Poetry- writing, revising and (boring) admin

 

If doing poetry admin is boring, then reading about it must be even more boring! So I’ll be brief: sorted out the database, created a spread sheet for 2012 submissions & competitions (better late then never) and sent some poems out into the wide world in the hope they catch the eye of an editor or judge.

That done I’ve been fiddling with the 3rd assignment poem on the Personal and the Public PS Course … a strange process of pulling apart a poem I wrote about my time in Tehran in 2009 and putting together a prose poem draft that draws on fairy tale language.  Then I used a revision technique I read about last week in which you turn the poem on its head … so it starts with the last line. Fascinating result .. not such a strong poem but it gave me ideas about what else I might include and what was redundant. The result is still very much a draft, ready to be shared for critical comment and I’ll definitely try the on its head rewriting process again.

In between poetry and puppy watching my intarsia knitting is making very pedestrian process … I am now knitting with 7 different yarns. Not sure how this is best dealt with, I just keep stopping and untwisting it all. Another task that qualifies as rather a bore so its a good job I’m enjoying re-reading Marilynne Robinson’s Home –I knit two rows, untwist and then pick up the book. .

I fly back to UK tomorrow so I’ve put away the sewing machine and safely stored the two quilt tops and several cushion covers I’ve  squeezed out of some fabric bought at a charity sale for £10. They’ll be my practice quilting projects when eventually I install a frame in my studio here … maybe this time next year!

Rain and Mountains

Its weather to delight the farmers and gardeners … wet, wet, and more wet each day but at least this morning, for a moment, a wonderful 3D view of the mountains –still lots of snow. My camera does not capture the scene at all but I will still share.my photo effort.

Puppy love

A few quiet moments with our new puppy, Mack, asleep on my lap and the other dogs out for their morning walk with Paul and Tracey. Its been wonderfully hectic since Mack arrived, intent on exploring his new home from the start –a very well socialised little dog who clearly thinks the only place to sleep is on a human lap. Cookie and Crumble have been just great … lots of sniffs and playfulness.

If the floor upstairs is to progress I think my tasks this week will include puppy watching –until the oak boards are sanded and sealed an occasionally accident prone puppy needs to be kept away.

Half of the Human Race by Anthony Quinn

This was a speedy, engaging read .. a good book for a journey, the beach, or while in the sun, bird song all around. I can’t remember why I bought it, probably read a review somewhere but no regrets. Every so often a light read just suits me –this had strong characters, the contexts felt authentic –woman’s suffrage, war, cricket, repression, depression … lots in there, all background for what was essentially a love story. And a well written one. I now feel refreshed, reading wise, to  begin reading something more demanding … a good feeling to have.

Dreams and poems

Strange dreams last night, I was in and out of buildings, sometimes there were lights, often not, there was a performance of something that I didn’t get to, no tickets left I was told …and then I was awake and thinking about the next poem and how hard it is to reach the point where I might know what to write. So the dream is really no surprise…

Assignment 3 on the personal/public/politics course requires us to be plain speaking, to use rhetoric … more on progress with this later in the week. I decided to submit both versions of my using a politicians words poem – the villanelle and the free verse one in tercets … will be so good to hear or rather read the feedback next week.

The Gaze of the Gazelle by Arash Hejazi

My reading pile is always a mix of poetry, fiction and non fiction but its very rare that I finish more than one of these within a few days of the other …let alone a third. On this quiet Sunday I’ve been reading the concluding chapters of Hejazi’s poignant memoir of his years growing up in Iran –through the overthrow of the Shah, the Islamic Revolution, the Iran-Iraq war and, as I’ve just read, through the Green Uprising of the last few years..

John and I left our wonderful life in Shiraz at the end of 1973 so this book filled so many gaps for me … and bought back memories of places, culture, and the goodness of the Iranian people.  The final chapters document the events that led up to the death of Neda Agha-Soltan, including how the camera video of her death spread the news of what was happening in June 2010.  That also bought back memories for me –of my time in Tehran and Shiraz just before the contested elections of that year.

Both my recent visits to Iran were made possible and very enjoyable through the good will and hospitality of colleagues.and their families  For me to return to the place where I lived some of the most formative years of my life, where my sons were born was very special.In Tehran, and more so in Shiraz, I felt at home, in familiar streets, with those mountainous backdrops and always in the company of kind, cultured and helpful people.

The Gaze of the Gazelle is, as the front cover asserts –the story of a generation. This story should be read widely to further the understanding of the lives of the Iranian people who,like people everywhere, like you and I, just want to live their ordinary lives in their homeland.

Poetry review: A Hundred Doors, Michael Longley

A small book that felt good to hold. Inside a beautifully crafted collection of poems that range in subject from place, to family, across other poets. There are memorials, reflections and some very personal poems –these feel written for the individual yet inclusive and welcoming to the outside reader.  To do that is a rare gift, as is Longley's ability to bring nature into poetry so that the ordinary becomes special and remains available. There are some good examples of the music of lists in this book, most effectively wild flower names but also the mundane, as in A Mobile for Maisie.

This is the first Longley collection I’ve read … from front cover to back and the in reverse … that   a way into the whole of this collection that then drew me back to the poems that appealed most. Among the stars for me are The Lifeboat, The Poker and Missing Marie … –elegies in different forms that show how reduction brings a focus to meaning, how plain speaking is poetic.

A book to return to: once again, the value is twofold, the poetry and the collection  of poems.

Review: The Art of Description by Mark Doty

This small book has been on my bedside stack for a very short while –what a wonderful surprise, a book about writing poetry that I looked forward to reading. Often such books linger on the stack until I just have to have a sort out and end up returning those half read or just dipped into books to a bookshelf somewhere.

But not this one. Doty has written a small gem as I’ve said before … and such a variety of poems to illustrate his points. For me this  has been a good way to find new poets and poems to read, to read poetry with fresh eyes and of course, to try to take his teaching on board in my own work.

Doty’s divides the book into sections of just the right size and into two halves, giving the whole piece variety & breadth. Its all about the importance of every word, the difference using one word instead of another can make to meaning and the need to stretch the imagination as far as possible to convey what something means to you, the poet, to bring it alive for others.

I’ve just put some of the other books in this series on my wish list and ordered one of Doty’s collections –and The Art of Description is destined to be my companion for a while, no dusty bookshelf for this little book.

To villanelle or not to villanelle

Had a good time in the Moodle chat room for the first workshop of this term’s online course. Some great poems, such a range of topic and form, including some experimental layouts that worked very well. I was called to task, quite rightly for the title of my poem … the other comments were very affirming. I just need to do some creative walking to give it a title that is worthy of the poem. For me a hard one..

Onto the second assignment –a poem using the words of a politician. Thanks to the internet  I found my material … and decided that the wealth of subject matter in one Ministerial speech was best tackled with form as a control. So my first draft was a villanelle …unsurprisingly it took a while but eventually sort of worked except the a and b rhymes are too close in sound. Transforming that out of the straightjacket of tercets and the two leading lines has led to something else … this needs a rest before another look.  More on this later.

In between poetry a quilt is quietly happening … fabric from my stash and a charity sale, 12 patch blocks and enough left overs to make some matching cushion covers. Easy sewing when often new thoughts about poetry and work arise.

Off now to make something for lunch/supper …possibly an onion tart and I might try my hand at Abel&Cole’s Rustic Irish Potato Bread  see http://www.abelandcole.co.uk/recipes/rustic-irish-potato-bread… looks like the sort of food for hungry floor layers!

The work of poetry

Yesterday and today have been filled with some of the good things about writing poetry. I’ve transcribed to the laptop my hand written notes and ideas writing for the second poem in a sequence on Andy Goldsworthy’s Alderney stones. Somehow I needed to have poem two in draft form to get a sense of how many stanzas, how many lines, did they have to be the same, could I put in some prose interludes etc. etc. Lots of questions as I go forward with this project; a big one for me as I’ve only written single poems before and to date mostly short ones.

My poetry reading this week is from Michael Longley's  A Hundred Doors –interesting to see how at least two themes emerge (so far) in this collection. Poems with a sense of the same place and several about his grandchildren. I’m seeing these as spilt sequences to gain some guidance for the one I am hoping to achieve.

I’m also looking for examples in Longley's poems of the Art of Description, the title of Mark Doty’s wonderful small book. I really like the way this book is constructed –fairy like sections with enough to read while you eat a bowl of porridge or a few strawberries –and lots of examples to delight. I’ve reached O for Opposition in the alphabet section. This sent me to examine how I might use this idea and then to look for its use in the poems my fellow students have submitted for assignment 1 of our online course The Public and the Personal: Writing the New Political Poem. Its the first workshop tonight –some very powerful poems submitted, I’m looking forward to reading the live comments.

Finally, in that wonderful roundabout way that comes from following a lead on Twitter I came across this website http://www.brainpickings.org and an entry on Henry Miller’s writing practice http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/02/22/henry-miller-on-writing/   Some good guidance there, for me especially ‘when you can’t create, you can work’ … so now I’m off to do some of that work –a walk with the dogs, a few rows of knitting, then some time in the kitchen cooking supper.

Back here in a few days …

Wriitng places and times

 Just posted to http://patthomson.wordpress.com in response to request for responses to

finding the right writing time/place -a blog worth reading if you write 

My response

I had a routine/place very much like yours, Pat, when writing for my doctorate and for papers and books as an academic. That was a while ago and I remember the glow of knowing I had logged several hundred words -even if they had to be revised or removed the next day. I also found long train journeys good, setting a word target (by the time I get to ... , I'll have xxxx) often moved forwards something that felt a bit stuck. Then I took very late gap year from academia (now a decade long and rather permanent, I think) and in between some consultancy I started writing poetry.

Two thoughts on this. There's a great deal of fuzziness in the border bewteen scholalry and so-called creative writing -the topic of a workshop I do for mostly new academic writers.  I need pen and paper much more for the poetry -often, most often, they are essential if something other that just description is to emerge and are key to seeing what I am looking at, at the slant that poetry demands.

So my poetry wriitng places are diverse. A place worth some attentiveness & the small notebook & pencil that are always in my pocket, then the early morning, preferably in the sun, with bigger notebook, pen, where I write to join the seen with what that has bought to mind (its always a wonderful surprise to read the words that arrive on the page at this stage). Finally, as now, on my laptop. on my lap, feet outstretched on the sofa, I move words to screen and begin the very long process of forming the poem. No surprise, that this takes time. Like a good loaf of bread, poetry works best if the ingredients are fresh, your heart is in your hands as you knead it into shape and long. slow proving is improving.