Musings

The Great Migration, Journey to the North

2012-01-25T14:57:00.002-05:00

Eloise Greenfield, The Great Migration, Journey to the North, illustrated by Jan Spivey Gilchrist, Amistad, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 2011

Eloise Greenfield, winner of the 11th NCTE Award for Excellence in Poetry, and award-winning artist and writer Jan Spivey Gilchrist have collaborated on a book of poems inspired by a little talked about period of American history. Train travel is almost foreign to today’s children. Yet a train ticket led to a better life in the North for hundreds of thousands of African American children in the early part of the 20th century. The Great Migration, Journey to the North chronicles such a trip in nine poems. Collage artwork using archival material lends historical authenticity to the collection. An introduction tells Greenfield’s own story of her family’s migration.

Greenfield’s free verse lets us witness a family’s goodbyes – goodbyes to the land, to inequality and to the Ku Klux Klan.

Goodbye, crazy signs, telling me
where I can go, what I can do.
I hear that train whistling
my name. Don’t worry, train,
I’m ready.

The poems book us a seat on the overnight trip with all its uncertainties.

I hope they’re right.
I think they’re right.
I know they’re right.

Finally, we arrive in Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Washington or another northern city where

…the people keep coming,
keep coming, keep on coming,
filling up the cities with
their hopes and their courage.
And their dreams.

The rhythm in each of Greenfield’s poems lets us hear the click clack of train wheels on the track. We feel the hope in the hearts of the travelers. Gilchrist’s haunting illustrations combine layers of artwork and archival photos. The results were achieved through labor intensive methods without computer graphics. They draw us into the poems as if we are watching a documentary. One moving illustration plants grainy photos of African Americans in a field like ghostly witnesses to the train’s passing.

The Great Migration, Journey to the North is a stirring account in verse of a period that opened up opportunities for America’s Black citizens and changed American history. The jacket flap says the audience is Ages 3-8. The subject matter is more suited for an older audience, such as Grades 2-5.

The NCTE has this profile about Greenfield.

Gilchrist's profile is on the Herman Agency's website.

Steven Withrow interviews Eloise Greenfield at Poetry at Play.

Welcome to Poetry Friday

2011-12-23T09:03:00.000-05:00

At a lovely Lessons and Carols service this month, I discovered a poignant poem by Dorothy Parker. Composer Nicholas White turned the poem into a carol.

The poem was a total surprise. I had thought of Parker as a witty writer and sometimes dark and even sarcastic. But this poem helps us imagine what a new mother in a stable may have longed for.

Prayer for a New Mother

The things she knew, let her forget again-
The voices in the sky, the fear, the cold,
The gaping shepherds, and the queer old men
Piling their clumsy gifts of foreign gold.

Let her have laughter with her little one;
Teach her the endless, tuneless songs to sing,
Grant her her right to whisper to her son
The foolish names one dare not call a king.

Keep from her dreams the rumble of a crowd,
The smell of rough-cut wood, the trail of red,
The thick and chilly whiteness of the shroud
That wraps the strange new body of the dead.

Ah, let her go, kind Lord, where mothers go
And boast his pretty words and ways, and plan
The proud and happy years that they shall know
Together, when her son is grown a man.

Schongauer painted The Holy Family. See more of his gorgeous art here.

Thank you to Dori who is hosting Poetry Friday today at Dori Reads.

2012 Award-Winning Books Challenge

2011-12-21T21:16:00.004-05:00

A Winter Solstice Commitment

I keep intending to read those award-winners I’ve missed. Now I’ve found my opportunity. I joined the 2012 Award-Winning Books Reading Challenge sponsored by Gathering Books.

I’ll read and write reviews to recommend award-winning books right here on my blog. I’m headed for the Silver Medal level, between 11 and 25 books. The books can be for children or adults. What fun!

Check out this challenge at Gathering Books. Local and regional awards and recognition count also, not just national and international awards.

Hosts Myra and Iphigene are Poetry Friday contributors, always posting phenomenal poems from creative poets we might not find on our own.

Wish me good reads as I add old and new award winning books to my reading journal. I’ll take your recommendations, too!

Tribute to Father of Frances

2011-12-16T08:33:00.000-05:00

Poached egg on toast, why do you shiver
With such a funny little quiver?

So sings the adorable picky eater badger named Frances in Bread and Jam for Frances when she would rather have

Jam on biscuits, jam on toast,
Jam is the thing that I like most.

As others will, I pay tribute this Poetry Friday to Russell Hoban, author of the beloved Frances books, the classic The Mouse and His Child and a host of other children’s titles. Hoban passed away on December 13.

Hoban’s books were part of my children’s childhoods and I love the books, too. But I did not know that Russell Hoban wrote poetry.

I’m captivated by the sounds in these lines from "Long, Lone" in Hoban’s book The Last of the Wallendas.

Long, long, long and lone
Is the selkie's song when the storm winds moan,
is the sigh of the sea as it rubs the stone,
is the word of the sea that lives in the bone.

“Ice Bears” is a haunting poem that challenges the reader to think of the effects of climate change.

Huge, silent-moving like
white dreams hungering for
the yester-prey,
what will they do when
the ice is gone?

Read the whole poem here. Don't miss the last stanza!

I’ll be reading more of Russell Hoban in the future. Lawrence Downes wrote this editorial about Hoban in the NY Times.

Thanks to Book Aunt for today's Poetry Friday round-up.

Batty Poets

2011-12-08T22:04:00.002-05:00

“Once upon a time there was a bat—a little light brown bat, the color of coffee with cream in it.” So begins The Bat Poet by Randall Jarrell with Maurice Sendak’s terrifc illustrations.

I’ve been reading Jerome Griswold’s The Children’s Books of Randall Jarrell. It’s fascinating literary analysis. Jarrell sold the Bat Poet’s poems about the mockingbird and the chipmunk to the New Yorker. He didn’t tell them they were children’s poems! My favorite of the Bat Poet’s poems is about the owl.

A shadow is floating through the moonlight.
Its wings don’t make a sound.
Its claws are long, its beak is bright.
Its eyes try all the corners of the night.

The entire poem is included in a critical analysis of The Bat Poet printed in the Children’s Literature Association Quarterly. Scroll down to p. 21.

When the Bat Poet says this poem to the mockingbird, he only notices the technical aspects of the poem. But the Chipmunk experiences the poem and shivers. It’s interesting that Jarrell’s wife has said that the vain Mockingbird is a caricature of Robert Frost and Robert Lowell.

Head on over to Read, Write, Howl for more wonderful batty poets.

Don’t Miss Shine by Lauren Myracle

2011-11-29T19:14:00.002-05:00

Step into Shine, a Blue Ridge Mountain world so real it’s like walking the dusty roads of Black Creek, North Carolina and solving a mystery with sixteen-year-old Cat. Author Lauren Myracle’s YA novel will grip you and keep you turning pages until Cat uncovers the perpetrator of a hate crime against Patrick, her gay childhood friend.

While Patrick lies in a coma after being beaten and tied to a gas station pump, Cat peels away the evidence layer by layer. Suspecting that the local sheriff is taking the easy way out by blaming the crime on unknown out-of-towners, she launches her own investigation.

Each discovery draws Cat closer to completing the puzzle. And each bit of knowledge increases her personal danger. Someone in her landscape dotted with drug pushers and meth users wants desperately to keep her from learning the truth. In her determination to avenge the crime against Patrick, Cat discovers the inner strength she needs to heal her own ugly wound. By story’s end, Cat emerges from the protective shell she has created around herself and faces the boy who once violated her.

My fury sizzled and popped until I wasn’t just mad, but crazy mad, as if I’d struck a match and lit myself on fire. What happened to Patrick was wrong. What happened to me was wrong. Every single thing was wrong, and when that great blaze of wrongness reached my core, my heart swelled and roared and cast it back out, leaving behind a white-hot clarity like nothing I’d ever experienced.

Myracle is a master story-teller. Shine is literary fiction at its best. Multi-layered characters, a strong sense of place, a suspense-filled plot all work to build a novel that dares to tell the truth about guilt, fear and love.

You may pick up Lauren Myracle’s Shine because you’ve heard about her roller coaster ride compliments of the National Book Award committee; first Shine is a nominee, then it’s not. But for whatever reason you read Shine, you’ll be glad you did.

Visit Lauren Myracle's website.

Poetry Friday

2011-11-25T08:05:00.000-05:00

Here’s a poem from New Hampshire’s Sarah Josepha Hale. The author of the nursery rhyme “Mary’s Lamb” and editor of the first women’s magazine, Godey’s Lady’s Book, Sarah firmly believed in a national day of Thanksgiving. She wrote letters for years advocating for this holiday. In 1863, Lincoln’s proclamation made it a reality. Heidi hosts the roundup today at my juicy little universe

HAPPINESS
“Tis not when th’ obsequious throng
Raise their plaudits loud and long,
Golden showers each wish supply
And surfeit even luxury;
‘Tis not then we taste of bliss,
Or feel the glow of happiness.

Rosy health the cheek may dye,
Youth exult with jocund eye;
Pleasure spread her syren feast;
Parasites attend their guest;
‘Tis not then we taste of bliss,
Or feel the glow of happiness.

Haste, unlock the hoarded store;
Feed the hungry, clothe the poor;
Aid the injured, nor the sigh
Of sorrow pass unheeded by.
Then, yes, then we taste of bliss,
and feel the glow of happiness.

Sarah Josepha Hale
from The Genius of Oblivion and other Original Poems, 1823

Check out To My Countrywomen, The Life of Sarah Josepha Hale by Muriel L. Dubois at Apprentice Shop Books.

memories

2011-11-18T09:14:00.002-05:00

For Poetry Friday, here's a Thanksgiving poem written by our daughter Jen when she was a teen. In the photo, her Nana prepares Thanksgiving dinner. Tabatha hosts the Roundup today at The Opposite of Indifference

Memories

It’s a good feeling
To see this house
And know that inside waits
Pumpkin chiffon
And other goodies like
Cashews and cranberry sauce
And afterwards
The rope swing under the willow tree
Coaxing Tabby out from under the
Front porch
Picking frosty wild grapes and
Spitting out the seeds
Traipsing through the tall grass
Up to the sandpit
Bringing back cups of sand
To make cakes with in the playhouse
Fingers stiff with cold
Bang into the house
Huddle in front of the woodstove and
Drink just-right cocoa with
Big fluffy marshmallows
Nana says
“Such red cheeks!”
And November wind whistles the
Thanksgiving theme song.

© Jennifer Ray Johnson
1986

IT'S POETRY FRIDAY

2011-10-27T21:13:00.001-04:00

Diane is Rounding-up at Random Noodling today.

Last night snow came to New England. I’ll mark it with New Hampshire treasure and former U.S. Poet Laureate Donald Hall’s poem “Blue Snow”. Last week Hall, author of the classic Ox Cart Man, read from his latest book of poems, The Back Chamber. He says whereas lines of poetry used to descend like meteor showers, poems aren’t coming to him nowadays. Hall calls The Back Chamber his last book of poetry, but if another comes up, he’ll not hammer it down.

Blue Snow

Pete Sullivan dropped by:
"Your barn needs work, and so do I."
Pete had the eye

To fix old boards with new
And keep the handy knotholes through
Which swallows flew.

Go to Poetry Daily to read the entire poem and another from Hall’s latest collection.

Here is a marvelous 3 minute video of Hall speaking from his home at Eagle Pond.

The Back Chamber; ISBN-13: 9780547645858

Poetry Friday

2011-10-21T12:23:00.001-04:00

Poetry Friday! Enjoy the offerings at Jama’s Alphabet Soup. Then stretch and limber up your poet’s muscles with poetry calisthenics suggested by J. Patrick Lewis. Poetry Advocates for Children and Young Adults posted this link. PACYA offers terrific information for poets writing for children.

Here’s my stretch using the Zeno form invented by Lewis.
I used the leaves theme from last week’s poem.

The New England forest explodes!
Shy green dares to
become
bold–
yellow, crimson,
russet,
gold;
fall’s memory
meant to
hold.

© 2011 Joyce Ray

If leaves could talk on POETRY FRIDAY

2011-10-14T11:43:00.003-04:00

Welcome to Poetry Friday. It’s a wet one here, perfect for enjoying the poetry selections posted at Fomograms. Thanks, David Elsey, for hosting today.

The leaves are lovely now and have helped me let go of summer. Hurricane Irene stripped many leaves away in August. The damage and hardship in neighboring areas has been so great that we’re not complaining about something as small as the lack of brilliant foliage. My mom used to sing this song in the fall:

“Come,” said the wind to the leaves one day /“Come over the meadow with me and play /Put on your dresses of red and gold /for summer is over and days grow cold.” American poet George Cooper

Remembering it got me thinking about what the leaves would say to the wind.

The Leaves Respond

Red silk rustles down
by the cattails and muffles
the murmur of gold gabardine.
Russet taffeta swishes
along the stonewall to
pose beside a bronze brocade.
Showing the fall collection,
they ignore the wind’s call.
They zip their zippers, fasten
their buttons, smooth their creases,
twirl, dip and sashay.
With a backward glance
and a ruffle flounce, they say,
“High fashion doesn’t play.”
Miffed, the wind insists
until colors deepen and reach their peak.
Then she teases apart their seams
and gathers their gowns
around their knees.

Poetry Friday

2011-09-30T07:00:00.004-04:00

We’ve had a couple of gorgeous Maine lake days this week. I am not ready to let go of summer. Today I am celebrating Mary Oliver. These lines begin her poem “The Summer Day.”

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.

With the specificity of a grasshopper, Oliver affirms the value of all creation. She begins the poem with three questions and ends with three questions. The last is one of my favorite lines of all time:

Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

Read the entire poem here

Listen to Oliver read this poem at the very end of a wonderful podcast here

Thanks to Sara for collecting poems today. Read the offerings at Read Write Believe

Golden Seams

2011-09-13T16:34:00.003-04:00

Welcome to Musings on Poetry Friday. I'd like to share my 9/11 memorial poem. Head on over to The Poem Farm
for more offerings.

This summer I had the great honor of being invited to write a poem for our town’s 9/11 memorial program. In July I started my draft and soon hit a wall. Thumbing through one of my writer's notebooks, I found a note about the ancient Japanese art of joinery called Kintsugi (kin-tsugi).

In the art of Kintsugi, the artist applies layers of lacquer to adhere the pieces of broken pottery together. The final layer is laced with gold to illuminate, rather than hide, the breakage. The repaired object is more beautiful than the original. You can see this process here.

I felt that Kintsugi might hold meaning for the healing of America’s wound, and so my poem evolved.

Golden Seams

Remember the day a ruptured sky
spread emptied and silent over us?
Doves and their kindred spirits dared not fly.
Smoke billowed. Haunting words
dropped heavy as descending stones.

On a stage where some called out, “Revenge!”
we cleaned and dressed our nation’s wound,
reached out to any stranger’s pain
to bond with post-9/11 glue.

On widening trenches of mistrust
we heaped security and sacred creed,
a monument to our lost innocence;
a Maginot Line Band-aid.

Do we wear you like a proud tattoo,
America’s September scar,
vengeance, vigilance– emblazoned
on muscles we habitually flex?

What if our splintered self, instead, displayed
seams layered like Japanese Kintsugi art–
heroic deeds of that one day
now gilded by forgiving hearts?

Let gold-illuminated seams
embellish and adorn our fractured vessel.
Let doves fly in from wild skies
to roost at last in sunlit olive branches.

~ Joyce Ray

Children's Book Illustrator's Exhibit

2011-08-12T16:58:00.002-04:00

Check out the Children’s Book Illustrator’s exhibit at the University of New England Art Gallery in Portland, Maine. Illustrations from many treasured books are displayed. My personal favorite is Barbara Cooney’s painting of Miss Rumphius discovering lupines in the valley.

I loved seeing two Dahlov Ipcar originals, since I just wrote her profile for Women of the Pine Tree State. The colors are much more vivid than those on pages of My Wonderful Christmas Tree. Diane De Groat’s watercolor of Anastasia Krupnik is there along with some Jerry Pinkney Aesop Fable illustrations, including his wonderful red fox cover.

The show includes a Holly Meade watercolor collage and Jane Dyer’s Fish Soup print of a green-scaled grouper in a waiter’s jacket. It’s very special to view these illustrations on the wall. Two more I loved are E.B. Lewis’s art from We Are All the Colors of Freedom and Melissa Sweet’s collage of Audubon’s collection in The Boy Who Drew Birds.

Twenty-eight artists are represented and author Lois Lowry is speaking at the gallery on September 6.

Poetry Friday

2011-08-05T08:09:00.001-04:00

Last week I enjoyed a day at the Maine beach of my childhood with my granddaughter and niece. The sky was gorgeous, the sand hot and the waves crashed and thundered. I was surprised that the water was merely chilly instead of the numbing cold I remembered.

Here’s a poem inspired by watching the girls bob in the swells and body surf.

Water Sprite

You twirl and dip and sing
your song while the water
cradles your arms, your legs
like before your birth when
only you could hear your song–
Water Sprite.

Mermaids in Maine

2011-07-01T12:47:00.000-04:00

It's July. It's Maine. The sun is shining and I can't wait to get to the ocean. "The Mermaid" is part of my collection of Maine poems celebrating a Maine summer.

Skate egg cases are known as mermaids’ purses. Horns and tendrils on each of the corners anchor the case to seaweed. Each case contains one egg, and skates lay multiple pairs throughout the breeding season.

In six to twelve months, the young skate slits the side of the case and slips out. Two skates common to the Gulf of Maine are smooth skate, Malacoraja senta, and thorny skate Amblyraja radiate.

The Mermaid

tosses her empty purse
on the sandbar and flips away.
She glides with skates to
egg them on in case
they let slip more
leather pouches
with tassels and tendrils-
cast off without notice.

Backstage at the Globe

2011-06-20T20:53:00.003-04:00

All the World’s a Stage, A Novel in Five Acts by Gretchen Woelfle

It’s the end of the sixteenth century in Elizabethan London. Orphaned Kit Buckles is working off a debt. Will Shakespeare has saved him from the sheriff. Now Kit must repay the kindness with a stage boy’s labor. In an instant, he goes from a nipping stripling to a grub-slave. As Kit learns what goes on behind the scene at the Theatre playhouse, he is caught up in the real drama of a secret plot.

Author Gretchen Woelfle’s middle grade novel All the World’s a Stage, A Novel in Five Acts takes the reader backstage at what will become the famous Globe Theatre for a historically accurate event. Woelfle casts her story with authentic characters that were part of the real drama in 1599.

Lured by the call of the stage, Kit takes pointers from player James. Encouraged by Master Carpenter Peter Street, Kit learns how to use a chisel and how to dismantle and rebuild a post and beam frame. Will Shakespeare, forever busily writing new plays, lends an ear whenever Kit needs one. Molly the apple-seller befriends Kit and tries to convince him he is master of his own fate. Through his failure at what he thought was his dream, Kit learns his weaknesses and his strengths. He discovers an inherited skill and finds a way to build a future.

All the World’s a Stage transports readers 400 years into the past. Yet, the main character faces choices as difficult as those of twenty-first century readers. From Act I to Act V, readers care about Kit Buckles. He seems like a real person living in a setting vibrant with sights, sounds and smells. It’s a great read. See Gretchen's book trailer at http://www.gretchenwoelfle.com

The Work Begins

2011-05-18T16:15:00.001-04:00

I’m just back from the New England Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators terrific annual conference. I attended workshops on creating quirky characters and levitating my fiction and had a professional critique of my MG novel draft.

Jane Yolen and Tomie DePaola were inspiring, and we heard wonderful remarks from Steve Moser and Lin Oliver, SCBWI’s founders. With almost 600 attendees, the networking opportunities were fantastic. I renewed acquaintances and made new contacts. It was a fantastic conference.

If that were not inspiration enough, last night I heard Katherine Paterson speak! So I am floating along on a sea of writerly waves. It was the perfect time to read NH author’s Ernest Hebert’s advice on the publisher David Godine’s blog.

Hebert says that when authors identify with their main characters, they tend to protect them like they would protect themselves. Wrong, he says. This results in no dramatic tension.

Hebert advises that authors “must convey in the fiction that the character will succumb to the fate of the story. …tell your protagonist that you don't love him, that he has make his way in the story without your protection.” Read the full comment in A Common Error.

So it’s revision time. Find the backstory, create a more likable character and let the worst thing happen to her.

Thoreau Meets Basho

2011-04-15T16:54:00.002-04:00

Happy Poetry Friday! Diane Mayer is rounding up the poetry at Random Noodling

The pines still stand here older than I. Sentries of the acres I tread. The bones of the dead stand with their comrades. Knobby roots push through earth. Cones crunch underfoot. A lone beech has slipped in. Wind rattles its yellowed leaves. The caw of a crow penetrates the grove. I shiver. I look up at green branches sweeping the sky blue. When I look down, a turkey feather.

surprise slips
into a pine symphony …
sanctuary

This morning a flock of turkeys meandered around my yard! It seems they like the pine grove. I began my haibun with a Thoreau quote from Walden: “The pines still stand here older than I.” That’s a great quote to remember when you’re feeling like your body’s not cooperating!

This month our library is promoting a town-wide read of Thoreau’s Walden. Haiku master Basho also kept journals about his experiences, so I thought I’d compare Thoreau with Basho and host a writing activity for my library during poetry month. We used Walden quotes to jump-start our own haibun.

Basho was pretty objective in his descriptions, telling it as he saw it without embellishment. Thoreau used evocative language to describe his environment while weaving in his philosophy. Basho’s subjective comments came at the end in a haiku. His combination of poetic prose and haiku is called haibun.

Here is a Basho haibun from The Hut of the Phantom Dwelling written in 1690:
I too gave up city life some ten years ago, and now I'm approaching fifty. I'm like a bagworm that's lost its bag, a snail without its shell. I've tanned my face in the hot sun of Kisakata in Ou, and bruised my heels on the rough beaches of the northern sea, where tall dunes make walking so hard. And now this year here I am drifting by the waves of Lake Biwa. The grebe attaches its floating nest to a single strand of reed, counting on the reed to keep it from washing away in the current. With a similar thought, I mended the thatch on the eaves of the hut, patched up the gaps in the fence, and at the beginning of the fourth month, the first month of summer, moved in for what I thought would be no more than a brief stay. Now, though, I'm beginning to wonder if I'll ever want to leave.

Among these summer trees,
a pasania-
something to count on

http://www.reocities.com/alanchng1978/hut.html

I had to Google pasania to learn it is a Japanese evergreen tree. Now the last line makes perfect sense.

cherry blossom mantle

2011-03-25T14:42:00.002-04:00

My mind is so much on Japan these days. We spent last summer in the north, a little west of the tsunami area. While volunteering at the Asian Rural Institute, we traveled a bit.

One June weekend we explored the beautiful bay area of Matsushima, where the poet Basho stayed for a time. This month, blogs report that the many pine-capped islands throughout the bay broke the brunt of the wave, or else the loss of lives and damage would have been much worse. Still, the town is suffering.

As northern Japan comes into its cherry blossom season, I remember the snowfalls of last April’s cherry blossoms. Perhaps this year, some of the devastation will wear a mantle of beauty. If so, to me it will symbolize the dignity of the Japanese people.

cherry blossoms snow
over shrines and splintered dreams
fragile pale beauty

Daughters of Genius

2011-02-12T15:30:00.002-05:00

I’ve neglected posting as I design poetry workshops and research Maine women. Both work is exciting and one balances the other.

As I work on the America’s Notable Women series, I am intrigued by Daughters of Genius by James Parton, published by Hubbard brothers in 1888. The subtitle is A Series of Sketches of Authors, Artists, Reformers, and Heroines, Queens, Princesses, and Women of Society, Women Eccentric and Peculiar!

Among the 43 profiled women are Queen Victoria, the Bronte sisters, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Joan of Arc, Peggy Shippen (Benedict Arnold’s wife), Empress Josephine (Napoleon’s wife), and Harriet Beecher Stowe.

My favorite profile is that of Louisa May Alcott. It’s filled with her own quotes about writing. On seeing her first stories printed in the Saturday Evening Gazette, she writes, “Only those who have known this experience can understand the intense satisfaction one feels on seeing his first literary efforts actually in print, and the sheet in which they appear always finds a warm place in the heart of the grateful scribbler.”

Daughters of Genius is an ancestor of the America’s Notable Women series! You can read this book online here.

2011-01-07T12:05:00.003-05:00

I made it through Epiphany and the holidays have given way to writing again. My friend Margaret, who has a treasure trove of old books, lent me a curious children’s book, Robinson Crusoe in Words of One Syllable by Mary Godolphin. Lucy Aiken wrote under this pseudonym in the 19th century. The book was published by George Routledge & Sons, one of a series that included The Swiss Family Robinson.

I opened the book, skeptical about its readability, and was surprised to find that it reads very well. Here’s an excerpt:

I could swim well, but the force of the waves made me lose my breath too much to do so. At length one large wave took me to the shore, and left me high and dry, though half dead with fear. I got on my feet and made the best of my way for the land; but just then the curve of a huge wave rose up as high as a hill, and this I had no strength to keep from, so it took me back to the sea.

Read the entire text here http://www.learn-to-read-prince-george.com/support-files/robinsonc.pdf
As a former reading teacher of primary students, this book interests me. It’s a window into the way reading was thought to be accessible in those days. It’s really the first of its kind. The preface says that other one syllable literature consisted of unconnected sentences in spelling books.

Without undertaking a complete analysis of the text above, we can see a big difference when compared to readability markers we are used to today. No concern for sentence complexity is evident in this passage. There are several consonant blends and no repeated words to anchor on. In document readability, it sc ores a Flesch Kincaid grade level of 8.3.

Colin Whitely viewed this book as a translation in his blog The Translation Bridgehttp://www.quicksilvertranslate.com/en/blog/robinson-crusoe-in-words-of-one-syllable.axd
He says, “One interesting way to consider the art of the translator is to compare it to that of a poet. Both attempt to express ideas in writing within some very specific constraints.”

Lucy Aiken produced an amazing book within the constraints of one syllable. It’s worth a look at this predecessor of today’s easy readers.

2010-12-15T17:25:00.000-05:00

It’s amazing how working in one area spawns an idea in another area. I’ve been researching Maine artist Dahlov Ipcar, whose children’s books(Hardscrabble Harvest, The Calico Jungle, My Wonderful Christmas Tree and others) are being reprinted by Islandport Press and who is still painting at age 93. It’s wonderful immersing myself in her gorgeous art, full of geometric patterns and lively colors. Her passion for jungle animals sparked an idea in my mind for a Christmas book.

I wrote a Christmas story during my first semester at Vermont College. Eric Kimmel was my mentor. Eric read my manuscript, critiqued it and said, “Now go write me a Christmas story worthy of the subject.” Hard to swallow, but he was right. Now I think my new idea might be worthy. The trick is to write it!

2010-12-08T19:47:00.002-05:00

The Book Swap Café photo is from last weekend’s interview for a segment of a book discussion show on our local community TV channel. Who knew an interview could be so much fun? The show’s hosts, Anita and Mickey, were delightful and asked wonderful leading questions. The America’s Notable Women series got great publicity, I think. You can see Women of the Golden State standing on the table, cover pointing at the camera!

It was easy to share highlights of Judy Baca, Janice Mirikitani and Alice Eastward, my Golden State women. The hosts thought the women were fascinating. Mickey had even seen the Great Wall, the world’s longest mural that Judy Baca coordinated in LA, but didn’t know the story behind it.

Anita and Mickey wanted to know about Women of Granite, so we talked about some New Hampshire Women. The cameraman loved the story of Charlie Parkhurst, a NH orphan who ran away, disguised herself as a boy and had a long career as a stagecoach driver.

I’m eagerly waiting for the release of Women of the Empire State, which will be soon, then Illinois, the Prairie State. And I’ve begun research on some women form Maine, my home state!

The show airs in January locally, and I understand it's uploaded to PEGMEDIA, so community TV stations anywhere in the country have the option of showing it.

Children's Book-a-Day Almanac

2010-12-01T17:42:00.001-05:00

Today I'm passing along author Leda Shubert's blog interview with Anita Silvey about Anita's fantastic Children's Book-a-Day Almanac. Imagine discovering the newsy bits behind old and new, all amazing, children's book each day. Veteran publisher, editor and author Anita Silvey dishes it up, and we get to savor what we didn't know about classics and newer books Anita has thoughtfully paired with each day.

This site is a must for teachers, librarians and all children's book lovers. The content will enrich book introductions and add texture to our own knowledge about everything that goes into creating a children's book. Silvey is a wellspring of knowledge about the history of children's publishing. I once heard her describe how Robert McCloskey had a bathtub full of tipsy ducks as models for Make Way for Ducklings!

Pass the word about the Children's Book-a-Day Almanac so all can enjoy.

Stick Season writing

2010-11-24T16:44:00.000-05:00

Stick season brings more indoor time, more time to nurse cups of tea and ponder revisions. This past week has centered on a picture book revision (yes, the market is soft, but writing is writing!, some Hildegard revision, revision of a poem based on discussions with my new poetry critique partner and some research.

I need to keep going on my ARI poems. There is so much to write about my experiences last summer. I want to capture the summer in a group of poems - poems that will make any ARI family member smile into their own memories and poems that will send images of life at ARI into the world.

Poetry Friday

2010-11-19T12:10:00.004-05:00

To honor all the aunts about to share Thanksgiving dinner with us, listen to Kevin Young's poem "Aunties" at Poetry Everywhere. Here's an excerpt:

there's a way only
your Auntie can make it

taste right -
rice & gravy
is a meal

if my late Great Aunt
Toota makes it -
Aunts cook like

there's no tomorrow
& they're right.

My mind is still on the gorgeous film, Vision, about the life of Hildegard of Bingen. I expounded on it in this week's Wednesday blog. Here I'll share the poem, first published in the journal Color Wheel, that came out of my visit to Hildegard's monastery ruins.

CLOISTER RUINS

Seeds sprout in holy space until
beech and oak arch over toppled stones.
Larks trill in a hilltop canopy
where psalms once floated upward,
and leafy hands now murmur prayers.

The stones, weighted with
longing whispered in secret,
sink into the earth.
Centuries ago they tumbled, like thunder
rumbling through the Great Silence.

Ivy anchors their moss velvet faces.
Rose thorns ramble over crumbled gables.
Helpless to shelter, the stones stand sentry,
mute witnesses to divine desire.

Did you think wind, rain, the shifting of earth’s crust
conspired to collapse these hallowed structures?

Know this - the human heart
beats a hunger for its creator
more powerful than natural forces.
Echoes of supplication saturate each stone.
Ages of murmured ardor pull stronger then gravity.

These stones are deaf now.
Speak freely.

Thanks, Diane for rounding up poetry this week over at Random Noodling

Hildegard in Living Color

2010-11-17T21:16:00.001-05:00

I traveled to Boston to see the film Vision on Sunday. It's a beautiful film about the life of Hildegard von Bingen, and the acting is superb. The cinematography is fabulous! Watching it was like seeing my book come alive. Of course, I thought my story is every bit as good as the screen story!

It was interesting to see what Director von Trotta and the screenplay writer chose to emphasize in Hildegard’s life and where they departed from known facts.

The same abbot was shown throughout, though Hildegard, in fact, knew three abbots, at least. I suppose this was for continuity, and I can understand this.

I have never read anything in the sources about a pregnant novice, though I'm sure it could have happened, especially in a double monastery like Disibodenberg. The device provided a believable motive for Hildegard to move the cloister, although sources say it was because a vision told her to move.

I was surprised at Richardis's reaction to Hildegard imploring her not to leave the cloister. Richardis’s jealousy of Hildegard's fame and power seemed to come close on the heels of her devotion with no time to develop. It seemed more likely that she was trying to please her mother, but even that didn't play right when she had shown herself to be headstrong in wanting her own way and so desirous of being near Hildegard. My choice was to have her grow weary of the way Hildegard tried to mold her into a leader who would one day take Hildegard's place. Either treatment is a product of imagination, so all is fair.

It was interesting to see that strict enclosure is not portrayed in this film. We begin with Hildegard being brought to a convent of sorts at a young age. Current scholarship says that she quite probably studied with Jutta at Jutta's family home from the age of eight. In 1112, Jutta and Hildegard definitely were enclosed in an anchorage and another young woman named Jutta is named, also. Since I found no further mention of this second Jutta, I left her out of my story. But I think there is a lot of drama contained in the enclosure years, even though we can't access it. The conflict introduced through the younger novice named Jutta in the film did add interest, however.

I was glad to see that nuns and monks worked side by side in the scriptorium. I had used that idea without being able to validate it. Also, it was interesting that the film has Hildegard elected by her nuns, and that is something I researched and included even though the sources didn't describe it.

Movies have to end somewhere, and books, also, but I'm happy my story continues and shows a bit about her travels and preaching and her final conflict with the archbishop. I think it shows her tremendous strength and faith in that she maintained her stand for what was right in the face of excommunication at an old age.

If Vision plays near you, go to see it! It’s having short runs, probably due to the English subtitles, so don’t delay.

Now I am energized and continuing revisions suggested by a dear colleague who has a strong interest in Hildegard and now lives in her homeland. Thank you, Barbara!

Poetry Friday

2010-11-12T11:56:00.004-05:00

"You can smell a poem before you can see it." Denise Levertov

This is my first Poetry Friday post. I'm excited to join this effort that honors and recognizes the richness that imagery, rhythm and metaphor add to our lives. I'm also thrilled that my poems are starting to grow again. The seeds were nourished in the rich soil of the Asian Rural Institute last summer. This is the first fruit!

I write mostly free verse, but sometimes fall into a form of sorts, with no regular end rhyme, but listening for internal rhyme. I wrote this poem yesterday, spurred on by Poetry Friday. As Levertov says, before the poem shaped itself, I smelled the dark soil on my hands and strawberry juice on my fingertips.

Lotus Field in June

Strawberries glisten in Lotus Field
but Tuesday’s harvest is hours away.
“Pick?” Nilushi asks her group.
A murder of crows hovers above.
Glossy feathers flap to the ground and
beady eyes fix on the fruit.

Trays are ready on harvest day
for crimson nuggets ripe with juice.
But pale fruit waits under leaves.
No berry bites leave telltale clues.
Who raided the strawberry patch?
Butog grins, “Maybe black-haired crows.”

Coal black wings now dangle from a pole.
Victim or thief in Lotus Field?
We pound stakes low to the ground,
crisscross string over leaves and fruit.
It keeps out wings. Not sweet-stained feet.

Check out other Poetry Friday posts at Scrub-a-Dub-Tub

creating light with words

2010-11-08T21:16:00.000-05:00

Today I'm thinking about the many kinds of writing I'm involved with on a daily basis. There's the occasional note card, emails, committee meeting minutes, editing, and biographical research notes. I try to fit in revisions for my Hildegard novel, short stories and picture books. I enjoy all this work, yet find it difficult to start fresh work.

Is there a name for this type of writer? I feel like I'm dabbling, like my focus keeps shifting and I never have a large enough block of time to attempt something new. Actually, I don't need to write new material since my files are full of manuscripts that would benefit from revision. Or is there a point when a writer just scraps everything and starts anew?

Today I received a gift - an invitation to become poetry critique partners with a writer friend! It is a gift because this practice will lift me out of my the daily writing pattern I feel stuck in. I will produce at least new poems because I know someone will be waiting to hear them! I want to create poems that process my summer memories of Japan and write playful children's poems.

I'm going to try to participate in Poetry Fridays, too, once I figure out how to do it! The long dark season is upon us now here in New England. We have to light up our surroundings with our words.

Borrowed Names - a new verse novel

2010-10-20T14:50:00.000-04:00

Books in verse appeal to me, and I’m in awe of the author’s ability to sift through mountains of material and come up with just the right bits to tell a powerful story. Two authors who are masters of this style are Marilyn Nelson (Carver, A Life in Poems, Fortune's Bones, A Wreath for Emmett Till) and Karen Hesse (Out of the Dust, Aleutian Sparrow).

I’ve just read Borrowed Names by Jeannine Atkins, Henry Holt, 2010. Atkins presents the lives of three mother/daughter pairs. In the chronicles of their interactions, separations and homecomings, we glimpse pieces of our own mother/daughter relationships.

Laura Ingalls Wilder, Madam C.J. Walker and Marie Curie were born miles and even worlds apart in 1867. They made lasting contributions to literature, business and science. They also raised daughters who grew up with strength to make their own choices.

Laura Ingalls Wilder’s daughter Rose travels the world and then returns to the prairie to help her struggling, aging parents. After she builds a new home for her parents to ease her guilt over accidentally setting the house on fire when she was three, Rose encourages her mother Laura to write.

“Whatever happens now
here’s the grace:
a writer can change even a burning house
depending on where she begins or ends her story.”

We now have the classic Little House books because Rose helped her mother make writing a priority.

“The dream begun under a tree
is sweeter than stories you tell yourself
over dirty dishes.”

Madam C. J. Walker was the daughter of former slaves. She bent over washtubs and lugged clothes baskets to back doors with her daughter. She followed a dream and created hair treatments that brought her fortune and fame and secured a life of ease for her daughter, A’Lelia.

“One can slide between poor and rich,
the difference as slight as between
paper and parchment
one voice and a choir
arms hanging by sides and a hug.”
Marie Curie’s two gold medals were always in the back of her daughter’s mind. Irene dreamed of earning her own. The day she and her husband succeeded in making artificial radium, Irene feels her mother’s (Mé’s) pride.

“A milky haze coats Mé’s eyes,
which meet her daughter’s. This gaze is her gold.”

At Marie Curie’s burial, Irene wonders:

“Can the past press closer than the present?
Who is a daughter without a mother?”

Atkins has selected patches of these mother/daughter stories. In Borrowed Names, she has skillfully turned history into poems and empowered the reader to stitch them together into an heirloom quilt.

take one baby writing step

2010-09-29T22:20:00.000-04:00

I’m beginning to feel like a writer again! I had a low point recently when I discovered a children’s biography had been published about my subject four years ago! Where had I been? I knew about the Jonah Winter PB on Hildegard, but mine is YA, so I could deal with that. Besides, I love the picture book. But I really felt like giving up when I read the preview pages of the biography. Then I researched the publisher and learned that the book was self-published. So the author may have had encountered the same sort of publishing difficulties I have met. I any case, my book has moved from non-fiction to a combo of fiction and non-fiction to fiction. So I will keep on trying to find a publisher. Anyone know of any Hildegard devotees who also happen to be agents?

Sometimes I feel like I'm in a writing game of Giant Steps. Someone doles out my writing progress: "You may take one baby step forward." Well,okay. It's those backwards steps we need to avoid! The Concord Monitor has published my review of Black Pearls by Louise Hawes, and a magazine editor has written a positive response to my query about a short story. Baby steps! Oh well, there’s nothing like reading to feed a writer’s soul, is there?

This summer I managed to read The Greengage Summer by Rumer Godden, one of my favorite authors. I wondered how I had missed this great mystery and coming of age story. Now I’ve devoured City of Thieves and just finished Red Glass, a touching young adult novel. I’ve just bought Jeannine Atkins’ Borrowed Names. I can't wait to dive in! Next week I’ll review it here.

Back from Japan

2010-09-21T21:11:00.000-04:00

Hello! I'm back from Japan. It's probably echoing out there since my small blog audience hasn't had any posts to read since last March! My sustainable agriculture experience was enriched by people from so many cultures. The multicultural picture books I brought for ARI's library helped in several ways.

Mary from Liberia loved Beatrice's Goat, a story about Heifer Project. She knows families that have received a heifer, just as Beatrice receives a goat. Uncle Timo, from Ghana, brought One Hen to Poultry class and asked all 29 participants to read it as an example of a small poultry project that financed micro loans to others. I read The Tree Hugger, donated by Jeanne Atkins, to my adult English class and told the story of Running Shoes to four Japanese Primary students when I subbed as their English teacher.

So I was immersed in relationships and not children's writing, though I edited lots of documents, helped write an Annual Report and wrote two grant proposals that were accepted! That was my day work. Before breakfast and before supper, you could find me feeding chickens, planting gardens, mucking out pigs, or cooking breakfast and supper!

Now I'm back to revising Hildegard and waiting for my wonderful ARI experience to ferment into rich stories and poems. The wonderful books on the shelf here are what I've read in the last week.

ask and you shall receive

2010-03-18T16:27:00.001-04:00

Blogging has taken a back seat due to life happenings and also preparations for a long stay in Japan. I am overwhelmed over the generosity of some wonderful children's authors. They have offered books to start a Multicultural Library at the Asian Rural Institute where I will volunteer for five months.

Adult participants from 16 Asian and African countries will be learning sustainable agriculture techniques and community leadership. Since English is the common language and skills will differ, I think picture books will be good discussion starters for practicing language skills.

Beginning in April, this blog will focus on whatever I happen upon that can be linked to literature! It's a big adventure.

Here's the link to ARI:
http://www.ari-edu.org/english/index.html

riffing with Lucille Clifton

2010-02-24T15:24:00.001-05:00

The world lost Lucille Clifton last week. A respected children’s author and poet, she was twice a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, won a National Book Award and the Ruth Lily Poetry Prize.

I have been reading some of her poems. They are spare but they bulge with wisdom and emotion. Through her poem “won’t you celebrate with me,” I learned riffing applies to poetry as well as to music.

Listen to Clifton read her poem here. http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=181377

Clifton refers to and echoes poems by Whitman and Keats in her poem. Whitman, who gave us free verse, confidently states “I celebrate myself” in “Song of Myself.” Clifton’s speaker tentatively invites us to celebrate a “kind of life” before discovering the reason for celebration.

Clifton’s speaker is suspended “between starshine and clay.” It’s an echo of Keats’s line “Betwixt damnation and impassion’d clay” in “On Sitting Down to Read King Lear Once Again.”

Riffing requires that one be well-read, have a good memory and sense the timeless connections between ideas! Thank you, Lucille Clifton.

ekphrastic poetry

2010-02-10T21:35:00.000-05:00

William Carlos Williams must have loved exploring Bruegel's art. He interpreted a number of the paintings in his poems. His ekphrastic poems inspired me to complete a poem based on a sketch of artist Jamie Wyeth's COMET.

SENTRIES
after COMET, a painting by Jamie Wyeth

Two sentries
stand rooted to Monhegan stone.
Do they take shifts watching?

Lens polished, one waits
for moonless nights. The other, eyes
shut, listens for turning tides.

The light flashes code.
Comet,
sea tosses up.

Time to
glut your gullet.
Open your eyes.

The sky darkens.
Clouds with purple tints
hint of weather.

Who will sound our alarm,
pry our eyes open
to behold the bruised sky?

What is worth sounding the alarm
in our century?
- Joyce Ray

ekphrasis

2010-02-03T16:18:00.000-05:00

A recent visit to my favorite serendipity bookstore (New England Mobile Book Fair in Newton Highlands, MA) did not disappoint. I came away with Linda Sue Park’s Tap Dancing on the Roof: Sijo Poems, Side by Side edited by Jan Greenberg and a gem called Poetry As Spiritual Practice by Robert McDowell.

All these will feed my poetry workshops which begin today. We will use a method to “unpack” poems I learned from Baron Wormser (poet and co-author of A Surge of Language, Teaching Poetry Day by Day.)

The first exercise will explore ekphrasis - writing poetry from art. I love to search for a painting that calls to me on a museum visit. First, I do a “naive poet’s sketch” in pencil (guards approach you if you take out a pen), then jot down thoughts and impressions on the spot. Later, the notes and sketch lead to a poem. Postcard art will be our workshop inspiration.

Virginia Lee Burton

2010-01-27T19:46:00.002-05:00

I saw a wonderful documentary from Netflix this week, “Virginia Lee Burton: A Sense of Place.” It’s a beautiful tribute to a defining picture book author, and it solved a mystery about a piece of fabric I have!

Virginia Lee Burton was the author-illustrator of the picture book Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel. A child really did give her the idea of turning Mary Anne into the steam plant for the Town Hall! Mike Mulligan, Katy and the Big Snow and The Little House speak of empowerment to children and nostalgia to adults. For over 60 years, children have read of friendship, loyalty, and hard work in her picture books.

Burton’s beloved Cape Ann home figured in The Little House, which won the Caldecott Medal. She and her husband moved it back away from the highway. Urbanization encroached even in the 1940s, and Burton’s book was like Carson’s Silent Spring for children. Burton pioneered in laying out the town in illustration, too.

In the DVD, Burton’s sons reminisce about their mother and the Finnish community they lived in. They talk of her discipline and passion for her work. Her test of a good story was if she could read it for a month to the same audience without them falling asleep!

Children’s book experts Anita Silvey and Andrea Pinkney both speak of Burton’s place in the evolution of picture books and the sense of place in her work. The place moves from story to story, from San Francisco to Gloucester to the universe. The story is always grounded in place. The sense of movement in her illustrations give power to the story. Her sense of style, the cadence of her language and her grasp of subjects that held children’s interest (she had three boys) catapulted her into success.

The Folly Cove designers talk of the textile business Burton started on Cape Ann. The designs looked familiar to me. On a hunch, I dug out a yard of russet printed cloth. Boys and girls, arm-in-arm, dance across it. Sure enough, Finnish Hop Folly Cove Design is printed on the selvage! I am thrilled to have this piece. I can’t wait to stretch it on a frame and hang it!

Rent this film for a real treat! Virginia Lee Burton wrote, “The future lies to some extent in the hands of the children of today.” I thought of her when I read this bumper sticker today: We are defined not only by what we create, but by what we refuse to destroy. Burton’s picture books whisper about bravery and courage so today’s children will be make wise decisions in the future.

in search of merriment

2010-01-21T21:18:00.000-05:00

What a gorgeous day! Snow weights the pine branches like those in my childhood paint-by-number paintings. Blue sky stretches over forest, field and pond. I walk. It’s a feel-good day. In my window, sunlight powers the gears of my new rainbow maker. They rotate the crystals, and light flashes, separating into all its colors.

What we need is a solar cell for writing. Input a manuscript and see it instantly separated into its parts. No, I don’t mean the readability programs that leave no room for creative expression. What I want is a device that tells me where the plot is weak, what sensory details I’ve neglected to use, which character needs more development. If there is anything like that out there, maybe I wouldn’t trust it. Back to the shrunken manuscript and trying to channel Gertrude Stein – “In the midst of writing there is merriment.”

shrunken manuscript

2010-01-14T16:05:00.001-05:00

Honey, I shrunk the kids! No, just my manuscript. Using Darcy Patterson’s technique http://www.darcypattison.com/revision/shrunken-manuscript/Shrunken-manuscript, I’ve reduced Hildegard to 30 pages of single spaced 10 point text. I made a pink X on each chapter I felt was strong. So 13 out of 19 chapters are strong. So far, so good. I see where I need to concentrate – chapters 4, 5 and 6 - three weak chapters in a row.

At least I don’t have Sagging Middle. Chapters 8, 9 and 10 are strong. So how do I strengthen the earlier chapters? I’m going to have another look at emotional tension and dialogue and action, for starters. I’m getting there! Stay with me, Hildegard!

epiphany

2010-01-06T12:09:00.000-05:00

In this season of Epiphany, I'm always hopeful that my own way will become clear. That I'll have a break through in whatever I'm working on or pondering. Like the Wise Men, I dream, but the meaning is lost to me. An eureka moment would make all the slogging worthwhile, wouldn't it?

So I begin the new year - researching and writing non-fiction, revising Hildegard, planning poetry workshops. I wait for my epiphany, the moment when I realize what my purpose is. It usually comes during the work, hard-won, but there all the same.

This year I will make a long journey for an extended stay in Japan. New experiences will open the way for fresh epiphanies. It worked for the Wise Men. Like them, I will be waiting.

prairie women

2009-12-31T12:58:00.000-05:00

As the 2009 winds down, I am immersing myself in the lives of two women of the Prairie State. Articles, journals, books all hold clues to why these women are important enough to write about. Sifting through to find the gems is like prospecting. I search for the detail that will hook my reader. I want something more than the obvious, something that shows how this woman thinks, what drives her to accomplish her dream. Finally, the detail jumps out at me. I know how to begin writing.

Happy New Year!

sea of stories

2009-12-23T11:41:00.000-05:00

“Nothing comes from nothing, Thieflet; no story comes from nowhere; new stories are born from old – it is the new combinations that make them new.” So says Iff the Water Genie to Haroun in Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie.

We’ve heard that before and what an incentive for a writer to read! More stories are fodder for new combinations. Here are stories I have enjoyed in 2009.

The Freedom Business – Marilyn Nelson
The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafon
The Graveyard Book – Neil Gaimon
Rules – Cynthia Lord
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society – Mary Ann Schaffer
The People of the Book – Geraldine Brooks
A River of Words, the Story of William Carlos Williams – Jen Bryant
Rearranging – David Gifaldi
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet – Jamie Ford
Lost – Jacqueline Davies
Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy – Gary Schmidt
Traveling With Pomegranates – Sue Monk Kidd & Ann Kidd Taylor
Black Pearls – Louise Hawes

writing blind

2009-12-16T11:32:00.000-05:00

Midway through the Advent season of waiting, I’m still waiting to send cards, get a tree, sew the doll clothes, and figure out a gift or two. I’m also waiting to finish the story of Hildegard that I have struggled off and on with for eight years.

My inner critic slows down the story and prevents the free flow of words. “You could think of a better word choice.” “Does this story even have a plot?” “You’re telling, not showing.” “This character is too shallow.” Why aren’t you using all the senses?” The voice asking these questions stops me cold. I begin to address the immediate problem rather than move the story forward. My inner critic keeps me from producing the volume of words that I need to discover the story.

YA author Norma Fox Mazer sometimes typed with a hat pulled down over her eyes. She may have been putting herself in her characters’ world, shutting out distractions or both. This week I discovered a technique that quiets my inner critic and allows me to pound out the first draft without thinking too much. I extend my laptop screen all the way back and cover it with paper. So simple! When I worked with a desk monitor, it never occurred to me to drape a cloth over the screen.

By covering the screen, I can’t focus on the words. My eyes see story images instead. No more waiting for an inner critic to approve a first draft. Later, she can help me craft and polish the words.

goodbye to stick season

2009-12-09T14:27:00.000-05:00

Fine snow drives down, piling up in the tree crotches and capping the birdhouses. As I work on Hildegard, I’m re-reading Stein on Writing by Sol Stein. He says triage is the way to revise. Tackle major matters first.

Are the characters alive and well-rounded? Both protagonist and antagonist need to have positive and negatives qualities. Minor characters need at least one special characteristic.

Make sure the conflict is credible. Does the plot need to be strengthened?

Compare the most memorable scene with the least memorable. What makes the first work well? If the least memorable scene can’t be fixed, cut it! Keep testing the next least memorable scenes until the scenes that are left create a strong story.

Are the three most important actions in the book well motivated? Motivation is caused by circumstance or planted ahead of the action. Check all important actions for poor motivation.

Finally, read the first page only. Make sure there is a compelling reason to turn the page.

After the triage work of the writer, the manuscript is ready for general revision. Read through with the eyes of the reader and the editor. Tighten. Transpose. No purple prose!

still stick season

2009-12-02T12:22:00.000-05:00

Last night I walked the woods path. The moonlight frosted those tenacious beech leaves, giving the illusion of snow. But bare pine needles and cones crunched under my feet. It’s still stick season.

The sticks cast long shadows. High in a tree, a noise squeaked intermittently. The scene reminded me of Carl Sandburg’s words: “Poetry is an echo asking a shadow to dance.” Sandburg came up with many metaphors about poetry, “the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits,” but I like the echo metaphor.

A line or a phrase won’t go away. It begs for attention, and when I try to capture its importance, it’s like a shadow whose real essence is impossible to capture. I begin to draft the poem, and it’s like learning to dance. I discover the right words, find the rhythm, and create a partnership between the idea and what it means. When I get it right, the echo dances with the shadow instead of bouncing of my brain cells.

giving thanks

2009-11-25T12:02:00.000-05:00

It’s time for giving thanks, so thanks for reading my blog! Writing is a solitary profession, and it feels wonderful to know some faithful readers are with me each week.

As a reader, I am grateful for the classics I love – Little Women, Jane Eyre, Parnassus on Wheels, Charlotte’s Web. These contemporary authors whose books I don’t miss also enrich my life – Katherine Paterson, Susan Cooper, Jane Yolen, Deborah Wiles, Karen Hesse, Cynthia Rylant, Donna Jo Napoli.

Professionally, I am thankful for the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and the NH Writers’ Project. These two organizations provide immense support and incentive. Academically, I am grateful to Vermont College, now Vermont College of Fine Arts, for the stellar program that helped me find a children’s writer’s voice. Without the mentors I worked with, my student writing colleagues and the hope instilled by the many publications of VC graduates, I would not have persevered.

When asked what I write, I’m tempted to say drafts because it takes many attempts to get a story ready to submit to a publisher. To my critique buddies, both face-to face and online, I owe so much for reading and re-reading with care. Lastly, I am forever thankful to my family, all of whom put up with an absent wife, mother and grandmother more than they should have to. Their support keeps me going after the rejection letters, and they’re the first ones in line to help me celebrate acceptances.

Because writing is solitary, some writers need a network, and I’m grateful to all who make up mine.

black pearls

2009-11-19T22:34:00.001-05:00

“We’re all working from the same dictionary.” That’s Dr. T, my dentist, commenting on the fact that English users are not all writers. I thought of this as I read Black Pearls: a Faerie Strand by Louise Hawes, Houghton Mifflin, 2008. The lyrical language of these re-imagined fairy tales is astounding. Is Hawes really working from the same dictionary as the rest of us?

The dwarf Erin falls in love with Diamonda as she waits for the fateful poisoned apple. “While the wind of envy rattled and moaned, closing its fingers around her hiding place, the two of us spent whole mornings in the blue shadows of the mountains beyond our forest.”

Rapunzel or Rampion? Snow White or Diamonda? The name changes alone signal that our beloved fairy tales have grown up. Did you wonder why Lady Godiva rode naked down Coventry’s single street? “…it was as a penitent that I dismounted, freighted with a secret treasure, at the small cottage where Ebba was being born.”

Hawes boldly travels into dark places with these tales. The surprising twists are perfectly geared to a YA, and even adult, audience. Readers who grew up with Hansel and Gretel, Jack and the Beanstalk and Cinderella will delight in approaching these familiar stories from new angles. Louise Hawes is a master writer. You can trust her to deliver stories worth reading.

finding treasure

2009-11-12T10:51:00.003-05:00

This week I found my favorite childhood picture book. The pages are ragged. The covers are long gone. I don’t know the title or the author. But Belinda is still there traveling through the forest, swimming to the lake bottom, and ascending to the moon and sun to find a friend. It’s hard to imagine my joy when the long-lost book popped off the closet shelf, hidden under another item. For years I thought I had lost this book that has moved with me all my adult life.

What is it about a book that makes us treasure it? It can be a strong character, a theme, beautiful language or stunning illustrations. Belinda’s story is told in a late 1940’s or early ‘50’s picture book. The illustrations are tinted photographs, which were probably new in this genre. The book my have been the only one I had with these life-like, lavishly colored pictures. Belinda is Jane’s wooden doll searching for a companion, and she finally finds one back in the wood shop when Jane’s dad makes another doll, Todd. I think the theme of finding what one searches for and the illustrations both made this the childhood book I am thrilled to find. Now for the title and author!

uncovering the ghosts

2009-11-03T19:37:00.003-05:00

My Hildegard writing has been slow, and I have decided that's okay. Today I didn't write. I sifted through my box of research begun eight years ago, looking for an article I needed. There must be a more organized way, but I haven't found it. It was time well-spent because I unearthed a scholar's debate that affects my manuscript.

On All Saints' Day, over 900 years ago,young Hildegard took the vows of a nun and was sealed in a stone anchorage. Scholars do not agree on the year. Some have thought Hildegard was age eight, some fourteen. I have leaned to age fourteen.

Now I've been reminded of a newer theory that says Hildegard was probably age ten. The case is made on the basis of monastery records stating the enclosure happened on All Saints' Day. Enclosures were allowed on certain feast days and on Sundays. All Saints' Day occurred on a Sunday in 1108 when Hildegard was ten, not when she was eight in 1106 or fourteen in 1112.

Scholarship is often a ghost hunt!

rabbit hill festival of children's literature

2009-10-28T06:07:00.001-04:00

My first Rabbit Hill Festival in Westport, CT was fantastic! The focus was on historical fiction and nonfiction. Susan Campbell Bartoletti, Tonya Bolden, Candace Fleming, Dennis and Judy Fradin, and Gary Schmidt all gave talks. They shared their fascination with history, their process and what guides them as they write.

Gary Schmidt was amazing to listen to. He is a gifted storyteller and held the audience spellbound. I was primed to hear him as I had just read Trouble and Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy.

Gary said writers have to “recognize that all characters must become multi-dimensional and develop. They have to do more than change.” On language, he reminded writers that “every word has to do more than carry its own weight. It has to do more than it seems, perhaps through rhythm or pacing.” If you ever have the chance to hear Gary Schmidt, don’t pass it up.

Look for Rabbit Hill’s 10th anniversary next fall!

historical fiction to savor

2009-10-21T21:49:00.001-04:00

I’m trying to read more middle grade and young adult fiction. There are so many wonderful books and not enough time! I’ve just come across author Gary Schmidt, first reading Trouble, and now Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy. I enjoyed both, but savored Lizzie Bright and understand how it won both a Newbery and a Printz Honor. It’s a beautiful book based on an historical event in Phippsburg, Maine.

At the turn of the 20th century, the town elders evict a community of former African American slaves from an island. The white community considers them a blight on the town and a deterrent to hoped-for tourism.

Turner Buckminster, the new minister’s son, is saddled with every rule you can think of and more. Harassed by his peers, he makes friends with Lizzie, granddaughter of the African American leader. Their friendship and Turner’s relationships with two old women sustain him while he fights for justice even when his reverend father is manipulated by the elders.

Through Turner’s voice, Schmidt sprinkles humor throughout a very serious story. Coastal Maine is so lovingly depicted that you can feel the damp fog and the sucking mud of the clam flats.

I can’t wait to read another Schmidt book. I’ll hear him speak at the Rabbit Hill Festival of Literature in Westport, CT this weekend.

memory bank

2009-10-14T12:11:00.001-04:00

We don’t always get the chance to revisit scenes of our childhood memories. This summer I went in search of a fire pond in Lincolnville, Maine. Fifty years ago, I fell into this pond and was rescued by my uncle. I remembered that I had lost my sneaker and Uncle George dove back in to retrieve it. On one grace-filled day this September, I stood on the dock of my pond. It looked so much smaller than in my memory.

Cattails and rushes crowded the pond’s banks. Reflected pines pierced the clouds. I tried to re-capture the moment, imagining my arms and legs flailing through the lily pad stems. But Uncle George wasn’t in the rowboat about to take me for a row. Nellie wasn’t standing on the house stoop wearing her long black dress and high button shoes. I can’t go back, but the memory is a treasure in my memory bank. My mind is refreshed with details. I can see the spot more clearly and my imagination can do the rest. Fine fodder for a writer! I need to write down more memories.

what if...

2009-10-08T11:59:00.001-04:00

Advice of the week: Listen. Ideas come from all corners. This week I was stuck! I struggled with bridging two chapters in my Hildegard story. How do I get across what was happening in my character’s life at this time? I needed her to interact with someone, but I resisted introducing a new character who had no purpose to the story. Then my husband said, “What if… .” See, I’ve trained him! His idea is brilliant. It helps anchor the ending, too.

Writers work in different ways. Some keep their work close until finishing a draft. Others like to talk out the plot. I guess I work best alone until I’m stuck. Then I’m up for brainstorming (or in this case, complaining about the impossibility of my task) and listening to possibilities.

the leaves respond

2009-10-01T12:01:00.002-04:00

“Come,” said the wind to the leaves one day.
“Come over the meadow with me and play.
Put on your dresses of red and gold,
for summer is over and days grow cold.”

This song came to me as I drove up I89 yesterday. My mother always sang it at this time of year. Trees seem to change their dresses daily, each costume deeper and more brilliant than the one before. The wind tugs and pulls, weakening the seams until the garments fall apart at October’s end.

The Leaves Respond

The red silk rustles down by the cattails
and muffles the murmur of the golden gabardine.
The russet taffeta swishes around like she owns the meadow.
“Haute couture doesn’t play,” they say.
They sashay, twirl, dip and bow,
each one’s zipper and buttons secure.
The leaves deepen and reach their peak.
They pose and ignore the wind’s call.
“See our fall collection,” they announce,
then gather their gowns around their knees
when the wind teases apart their seams.

sifting for gold

2009-09-24T11:10:00.000-04:00

The lake is so quiet. Only the loons, crows and yellow birch leaves dropping on the deck break the silence. Even the chipmunks have stopped their chatter, busy building up their cold weather store. I paddled all the way to the Narrows, relishing the stillness.

My revision is creeping forward. No leaps and bounds, but some hard earned ah-has when I figure out how to show another aspect of Hildegard’s personality. Writing really is about showing up in the chair and persevering. I sift a lot of rubble before some gold dust appears!

I’m doing the footwork to publicize the book I collaborated on – Women of the Golden State, published by Apprentice Shop Books. I showed it to a Maine bookseller after I purchased a book. She had not heard of this America’s Notable Women Series. I felt good about introducing her to the series. Then she said in her experience, biography for kids didn’t sell! I wonder if that is true for other areas, and if so, what can be done about it? Something to chew on.

equinox popcorn

2009-09-16T20:40:00.002-04:00

It must be the proximity of the fall equinox. Ideas have been popping like popcorn for the past week. I love it! And I love the clouds that spread across a clear blue sky in September.

I finally got around to reading The Underneath by Kathi Appelt. It’s a wonderful book, bursting with poetic language and still full of the kind of suspense that won’t let you stop reading. I kept thinking of Kipling as I savored the narrative style. I was also caught up in the characters’ struggle for survival, as today’s young readers will be. The story has many layers which Appelt builds up, then peels off. And, yes, there are talking animals! Kathi Appelt has written a winner, a National Book Award finalist and a Newbery Honor book. Another keeper for one of my lucky young readers.

not so random acts of publicity

2009-09-09T18:53:00.015-04:00

This is Random Acts of Publicity Week. Here I'll review a wonderful book I just read, but I have a not so random act of publicity, too. My copy of the first children's book project I have collaborated on arrived this week! What a grand feeling to hold that book in my hands! My family threw an on-the-spot author party with tea, scones and Silly String! My grandson even created my promotion poster!

Women of the Golden State is authored by Linda Crotta Brennan and Others. I contributed three profiles - Alice Eastwood: Plant Pioneer, Judith Baca: Healing with Art and Janice Mirikitani: Word Warrior. I loved researching and writing about these women.

Women of the Golden State is part of the America's Notable Women Series. You can find out more information at Apprentice Shop Books.

Now the book review. Lost by Jacqueline Davies is the riveting story of Essie, a shirtwaist factory girl in early twentieth century New York. Essie is a character to care about, to make a reader turn the page, as if reading on will help Essie find what she has lost.

Essie’s fierce determination and skill with her hands gets her through life. Her can-do attitude helps her fix any problem. But it’s her love for her young sister Zelda that gives her life purpose. Essie’s budding love for her fire-escape friend and her curiosity about a mysterious new factory girl add texture and intrigue. Davies weaves these threads of Essie’s life together until she is so real we are sure we know her.

When Essie survives the 1911 Triangle Waist Company fire, she is finally able to face another tragedy. She accepts what her conscious mind has buried and acknowledges what she has lost.

Jackie did a superb job. If you loved Katherine Paterson's Lyddie, you'll love Lost by Jacqueline Davies.

basics

2009-09-03T17:29:00.002-04:00

Another creative idea blossomed this past week. I’m on a roll! This one came in the wee hours of the morning. Since these kind equal lost sleep, I bemoan the clutter that keeps those ideas from getting through during the day.

After I typed the picture book text that had been born, I marveled at how tight the first draft was – around 400 words. When I first began writing picture books, it took me over a thousand words to tell the story. My manuscripts were like the sequined summer shoes! Of course, I wasn’t leaving anything for the illustrator to show. Not to mention my attempts to be poetic and way too many adjectives!

Increased knowledge of craft and practice have helped, but I think something else is at work, too. I’ve written 500-word profiles over the last year, and I’ve learned how to make every word count. While picture books are entirely different, I think I’ve internalized short, sweet and basic. This is another example of process and the huge part played by our subconscious.

grace at work

2009-08-26T16:29:00.000-04:00

This week I’m thinking about process again. Or rather, process hit me over the head. I wrote a poem after three signs I saw rubbed against each other in my subconscious for a few weeks.

Grace Street – One Way reads a sign in Rockland, Maine. Beautiful! Had to take a photo. The Self Storage sign in Oakland has Taxidermy lettered on top. That day I thought storing my Self was a pretty good idea, especially if I could get it stuffed and permanently out of the way. And right up the hill is the Redemption Center for those Maine bottles we have to deposit money for. I though redeeming myself was a good idea, too.

A few days ago I read a reflective piece on the Bible story of the woman at the well – a redemption story for sure. And the next thing I knew, my brain put it all together and a pantoum was born! Grace at work!

hanging with Hildegard

2009-08-19T19:34:00.000-04:00

It's been too hot to work for a week. At ninety degrees all I can do is breathe! I guess summer remembered Maine, after all. Or did Maine suddenly recall how to serve up summer? I definitely couldn't be a southern girl! How did Eudora Welty manage to write down in Jackson, Mississippi!

Today the heat wave has broken and clouds have rolled in. I tackled my Hildegard manuscript again, filling in details about herbs that would have been in her infirmary garden. I stumbled onto websites where current posts responded to the "news" that Hildegard was a herbal healer. All this interest in my subject is good!

I verified that Agnes was indeed a woman's name in 12th-century Germany and straightened myself out on the difference between a Psalter and a Breviary. I sleuthed around until I found that Lady's Mantle and Shepherd's purse grow in the Rhine Valley. The Internet makes these searches so easy.

I also have to get going and revise some poems. I'm one of the readers at Art in The Woods in Marlow, NH in September and need some fresh material! Cooler weather will help tremendously!

finger knitting and writing

2009-08-12T20:54:00.001-04:00

This week I learned to finger knit, thanks to a beautiful 6th grader. Alex deftly looped yarn named Fiesta around four fingers, growing her yarn tube into a bookmark, a bracelet or choker. She coached me, guiding the yarn between my fingers, which I tended to spread awkwardly. My first tube was loopy and stretchy. I commented that it didn’t look like her even finger stitches. She said, “Well, you’ve only been doing this for five minutes. I’ve done it for three years.”

And isn’t that just like writing a first draft? Or in my case, adding chapters to an existing manuscript or expanding existing chapters. What I had seemed even and polished. After all, I have been working at it for eight years now! But an agent has suggested that I ditch the certain parts and build others up. Essentially, I’m trying to incorporate more historical fact into a fiction manuscript. And the more historical fact is the loopy part right now.

So I will continue growing my manuscript until my words are even once again. I try not to think about the finger knitting option of ripping out what I’ve done and starting over!

basho's pond

2009-08-05T11:41:00.000-04:00

It's hot, muggy and threatening to storm, but it's a glorious Wednesday! This morning I received word that hubby and I have been accepted as volunteers at the Asian Rural Institute in Japan next spring! We are ecstatic.

All of a sudden the air of my morning walk felt like Japan! It was humid with a slight breeze ruffling the leaves. I passed the flood control area. It looked like green dotted swiss with white water lilies dotting the lily pads. All along the bank frogs plopped as my feet vibrated the earth. Basho's Pond!

I've just discovered writer John O'Donohue and placed his book Benedictus on my wish list. This last verse from his poem For a New Beginning holds much meaning for me today.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

work and play

2009-07-29T19:54:00.000-04:00

No more museums for awhile. The sun has found Maine! In order to work and keep from morning kayaking, I drive to Miller Library at Colby College. Funny how that provides a work atmosphere for me. I can’t make potato salad, wander down to the dock or do a hand laundry. I write for three hours, return to camp for lunch where my husband is glad to see me and we enjoy the lake in the afternoon.

I’m crafting a new chapter in Hildegard’s story. When I get stuck, I re-read other chapters. Sometimes I discover that I need more detail to flesh out the scene. I needed to see what Hildegard saw when she moved her nuns to start a new monastery. She had been enclosed in an anchorage for some years, then moved out to start a convent with her teacher within the walls of St. Disibod’s monastery. For forty years she had not been outside the walls. Everything must have seemed new.

The details are coming from the Luttrell Psalter, a 14th century illuminated English prayer book. I’m making the leap that English medieval country scenes were much like those in Germany in the 12th century. Hildegard may have seen women harvesting barley and a gooseherd waving his club to scare a hawk away from his geese.

However, Hildegard will be on vacation for a few days. The grandkids have arrived!

character

2009-07-23T17:47:00.000-04:00

At our Maine lake, the only thing keeping me from inhabiting this painting is the rainy weather! So on a visit to the Colby College Museum of Art, I enjoyed this Winslow Homer painting and another by William Merritt Chase.

I had seen Chase’s painting “Boy Eating Apple (The Apprentice)” before. This time I was surprised to notice other details. The freckled boy seems caught in the act, as if he shouldn’t be behind the fence enjoying a green apple. His mouth is stopped in surprise before he chomps the apple. In addition, the bulge in his apron bib is not caused by only his hand. A tell-tail leaf and the end of a twig tell us that the boy has stashed away a whole branch of apples for future eating!

These details seem to illustrate something about character. When we first meet a character, we don’t know all there is to know right away. An action tells us something (boy likes apples, Charlotte’s “Salutations!” evidences an intelligent spider). More detail gives us more insight (boy is sneaking apple, Charlotte can write words). Looking, or reading, further, we discover intentions not known at first (boy is really hungry, Charlotte will save Wilbur).

I’m trying to remember this simple analysis and comparison as I draw out Hildegard’s character – growing her from a fourteen-year-old nun who doesn’t understand her visions to an eighty-one year old abbess who learned to listen to God’s voice. It’s all in the details.

revision

2009-07-14T11:35:00.000-04:00

Community college libraries are wonderful to escape to, especially in the summer. But it's hard when the sky finally looks like this one in Slovakia a few weeks ago! I've been writing at our tech this week. Hardly anyone has been there, though today groups seem to be conferring with professors in the library. It is warmish, but not bad with this cool NE summer!

I feel like I'm working with a scalpel and a trowel! I'm re-visioning the structure of my Hildegard story. Cut, add and lay in mortar to hold it all together! With this new version of Hildegard, flashbacks are needed to fill in back story, and I have to relearn how to do them effectively.

The draft I'm working with is so polished that the new writing seems strained. I have to get over that and just lay down the words. The polishing will come later after I have the new structure.

It's off to Maine now. When the lake gets too distracting, I head for the Colby College library.

2009-07-08T21:47:00.000-04:00

Windows are being replaced at home, so I took refuge at the community college library today. I intended to continue work on Hildegard. However, I revised a picture book manuscript instead.

I received good peer feedback from the annual NESCBWI conference this spring. Now I've incorporated it. Where to submit? This is a tough one. I've already tried the two houses I targeted as open to stories with a religious theme, Eerdsmans and Ideals. Now I must find others.

I ended the day by hearing Donald Hall and Peter Campion read at New England College. Hall read one of my favorites, "Names of Horses." I got up the nerve to introduce myself. At over eighty and frailer looking every time, he still is rather a rather formidable wild haired, bushy person with a literary giant's reputation!

Hildegard of Bingen

2009-07-02T19:35:00.000-04:00

This is the summer of Hildegard. I’m fresh back from my second visit to the Abbey of Saint Hildegard in Eibingen, Germany. What better time to tackle another revision of the story of this abbess who captured my attention ten years ago?

So today I began. With the singing of Vespers echoing in my mind, I re-read my manuscript. I put myself back in the abbey church at dusk. One nun approached from the choir. She turned a key to lock the wrought iron gate that separates the altar from the pews. Then she lit the floor candle, turned up the lights and exited. Very soon the sound of many footsteps signaled that the nuns were entering the choir. They were hidden from view as their voices blended together in the Vespers Psalm. One voice led and fifty-something voices responded. It did not matter that I couldn’t see the nuns. Their crystalline voices were enough.

This was Hildegard’s life, too. Though her cloistered beginning was secret, her life blossomed. She dared to write her visions, though punishment for heresy was death.
My task is to make the 12th century life of this Benedictine nun come alive for today’s young teens. How can they believe in her and understand her spiritual yearning?

smallest book in the world

2009-06-24T17:32:00.000-04:00

After seeing microminiatures for the first time last week, I returned home to read that a British sculptor has mounted the Obama family in the eye of a gold needle! My introduction to micro art is tucked away in a narrow alley in Szentendre, Hungary. An small museum there exhibits the work of 72-year-old Ukranian sculptor Mykola Syadristy.

He works in the moment between two heartbeats and wields tools several times thinner than a human hair. Under a microscope, he fashions gold into camels and places them in the eye of a needle. Golden baby swallows wait for their lunch in the half shell of a poppy seed. Gold chessmen sit on a chessboard mounted on the head of a pin. These breathtaking microminiatures are seen only by the aid of a microscope.

The golden sculptures are delicate enough, but the smallest book in the world was most special to me. Only twelve pages long and 0.6 sq. mm, it holds poems of Ukranian people's poet Taras Shevchenko. They are between yellow covers made from immortelle, or "everlasting" flower petals and are sewn together with a strand of spider silk.

Here is a verse from Shevchenko's "The Mighty Dnieper" translated by John Weir.

The mighty Dnieper roars and bellows,
The wind in anger howls and raves,
Down to the ground it bends the willows,
And mountain-high lifts up the waves.

This website shows Syadristy's amazing sculptures.

http://microart.kiev.ua/en/index.html

sound effects

2009-06-03T15:39:00.000-04:00

This week I attended a kids' concert by NH musician/storyteller Steve Blunt. Young kids loved repeating sounds in his songs. Whether it was frogs calling "knee-deep, knee-deep," or the golden bird chanting "Na-na-na-na-na-na," or any other nonsense chorus, they chimed in loudly. The sillier the chant, the better.

I thought of picture books that capitalize on kids' love of sound effects,Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Click, Clack, Moo and Rattle Trap Car. Writers know that rhythm and sound are hooks that keep kids interested. The trick is to find the right combination!

In her young chapter book, Ugly, Donna Jo Napoli used sound effects. Ugly peeped his way through many adventures until he discovered he was a black swan. Geese honked, chickens pa-kokked. Ugly was learning life lessons, but the various noises grounded the reader in the animal world.

My next post will be in three weeks. In the meantime, I'll be cruising to whatever sounds riverboats make!

memories

2009-05-28T11:22:00.000-04:00

The anniversaries of my parents' birthdays fall this week. They nurtured me and provided a safe, loving home. My mom especially loved poetry. Her generation grew up memorizing poems. One of my special memories is of my two uncles reciting Kipling's "Gunga Din" together a few years ago.

The uniform 'e wore
Was nothin' much before,
An' rather less than 'arf o' that be'ind,
For a twisty piece o' rag
An' a goatskin water-bag
Was all the field-equipment 'e could find.

Ever supportive, my mom recited for me the first poem I ever wrote when she was 88 years old.

I saw a big fat robin
a-hunting for a worm.
and when he did find one,
my, how he did squirm!

Fortunately, my grandchildren are much better poets than I was at age 9!

This week I'm preparing to share with my contemplative group what I learned in the Psalm-writing workshop.

mugwump box

2009-05-20T15:30:00.000-04:00

All writers need a mugwump box. Mine was a gift from a wise mentor. It's a hinged cloisonne box. Inside is a carved stone turtle and the words, "Slow and steady wins the day. Park your fears in this mugmump box when you write."

Mugwump is derived from an Algonquian word meaning war leader. It evolved into describing a politician who couldn't make up his mind, or someone on the fence with his mug and wump on opposite sides.

I have been known to sit on the fence worrying about a writing project. The project's too huge. I have no authority. Better to jump of the fence and lumber along into a new book!

sacred poetry

2009-05-13T13:55:00.000-04:00

Last week I attended a Psalm-writing workshop. Ray McGinnis, author of Writing the Sacred, spoke about literary elements found in the Psalms and how to apply them to poetry that recognizes a relationship with a Creator.

Having just weathered a tragic death in my community, I was deep into lament. In one exercise, I repeated the phrase "In the day of misfortune." I wove in other phrases from a list of Psalm phrases to use as springboards.

In his day of misfortune
did your bountiful hand
rest on the truck driver's shoulder
as his bones grew weak
and hope waited?

Sacred poems are all around us. Some are explicit, like Gerard Manley Hopkins' praise poem "Pied Beauty."

Glory be to God for dappled things -
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;

Others are implicit, like Mary Oliver's "Wild Geese."

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.

the book whisperer

2009-05-06T16:29:00.000-04:00

My teacher self couldn't pass up a book titled, The Book Whisperer, by Donalyn Miller. It's an inspiring account of how one 6th grade Texas teacher instills a passion for reading in all her students.

She requires they read forty books during the year, but they get to choose. No book reports, no vocabulary lists, no work sheets. Scheduled independent reading time is hallowed in her classroom. And wouldn't you know, all readers, even so-called struggling ones, get hooked on books and improve both their reading skills and their test scores.

Of course, to achieve this, she works very hard. She creates a space filled with delicious books. She fosters an atmosphere where everyone talks about what they're reading and recommends books to each other. And she teaches language arts and reading strategies in the context of what her students are reading.

If you know a teacher, get this book into his or her hands. It could be the start of a revolution.

line breaks

2009-04-29T10:34:00.000-04:00

National Poetry Month is closing with "Poem in Your Pocket Day" on April 30. Carry around a favorite poem or one of your own and read it to those you meet.

Last weekend at the New England Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, I attended a workshop on narrative verse. Laban Carrick Hill presented many examples that helped explain the differences between poetry and stories told in poems, or narrative verse.

I gained a lot from his discussion of the line break. I've been confused about when and how to break the line when it is not end-stopped with punctuation. Hill said that while syntax is the logical way to consider a line break, the line is actually broken for emotional impact. The lyrical moments in a poem happen when there is tension between logic and the line break. It's this lyrical moment that surprises the reader.

I think a stanza of Jane Yolen's "Crayons: A Rainbow Poem" from Color Me a Rhyme is a clear example.

Speaking of a box of crayons -

It holds my pink
and your chocolate
and her burnt sienna
and his ivory skin.

Each line breaks after a color. Yolen's choice creates a lyrical moment because the reader has to stop and register the colors. The emotional impact comes at the end when we realize that the poet is talking about diversity and harmony, not merely crayons.

still standing

2009-04-22T15:28:00.000-04:00

NH Literary Idol was a hoot! Flash fiction took many forms, including a bloggish account of a writing mom's life and a hilarious rejection letter. My picture book reading earned a respectable score of 11 out of 15. The only children's entry, Blue Ribbon Surprise accomplished my goal - to make sure NH children's literature was represented. I almost got points deducted for my duck puppet prop, though! I was happy that the poet of the panel noted my use of alliteration. Occasionally, the judges tucked a positive comment in their off-the-cuff responses. The winning presentation was a masterful short story.

Throughout Writers' Day, I learned from workshops on dialogue, plot and creating chapbooks. Best of all, I pitched my Hildegard biography to an agent! Now it's on to this weekend's NE SCBWI conference!

a literary debut

2009-04-17T11:45:00.000-04:00

At Disney World this week, I was tempted to buy a American Idol shirt saying VOTE FOR ME. This weekend I'm a contestant in New Hampshire Literary Idol, sponsored by the NH Writer's Project. In a weak moment I thought I could bear the standard for children's writers!

So I have cut one of my picture books to a three-minute reading. And I practiced, duck puppet in hand. Whatever the outcome, honing the manuscript was a great exercise. I thought at 600 plus words, it was lean. Now, stripped of everything but the essentials and the verbs, it's a 400-plus-word action-packed manuscript.

I think I gained clarity, and there seems more room for an illustrator's interpretation.

Stay tuned for results of my stage debut as a children's writer!

profile research

2009-04-08T13:58:00.000-04:00

This week I'm working on profiles of strong, determined women from New York. I love the research. It's a challenge to stop collecting information and write the profile. I'm always hoping to uncover a gem that will make the piece more interesting.

William Zinsser, in On Writing Well, advises collecting more material than you will use. "Every article is strong in proportion to the surplus of details from which you can choose the few that will serve you best."

My audience and my word limit help me decide what material to include and what to leave out. Even though I can't include it all, I'm learning lots! These women who have accomplished so much deserve our respect. Check out the new "America's Notable Women" series from Apprentice Shop Books.

2009-03-31T20:37:00.000-04:00

Good news this week! My poem submission to Goldfish Press has been accepted. It will be part of an anthology titled, The World According to Goldfish. I am most happy that the proceeds from the sale of this book will go to Heifer Project International. This organization helps alleviate world hunger. My family has bought goats and chicks for others for many years. Now I can help in a literary way. Stay tuned!

Poetry group is over for now. I am concentrating on getting out my children's poetry collection submission this week. And because in a weak moment I became a contestant in NH Literary Idol, I am practicing my three-minute children's book presentation. The event is April 18, moderated by NH humorist Rebecca Rule. I hope I survive intact!

finding walden

2009-03-25T11:56:00.000-04:00

Our poetry group met last night for the last time this season. The exercises have produced the beginnings of new work, and that's good. We looked at a Mary Oliver poem, "Going to Walden" and D.B. Johnson's picture book Henry Works. Oliver writes,

Going to Walden is not so easy a thing
As a green visit. It is the slow and difficult
Trick of living, and finding it where you are.
New and Selected Poems, Volume One, p. 239

Johnson ends his story with Henry David Thoreau writing, "Today I took a walk in the woods." But his walk included watering milkweed, picking huckleberries and delivering wild strawberry plants. All this before he began the work of writing.

I want to try harder to find Walden where I am. Part of my Walden is a cabin in Maine- a phone, no tv, simple food, walks, swims, kayaking.

Raindrops drum the tin-hard roof,
drip down the dense cedars.
Loon giggles stipple the lake,
keeping the white pines awake.

It's almost time!

finding spring

2009-03-19T15:33:00.000-04:00

In this magic of spring, rainbows and pots of gold week, our poetry group focused on "found poetry." There are a variety of ways to find a poem. It's fun to flip through a book of poems and write down delicious words and phrases that pop out. Then try to arrange them, add your own thoughts and you have "found" a poem.

We grabbed a newspaper page and a magazine page. You'd be surprised what you can find in the classifieds. One ad for a lost cat started, "Answers to the name of Midnight." That's inspiration enough for me!

Scanning, we circled words and phrases, about twenty per page. After recording what we had found, our personalities took over. Some wanted to make order or meaning. These writers arranged, connected and added words to make sense. Others let the music of the words guide them. Their poems were more eclectic, and the sounds of the word groups were pleasing to the ear.

Here is my "found poem."

Hindsight

At Lumpkin’s Slave Jail, in a cobbled
courtyard, food is served round the clock
in memory of Mimi.
In Yellowstone where bison winter,
animals have been spotted. Yet,
they euthanized a newborn right whale
due to slumping ticket sales.
Particular angels can be seen reveling
downtown in a decade. Blind trust
dissolves. Taproots clatter.
Sheers of wind and breezes of change
are the cause. Can these bones live?
Breathe!
The fact of the finding is
hindsight comes easy.

forcing poems into the light

2009-03-11T10:57:00.000-04:00

This forced tulip seems to yearn for the outdoors. It senses the light but not the snow-covered earth. We've been forcing poems in our poetry group by reading into photos. It's a form of ekphrasis - a Greek word meaning "speak out."

I gave an interview to a teen working on a career project, a nice stroke for me! She asked me about my process. I described an exercise I enjoy - sketching a painting in a museum and writing what the process reveals to me. "That sounds like ekphrasis," she said. "Describing a work of art in a poetic form."

I may have known the term from my English major days, but it was buried. So I am happy to know that I enjoy a process described by Plato and practiced by Virgil, Homer, Shelley, Rilke and a host of poets. The process is like using a third eye to see something you might miss with two. The right brain works while the left brain is occupied with line, perspective, etc.

Other artists also use this technique. I'm currently researching Malvina Hoffman, American sculptor who studied with Rodin. Her first assignment was to take home one of Rodin's plaster hands and draw it for a week.

So pack a sketchbook and pencil on your next museum visit and practice ekphrasis.

layer by layer

2009-03-04T12:39:00.000-05:00

Another foot of snow buries spring even deeper here in New Hampshire. I'm watching my potted tulip bulbs with longing, willing the green shoots to stretch. This is the season of literary deadlines for grants and conference submissions. Maybe the snow will melt as I push through the paper piles.

Our poetry group unpacked Donald Hall's "Mount Kearsage" last night. I love Donald Hall and remember years of reading Ox Cart Man and The Man Who Lived Alone.

Listening to the poet's reading on CD, we heard so clearly the assonance of repeated vowel sounds that create "Mount Kearsage's" near rhyme. Hall's personal connection to the mountain facing his front porch is visceral. He talks to it, calls it "you." Images of porch rocking and physical descriptions of the mountain balance its ephemeral qualities obscured by haze. The immortality of the mountain is in tension with the poet's own mortality.

You can hear Hall read his poem at the Library of Congress website.
www.loc.gov/today/pr/2006/more/MountKearsarge.mp3

"Mount Kearsarge"

This week we will transpose the structure of "Mount Kearsage" into a poem about our own strong images. The goal is to discover a response to them we may not have considered before - to unearth the qualities that make these images everlasting to us. Layer by layer, we will try to "write thick."

galimaufry gang

2009-02-25T17:42:00.000-05:00

Last night's Poetry Group meshed together beautifully. We were seven, all ages, a galimaufry gang. See, I used the word! We wrote a Moebius strip poem - one continuous line on a twisted loop. Our topic was an unexpected turn in our lives. The exercise was fun and helped us become better acquainted.

Next, we "unpacked" Longfellow's "The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls." What a great discussion! I was impressed by the insightful comments as we looked at word choice, connotation, repetition, alliteration. Our sharing really helped us discern what the poem is about, or what we think it's about! This technique that I learned in poet Baron Wormser's workshop is really valuable. It forms a solid foundation on which to write our own poems.

The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The tide rises, the tide falls,
The twilight darkens, the curlew calls;
Along the sea-sands damp and brown
The traveler hastens toward the town,
And the tide rises, the tide falls.

Darkness settles on roofs and walls,
But the sea, the sea in the darkness calls;
The little waves, with their soft, white hands
Efface the footprints in the sands,
And the tide rises, the tide falls.

The morning breaks; the steeds in their stalls
Stamp and neigh, as the hostler calls;
The day returns, but nevermore
Returns the traveler to the shore,
And the tide rises, the tide falls.

I had asked participants to bring a photo, and we began to write our way into a poem that should end with a revelation we had not thought of before. The exercise comes from In the Palm of Your Hand, The Poet's Portable Workshop by Steve Kowit. The poem will be homework, and I can't wait to hear the results.

I share my work-in-progress poem that resulted from last week's exercise. Leading this group is helping me to produce more work, which is good.

A raspberry mousse plum
waits for the brightest star
to whisper waves lapping sand.
Foreign fruit, you dangle in my
willow branches as they sway and sing
laments of losing.
Meanwhile, a periwinkle bug
hops gurgling brooks
in search of an elliptical moon.

it's all about words

2009-02-18T22:03:00.000-05:00

Poetry is all about words, particular words. Word choice can be an obsession for poets. Which fits better, door or gate, forest or woods? Sound, rhythm, connotation and more affect the decision.

I just enjoyed a wonderful weekend with my Uncle Fred in North Carolina. He is a word wizard and a Scrabble master! When I was a child, I had to pass the sycamore spelling test every visit. I cannot pass a sycamore tree without thinking of him.

In two Scrabble games, I learned that a runnel is a brook or a rill and a jo is a Scottish sweetheart. Ka is apparently the name for part of the soul in an ancient Egyptian religion, though it's not in my dictionary. I should have challenged him! Did you know that xi is the fourteenth letter of the Greek alphabet?

Play Scrabble with a word wizard. Collect words. Add to your word pool! In Uncle Fred's Oxford Dictionary, I finally found the definition of a delectable word I had been looking for. Galimaufry - any absurd medley, a hodgepodge of things or persons. Someday I'll find the right spot for that word.

unpacking a poem

2009-02-11T20:46:00.000-05:00

If you're looking for new ways to teach poetry, get to a Baron Wormser workshop! Wormser was Maine's Poet Laureate in 2005. He's taught poetry for years and knows what works. In a recent "green" workshop (no handouts!), he helped participants "unpack" a poem - look at the poem's ecology or its many aspects.

Word choice was the first step. We spent 45 minutes discovering the richness in the connections among words in a seven-line poem. Step-by step, it was easy, fun and led us to figure out what the poem was about. Not what it meant because distilling a poem to a one-line meaning reduces its impact. Better to ask, "What is this poem about?" so that we can discover its expansiveness and find our way into relationship with it.

After exploring a John Haines' poem, "The Long Rain," I wrote a poem about a place dear to me.

Lincolnville Beach

Under gulls’ cries and a blinding sky,
sparkles shimmer on the bay
while pebbles shine in shallow water.

Toes grip the stony shore,
but waves suck the stones away
and there, bathed in salt

and caressed by tides
waits a heart-shaped stone.

Check out Baron Wormser's website. baronwormser.com

Still Hungry

2009-02-04T11:35:00.000-05:00

eric carle museum of picture book art

2009-02-04T10:41:00.000-05:00

My grandkids, our kids and we met last week at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, MA. The Carle exhibit was down as they are preparing an exhibit for the 40th anniversary of The Very Hungry Caterpillar, shown here in its quilt form above the registration desk.

The highlight of the visit was a living history presentation of Beatrix Potter Heelis. One of my favorite movies is Miss Potter, so I was into this. Marcia Estabrook really engaged the audience, some very young. She sprinkled Potter's Victorian background with questions and remained in character while responding to answers. She was just delightful.

In the gallery, the adults examined original picture book art by the Dillons, Beatrix Potter, Chris Van Allsburg, Trina Schart Hyman, Sendak and others. The kids plunked down on benches and read books! Finally, my seven-year-old grandson Wil, book in hand, led me to a Gerald McDermott painting from Arrow to the Sun and said, "Look. The cover of this book has the same colors as the painting."

We looked through the pages until he found the reproduction. He was pleased with himself and I was proud he had made a connection! Then he was off, grabbing books and searching the gallery until he found the right style and discovered the book art to match the painting. Of course, I thought he was very intelligent and happy he had found a way into the exhibition.

For my Maine poems, I experimented with the Higgledy-Piggledy or double-dactyl form yesterday. It's a challenging, playful form with nonsense rhymes and a single six-syllable word. Here I share my poem about shampooing a sheep for the sheep show.

Sheep Suds

Sudsion wudsion
Cheviot Champion,
hosed down and lathered with
copious suds.

Squeaky clean wooliness,
impeccability,
will win a ribbon for
Best of Show duds.

maine state fair poems

2009-01-28T20:00:00.000-05:00

Last week I imbibed white peony tea at the Dushanbe Tea House in Boulder. It was constructed in Kajikistan, Boulder's sister city, dismantled, shipped and reconstructed. Perfect atmosphere. I bet the Persian influence inspired me.

Later, I drafted some poems for my Maine collection. I had to write something after hauling my laptop through security! The poems recall the sights and sounds of Maine's State Fair in Skowhegan.

Midway Magic starts like this:

Carousel croons tinny tunes,
bumper cars spark ozone gas.
Barkers babble, “Step right up!
Hit the target. Three balls, a buck!”

I'm still scanning and trying to be true to the form. It's difficult, but it forces me to rethink word choice and I end up with crisper images. Thanks to Marilyn Nelson for shaking the form finger at me!

children's author K.D. Huxman

2009-01-21T21:48:00.000-05:00

I'm in love with public transportation. In Boulder, Colorado for a January thaw week, I've hopped on a regional bus to Longmont and an express to Denver. In Denver, I met with a friend and writing colleague whom I hadn't seen for eight years. Over lunch we caught up with each other's lives and writing projects.

Karin writes for adults and children. Dragon Talk and Grizzelda Gorilla are picture books for young children and published by Kittycat Books. Grizzelda Gorilla won an EPPIE Award in 2008 for best children's ebook. Check out Karin's books at http://kdhuxman.wordpress.com

I've started another poem for my Maine Summer collection while here. It's a state fair poem, complete with cotton candy, Midway rides and heifer showing.

Next week I won't be gazing at the Flatirons, the Rockies or enjoying 60 degree weather. I'll be back to boots, mittens and snow!

YA poetry

2009-01-14T13:58:00.000-05:00

If you think young adults won't read poetry, take a look at this book. I just finished reading The Freedom Business by Marilyn Nelson, Wordsong, 2008. Marilyn has written poems in response to the story of Venture Smith, son of a prince from Guinea. Venture was enslaved as a boy in the early 18th century and eventually bought his own freedom and others', also. Opposite the amazing poetry, Venture's own words tell his compelling story in the text, A NARRATIVE of the LIFE AND ADVENTURES of VENTURE, a NATIVE of AFRICA.

The narrative is compelling by itself, but twenty-five poems place the heart-breaking details of Venture's life under a microscope. We see, hear and feel with Venture when he is captured, sails to the New World and learns to serve his masters.

We feel the back-breaking work to purchase his freedom in a brilliant poem, "December Moonrise," that evokes Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening:"

"My bones so weary, I could near about weep."

We feel his love for his wife Meg, who he purchases after many years, in a poem named for her:

"This is the hour of stars and of the night, dreaming
where she lies on a hill of clouds, wrapped in a length of milky-way cloth."

The Freedom Business is an historical account opened up for the reader by Nelson's poems and Deborah Dancy's evocative art. It is wonderful!

sonnets

2009-01-07T15:08:00.000-05:00

Chickadees, finches and titmice are emptying our new feeder daily. It's joy to watch them as I work on summer poems for my children's poetry collection.

I'm creating a September poem now. I want it to reflect the loss of summer's freedom, to contrast with the other poems about a Maine summer. I'm using the Shakespearean sonnet form, which I hope conveys the return to serious endeavors and the rigidity of a school schedule. It also offers an opportunity to use form to contrast how the speaker feels about the end of summer.

It's my first sonnet. I'm trying to master iambic pentameter and create near rhymes instead of perfect rhyme. It's challenge because my natural rhythm seems to be tetrameter. Anna Boll's sonnet worksheet has been helpful. Thanks, Anna.
http://pics.livejournal.com/ajboll/pic/00022k6p

Mary Oliver (Rules of the Dance)writes that a sonnet's thought turns after an eight line statement(the octave)and reflects back on itself or comments on the statement in the last six lines (the sestet). I'm still working on that part! Here's the beginning:

My sneakers pinch like cramped crab shells, and yet
I lace them up. No bagel. I’ll be late.
I scuff down River Road while monarchs flit .
in milkweed fields to summer’s sweet heartbeat.

endings

2008-12-30T20:39:00.000-05:00

The day after Christmas, in between Wii bowling matches, I read one of my grandson's gift books. The Wringer by Jerry Spinelli has been on my list for ten years. Hard to admit! For me, it was not only a page-turner, but also a lesson in characterization and twist endings.

Spinelli deftly reveals Palmer through his relationships with others. Palmer tries to gain the respect of his peer buddies by pretending to be someone he is not. His
parallel secret relationship with neighbor Dorothy allows the reader to see a truer side. Palmer's interactions with his parents help the reader understand him on
another level. But his love of a pigeon, Nipper, shows the reader Palmer's heart.

Throughout the story, Palmer dreads the day he turns ten and, like all boys of that age in his town, is expected to serve as a wringer in the annual Pigeon Shoot. He does not want to wring the necks of injured pigeons. Dorothy's strength in the face of daily bullying serves as a quiet example to Palmer. He grows stronger and overcomes his fear of being different and disappointing his father, who was once a champion pigeon shooter.

Palmer has to set Nipper free to save his life, but in a twist ending, Palmer discovers that Nipper has been freed in the very place that Pigeons are captured for the shoot. In a heroic finale, Palmer declares his love for Nipper in front of the whole town and becomes true to himself.

It's a knock-out ending and a fantastic example of revealing character through relationships.

Goodbye, 2008. Welcome, 2009!

wrappings

2008-12-24T11:57:00.000-05:00

It's Christmas Eve and I'm still wrapping. I can use the ice storm as an excuse, but, truth be told, last minute wrapping is my norm. Books are always in my gift pile. Somehow I think others like to receive them as much as I do!

This year I chose two books for my granddaughters. One, Heidi, very traditional, and the other, Fairy Tale Feasts by mother and daughter team Jane Yolen and Heidi Stemple, sort of traditional.

In Fairy Tale Feasts, subtitled A Literary Cookbook for Young Readers and Eaters, Yolen presents familiar and not-so-familiar tales with new details that make the stories fresh. Grandmother loses her white curls in Little Red Riding Hood when the hunter fillets the wolf too quickly.

Folktale history is presented in sidebars, and each tale is followed by a relevant recipe developed and tested by Stemple. Deviled eggs, potato salad and chicken pockets are in Red Riding Hood's basket.

Creating and enjoying the food in this book will connect the fairy tale with the experience forever. Why shouldn't my too favorite occupations, reading and eating, be companions?

ice storm

2008-12-18T10:48:00.000-05:00

Six days without electricity tests your mettle. The experience will tell you why you were not born a hundred years ago. Three days into New Hampshire's ice storm, the adventure wore off for me. Gone was the crystal woodland, here to stay were snapped power poles, trips to the school tap for buckets of water and wood stove stew gleaned from food in the garage that had to be used up. Life was a repetition of survival tasks.

By candlelight, I experimented with the pantoum form again. I needed a poem that reflected the monotony I was feeling!

Ice Storm

Trees bow crystal crowns to the ground,
break as diamonds snap them down.
Stretched and severed by nature’s whim,
power lies tangled in bough and limb.

Break! As diamonds tinkle all around,
wood is hauled and water found.
While power lies tangled in bough and limb,
it’s hobo stew with a pioneer grin.

More wood is hauled, more water found.
Whose generator makes that groaning sound?
Hobo stew loses its pioneer flavor,
scorched by a wood stove misadventure.

Your generator makes that groaning sound?
You’re offering the steamiest shower in town?
Scorched by wood stove misadventures,
I bathe myself in luxurious lather because

you offered the town’s steamiest shower.
Stretched and severed by nature’s power,
I bathe myself in luxurious lather and picture
trees bowing crowns to my generator.

Wednesday's Musings

2008-12-10T14:45:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I attended a reception at New England College celebrating a new issue of the literary journal Entelechy International. The journal's theme was Metamorphosis, and my poem, "The Picklefork," is included.

The journal is really lovely, mostly poetry and photographs, some prose. The editors are open to new talent and achieve a balance of established and emerging writers. The reading period usually begins in January, but the editors are taking a break to pursue their own writing. Here is the link, though the 2008 issue is not yet pictured:

http://www.nec.edu/academics/entelechy-international

I post the poem here, with a few word and line revisions thanks to feedback from poets Marilyn Nelson and Kevin Young. To the poet, a poem may never be finished, may always be in revision. Kevin Young told us that according to Denise Levertov, a poem is not a monument, but a living thing.

The Pickle Fork

We left her clothes ‘til last
not wanting to face the closet
bare with the stone rolled away
and no angel proclaiming,
“She has risen!”
Her dresser drawers
were easier.
Stretched elastic waist bands
crowded packaged panties,
and familiar flannel nestled
next to velvet fleece.
We left her blue slippers by the bed,
as if she might need them in the night
once more.
In the kitchen, we ditched the crumbled
bay leaves and twenty-seven cent turmeric
that once spiced her bread and butter pickles,
tossed the folded cello wrap, pressed tinfoil,
even the dozen corn kernels that counted
our blessings like proper Pilgrims.
Flatware lay fallow in a drawer,
bowls of silver plated spoons
yellowed by years of simmered soup.
And there it was. The pickle fork.
Its slender handle weighted my palm
while the tines talked of families
gathered like pickles, olives and figs
in the depression glass dish before the feast,
before the bones were picked bare,
before my mother sucked out the marrow.
My tears stained the damask tablecloth.
The pickle fork slipped into my pocket.

Parnassus on Wheels

2008-12-03T21:40:00.000-05:00

Today I dropped my niece off at the same, but much enlarged, elementary school I attended in Benton, Maine. It brought back memories of the bookmobile that was our library. How dating is that? I remember falling in love with a book called Parnassus on Wheels by Christopher Marley. Set in 1917, A grown sister tires of keeping house for her brother and takes off with on a book selling tour with an itinerant bookseller, intending to buy his horse-drawn book wagon. At that time, I thought roaming around with a wagon load of books was a delicious idea. I still do! But now I have the ability to download this same book and myriad others from Project Gutenberg. So much for bookmobiles.

However, the idea still fascinates and shows up in children's books. Margriet Ruurs'
My librarian is a Camel, How Books are Brought to Children Around the World tells of books delivered by camel, elephant, donkey cart and more in thirteen countries.

I now know that Mount Parnassus is the home of the Muses in Greek mythology. I thought of putting Parnassus on my license plate this year, to carry my muse along with me. But I couldn't risk shortening the word. I need to keep my muse happy!

Wednesday Posts

2008-11-26T21:07:00.000-05:00

Wednesdays are my new blogging day, as I move from daily to weekly posts, and from residency heaven to the household chores and everyday concerns of the real world. I've toyed with the idea of changing my blog name to One Wednesday, as a reminder of posting day. But I'm sticking with Musings for now.

Last night my nephew and his friend introduced me to Guitar Hero, the singer. While the amazing teen of my family chalked up five stars on difficult level with his master fingering techniques, I scored 96 % singing the lyrics to "One Way or Another," easy level. I had a blast and a window into the entertainment available for this age group. Thanks, Jon and Aaron!

2008-11-20T10:47:00.000-05:00

We are like these pigeons lined up on the Red Mill roof. Today we still huddle together in our community, trying to work and avoid saying goodbyes. Tomorrow we will fly off to our own spaces. It has been an amazing time. The Gihon’s edges have a layer of ice this morning, but the river flows swiftly through the middle. This is a good image to take home, I think. When life starts to close in, I’ll imagine my writing channel traveling along from its source, determined not to freeze up!

open studio

2008-11-19T09:37:00.003-05:00

Last night the writers held an Open Studio after their reading. The artists wandered through, amazed at the clean walls and carpet with no paint spills. They were very interested in any work we had displayed. I posted rough drafts of poetry with scanning marks and the final version, as well as the plot line in-progress for my novel. Another writer had samples of his handcrafted books. The event gave us all a chance to learn about process and just seeing each other’s working spaces offered a window into our writing lives.

On Friday I will leave this writing studio and return to my own. My blog will continue, but not daily. Weekly entries seem about right, maybe change my blog title to something like Monday Musings or Wednesday’s Muse to trigger the entry day.