Writing Prose About Poetry, AWP Prep, and Snow on the Ocean
Lately I’ve lucked into several simultaneous assignments to write about poetry. This is usually good, but I find when I have several articles due all at the same time, I feel unable to write poetry and must stick with my prose assignments til they are all finished, which inevitably crumples any inspiration I had at all for any type of writing, my enthusiasm dulls, and my usually crackling wit and charm dry up. I know some of you churn out poetry-related prose like nobody’s business, writing tome after tome of criticism and keeping up your poetry work too. How do you balance your prose about poetry with your actual poetry writing?
This weekend I’m going to a 48-hour intensive planning session at Centrum at Fort Warden, where I’ll get to hang out with a lot of other kinds of artists and talk about collaboration among the arts (cool!) and lesson plans (hmmm…) and basically get it in gear for our sessions in March and June. Hopefully all that work will shake up the old brain. It usually does. And I’m reading books on teaching poetry to high school and junior high kids as well as resources on teaching mythology and some comic book-related stuff as well.
Finally registered for AWP officially and made some hotel reservations (not as cheap as the room rates for the conference, sadly, but less than the non-conference rate for the Hilton) and now will have to look up airline tickets to NYC. Strangely, it is much cheaper for me to fly to New York City than to see my family in Ohio (I pay around $500 for bad coach seats to see them in Cinci while apparently I can get to NYC for around $300 if I’m not too picky) even though there must be more fuel involved getting to NYC than to Ohio from Washington State? Anyway, I swear I’m looking forward to the conference this year – even though it is at the worst time of year to visit anywhere in the general area of New York – I don’t always feel this excited. I think because I miss New York, the cute hole in the wall restaurants, the rush-rush attitude which I totally embrace when I’m there, the wonderful museums and Central Park…I feel like myself in NYC, one of the only other cities that happens in besides Seattle. I could totally see myself living there (I turned down a publishing job there about ten years ago, and have just always wondered “what if…”) someday. Someday after I win the lottery, perhaps.
In my tiny-town-by-the-sea, it is snowing. I don’t think anything will stick, but it does encourage the thinking about Christmas (I have yet to do much shopping, or get a tree, or make plans…) My Dad asked if I was getting much writing done, now that I’m in the ideal place for it. Well, with all the move-related shenanigans, doctor appts, and trying to get my freelance assignments done, I haven’t had time (or brainspace) for many picturesque walks by the beach, or visiting with my friends who live reasonably close, or, writing or sending out poetry at all. I hope this will change and the muse will visit soon. I’m sort of cranky when I’m not writing poetry. However, little half-grown deer all over the place, everywhere I drive, there are little deer on the road, deer in the yards, four or five at a time! It’s hard to be cranky looking at these little animals. No whales or bald eagle sightings yet, but I know they’re out there…
And PS Thanks for the great discussion on pop culture on the last post. Very helpful! I wish I could just fly everyone out to my house to sit around and talk about poetry for a few hours.
Earthquakes, My Publisher’s New Book, and Pop Culture and Poetry
Yes, my friend, almost one week after we moved in, we had a 4.0 earthquake near our new home. Now, the Pacific NW ain’t California, but it’s no earthquake-free zone. This one didn’t even rock our plants, although the cats were acting crazy about the time of the quake.
My publisher, Steel Toe Books’ Tom C. Hunley, just won the Holland book prize from Logan House Press for his newest MS, Octopus. Congrats Tom!
So, I’m writing a little article about pop culture and poetry, so I’m curious to get some discussion going and hear your thoughts…
What do you think about artists like Denise Duhamel, Bob Hicok, and others who drop pop culture references (from Pepsi to baseball blayers to Barbie) in their poems? What role do you think pop culture plays in the “high arts” ie painting, poetry, music, etc? Should it play a role?
Has advertising language penetrated our minds and souls?
Is there a way to subvert the culture while participating in it?
Are superheroes the new Greek myths?
Grumpy post deleted.
More cheerful post replacing the grumpier post…
Let’s just say this day (which included getting a needle in the arm, a somewhat dubious traffic ticket for my husband while he drove me the 2.5 hrs to the UW medical center where my endocrine specialist was, driving in dark, cold, freezing rain) could have gone better.
But, on the other hand, things could have been worse. I will just have to remember that.
And I will say, things will get better.
My Thanksgiving List of Things to Be Grateful For
–Good friends who are there when you need them. And supportive families when you are freaking out about moving and finances and why you became a poet in the first place.
–Baby seals sleeping on the beach. Are they dreaming about swimming?
–Deer in people’s yards, eating blackberry leaves, in the middle of the day for no reason.
–Sunshine in November in the NW – high 45, sunshine all day expected!
–Upcoming Poetry Books to look forward to from people whose poetry you really like (Yay, Suzanne Frischkorn!)
–Pomegranate 7Up – a little too sweet, but you know what? Awesome! And real pomegranates at every market too!
–To everyone who publishes and buys poetry and grant-giving organizations and artist colonies that support poets. Thanks!
–Renting three videos in case the DSL goes out (again!) and not feeling guilty about watching them because it’s a holiday darn it!
–My husband’s cooking Thanksgiving dinner!
Happy Thanksgiving! And the holidays and Christian Humanism (or, I John 4:12 and the Greatest Commandment)
So, Jessica Smith and The Poetry Foundation Blog have got me thinking about the kind of Christianity I could really embrace. Jessica mentioned that she’s not religious, but that the verse “No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us” ( I John 4:12) pretty much sums up what a religion should be about.
Ange Mlinko on the Harriet Blog talked about how Auden got in trouble with Christian friends and Rationalist friends alike for valuing the commandment “Love your neighbor as you love yourself” above the rest of the cannon or the Church (which, as Ange points out, Jesus said in a related verse could be used to replace entire Old Testament Law.)
These days, Christianity has a terrible rep in America, as a bunch of smug, self-righteous people trying to start another set of crusades (cough, President, cough.) But I think of back when I read the Bible myself at 12 or 13 (complete with rainbows and Jesus-hugging-sheep pictures!) that I was really struck with I John 4:12, and that I thought, that is really a God I could picture and get behind, a God who, crazy as it sounds, is love. I think the verse in I John goes onto say something about “God is love. He who does not love does not know God…he who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.” (This is a paraphrase, I don’t have it memorized.) It really puts that religious stuff in perspective – listen, if we can’t get be kind and stuff to all the crazy people around us (our families included – and they’re the craziest of all, usually) then we don’t have any business going around saying how much we love God.
In high school my Honors European History class studied Christian Humanism, and several pieces of work by Erasmus (In Praise of Folly was a really witty piece of writing I still enjoy reading) and Blaise Pascal. Like Auden, they were intelligent, educated people who didn’t believe the Church was really acting for the good of the average person, and encouraged people to 1. think for themselves, read the Bible for themselves, which was pretty radical in the 1500’s etc. and 2. do that thing where you love your neighbor instead of doing a lot of religious rituals.
Hmm. Must be all the Christmas music in the air, but that all sounds good to me. I’m basically a selfish person, and tend to forget that the people around me (the slow person in line, or the idiot weaving over both lanes going 40 in a 55 mph zone) are real people, with internal lives and struggles, just as valuable as me. It would be good for me to remember more often that the best way to be a spiritual person is just to be decent to the person next to me.
Pshaw. What will happen to my Villainess reputation if I keep up this kind of talk. Bah Humbug I say! Poison apples (and pumpkins) for all!
Plus, I just got done watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. If that doesn’t make you all sentimenal for your high school history theology-studying days, I don’t know what will.
Notes from the small-seaside town:
Today I was walking on the beach with my husband (don’t be TOO jealous, it was grey, about 30 degrees and super windy) and there was this sign that said “DONT BOTHER THE SEAL PUPS.” And then four feet away, looking exactly like a piece of moldy driftwood (or, conversely, a very gray human baby) was a tiny new baby seal with its eyes closed, breathing really fast and twitching in its sleep. I tried to convince Glenn it was cold and needed me to hug it keep it warm, but he pointed out the sign again. I think it would play really well with the cats.
In other news, I found my roasting pan, and put my bookshelves together. Also had to go to the eye doc after something during the move flew into my eye and my eye swelled up and got all red and they had to get it out with a suction cup thingy they put on your eyeball (ow!) and run an IV (eye-V?) bag of saline through to rinse out your eye. Like a big plastic contact lens. Not something I’d recommend for fun, especially if you’re a little eye-squeamish (I am!) In future, my father tells me, I should wear protective “Lab Goggles” when I move. Especially in the 60-mile-an-hour winds and a truck full of tiny particles of dust, mold, fiberglass, feathers, and God knows what else was in there from previous moves…Hey, when I was in organic chem, we had the eye safety center, which was basically a big water fountain, and that was good enough for us. No frou-frou-plastic-suction-eye-wash crap for us! No sir. Such overkill these modern doctors!
Also, I bought Thanksgiving food, including a branch of brussel sprouts. I don’t know exactly how to cook them on a branch. Should we just throw it in the over and gnaw at it? I did not buy a pie, though they looked good, because, what are two people going to do with a whole pie? If we want pie, you can go to the coffee shop the day after Thanksgiving. I’m sure we’ll be hungry again by then.
One more carload of stuff in the old place to get tomorrow…
40 things that can go wrong when you move, or why moving is always, always more expensive and challaneging than you think…Or, trust that Murphy fellow and his law
First of all, a big shout-out and thank you to Poet Kelli and her husband who helped us move into our new place. That’s a real poetry superheroine, one who will actually move your boxes with you! In the driving cold wind and rain! Anyway, we are eternally grateful, K!
So, yesterday, the pickup of the 26-foot truck was scheduled was 8:30 AM, and the movers were supposed to appear at 9 AM. But, low and behold, when husband G shows up yesterday morning, they did not have the reservation or know anything about it. Later, the manager showed up and says, Oh, I wrote you down for blank day. Of course, the wrong day. So we end up calling a bunch of rental companies in a panic. The movers start charging us at 9 AM whether we have a truck or not. Finally we find a truck, a 23-foot. Glenn buys extra insurance on the truck because he is nervous about driving such a big truck himself. (Turns out that will be a smart move on his part.) So that was yesterday’s drama (ended up paying an extra $110 for the mover’s time.) Also, we had to buy lots of little things that were missing from the house: a curtain rod, new sets of curtains for the hundred thousand giganto-windows we have that look directly into our neighbor’s houses (great view!) a shower curtain, a new cat litter box, and one of those rugs for the inside of the doorway – since we haven’t had non-carpeted floors in about 8 years. A Target run that cost about as much as I made last month.
This morning, at 7 AM we start loading up all the little stuff, including all of our clothes. It is about 40 degrees, howling wind, and driving sideways soaking rain. At about 11 AM, we took off in the big rig for Port Townsend. Husband G was driving like a champ, even maneuvering the giant truck on and off the ferry, which can be tricky. But after two hours of driving, about five miles away from our new place, he tries to pull a turn in a parking lot and knocks the fender off a parked car. Holy Crap! The truck isn’t even dinged. He calls the police to let them know what happened since he can’t find the owner of the car, and leaves his insurance information, but he is devastated. The woman evenutally calls and they exchange information, (she wasn’t mad, just bemused by how such a thing had happened) police later give him a citation, and our insurance rates will go up now. Perfect way to start life in a new town!
Did I mention my computer crashed (for no apparent reason) three times during the last two days, wiping out not all of my labor, but at least a chunk of it?
Lessons Learned: Always buy the extra insurance. Sometimes it’s worth it to pay for a moving truck AND driver. Don’t buy Vista yet. Save your documents frequently. When making reservations for movers and a truck, give yourself a few hours of leeway, and always call every day for at least ten days and talk to every employee at the rental truck agency to make sure they all know you and when you’re renting their truck. Or get a written contract. Or save yourself a lot of pain and stay put in one place as long as possible. Sell all your possessions and live out of your backpack, so you don’t have to rent a truck in the first place. Or make a lot of money so none of those little-expenses-that-add-up hurt so badly. Maybe I should look into that…
Mood: Exasperated, Exhausted, and Broke
Not Poetry-Related, Technical Effluvia
In the midst of the move, and all the associated panic (where is my blank? Where will we put blank? And where the blank have the blanks gone?) here is my pressing question:
Does anyone else who upgraded to Vista feel nostalgic for Win NT?
Moving Some More…and poetry and stuff…
Okay, now that I’ve gotten the keys and stocked the fridge and made sure the cable and phone worked (they didn’t, but we had the guy come out to fix them) I’m thinking, yay, small town Americana by the sea! Sure I’ll miss those big glitzy (and also, teensy cool) bookstores and big glossy grocery stores, but the ocean will make up for it. Unfortunately, no view of the water from the little slightly dingey side street we live on, but it’s less than a five-minute drive in any direction.
Snuck out of packing for an hour yesterday to see Matthea Harvey at Open Books, who was great, but sadly, had not heard of Astro Boy (a 60’s anime cult figure who has made a comeback on Adult Swim.) I had this theory abour her Robo-Boy poems and their connection to Astro Boy…well, maybe the connection still works, but more in a collective unconscious kind of way. Anyway, she was great and the room was packed, and Oliver was there (hi Oliver!) I did manage to get away without buying any new poetry.
On the way down to small-town-by-the-sea to the new house today, husband G and I listened to Margaret Atwood’s CD of her reading her new book, The Door. She’s a fun, if slightly flat-toned, reader. It helped to hear them as well as see them.
I’ll be delivering a paper at AWP on Pedagogy, it seems. Yay! Now to get those airline tickets and hotel reservations (all the conference hotels are sold out, of ourse, even the new Doubletree one…) At this AWP, I swear I will be neither disabled by back injury (like last year) or sick (like the two years before that.) It’s health all the way for me! And dancing and fun til all hours! I hope 🙂
- At November 12, 2007
- By Jeannine Gailey
- In Moving Time
9
Moving Time…You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here
Moving again? Well, by now it’s become old hat. Since 1998 I’ve moved…let’s see, Cincinnati to Virginia, Virginia to Seattle…9 times. I’d like to point out that’s nine times in less than ten years. I don’t recommend that kind of behavior. It’s expensive and really puts your writing life into disarray. For instance, right now I’m desperately grabbing copies of Margaret Atwood, Dorianne Laux, and Matthea Harvey’s books for my reviews, in case I need to quote something from one of their earlier books, as my husband deconstructs the poetry bookcase and packs my books (there go the anthologies!) into bins. All around me are boxes, boxes with shoes and dishes and life’s every day chutney-of-stuff. Hard to write when the dust hasn’t settled, the dust of the mind, I mean.
I moved around a lot as a kid, too. My Dad, looking to land that ever-elusive tenure-track professor of Engineering position, moved us (four kids and wife, plus, sometimes, animals) from – let’s see – from Missouri to Yale U to UCLA to U of Tennessee to U of Cincinnati, where he still teaches. As a kid I used to think everyone moved as much, and as dramatically (my parents often finding a place to live at the last minute, giving us a week or two notice, packing ourselves into moving trailers, driving 21 hours a day on route to the new place) as my family did. When I found out there were people who stayed in the same place their whole life, I felt sorry for them. I thought they were really missing out – the new friends you’re forced to make, new scenery to admire or grumble about, the new horizon – plus the whole self-reinvention thing you get to try out.
Now, I’m not so sure. I think moving so much may have done something to my mental processes, the way I process memories of places and people. I often don’t put as much mental or emotional energy into getting attached to new places or people as I probably should – investing the kind of emotion neccessary – after all, in the back of my mind, I’m pretty sure I’ll be leaving as soon as I’ve started to get used to them. Everything physical is temporary – that is a lesson I have definitely learned by heart.
So will the new place be Home? In the words of OK Go, “So here I go, here I go, here I go again…”
Jeannine Hall Gailey served as the second Poet Laureate of Redmond, Washington and the author of Becoming the Villainess, She Returns to the Floating World, Unexplained Fevers, The Robot Scientist’s Daughter, and winner of the Moon City Press Book Prize and SFPA’s Elgin Award, Field Guide to the End of the World. Her latest, Flare, Corona from BOA Editions, was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award. She’s also the author of PR for Poets, a Guidebook to Publicity and Marketing. Her work has been featured on NPR’s The Writer’s Almanac, Verse Daily and The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror. Her poems have appeared in The American Poetry Review, Poetry, and JAMA.
