and I can overcome even him, then what’s the worst that the street could throw at me?

As you travel abroad and spread love through poetry, what can you tell us about your experience with humanity currently? 

Humanity is where it’s always been. We’re all seeking answers. Believing in a higher power or some sort of connection between all of us and all of our surroundings. Looking for love. Enjoying the moments we share with loved ones. Though we come from different backgrounds and experiences, there is not much that really divides us.

Even the irony of the internet era can’t help but have their heart tickled by the sincerity of a poem.

We all hold a lot of pain underneath the surface. There’s also a lot of joy and celebration. Overall, I think what we all seek is someone to relate it to or the right words to transmute the emotion.

Do you think poetry can help change the world? Why? How? 

I think poets have quite the burden on their shoulders. They are the voice of a generation. At their best, they express all the fantastical peace and chaotic discord of any moment experienced in time.

Even the apolitical poets offer somewhere for the mind to wander. A moment of freedom. I think poetry certainly can change the world. I say let’s elect more poets to public office. Less actors and less reality TV stars. Let’s let the connoisseurs of language stir us up into a frenzy until our hearts explode in rapture. I think poetry offers a safe space for an exchange of consciousness. If nothing else it puts into words what is hard to otherwise express. Through its direction we are led straight to the heart. Our world certainly needs more people thinking with their hearts. Less with their minds. There is a great vulnerability there, but there is also great medicine. A poem is where the heart is. Let’s all read poetry and fall in love for the first time.

WOW!!!

If you’re not inspired to read a poem, write a poem, run outside and scream at the beauty all around you – then my friend, the least you can do is request that Marshall write you a poem!

Marshall’s website: http://www.marshalljameskavanaugh.com
Instagram: @DreamPoetForHire
If you’d like to request a poem from Marshall, you can ask him via Instagram or send him an email: dreampoetforhire@gmail.com

He’s promised (right?!) that if and when he makes a stop in Detroit, he’ll let me know and I can scoop him up and bring him to Windsor for some quality poetry-writing and creative love.

THANK YOU, MARSHALL!