Remembering Poet Martha Silano, Spring Continues On Springing, Cats and Hummingbirds and Rebecca Solnit

Marty and I in a field of sunflowers, Woodinville

Remembering Poet Martha Silano

On May 5, we lost my good friend and wonderful poet Martha (Marty) Silano to ALS. The photo to the left is the last time I saw her in person, on a sunny summer afternoon with wildfire haze. This is the way I’ll always remember her, wondering with te sun at her back in a field of flowers.

I met Marty when we both published books with Steel Toe Books, her Blue Positive and my Becoming the Villainess in 2006. I remember us doing a reading together at the old Hugo House (housed in a retired funeral home – amazing and full of ghosts!) and thinking she was so cool. I did not know we were going to start a nearly-20 year friendship where we’d celebrate together – book launches, literary festivals, AWPs, birthdays, housewarmings, babies, and more.

Sharing cocktails outdoors during 2022

Marty was diagnosed with ALS about eighteen months ago, and because she had the most severe kind, she tried to do as much as she could as long as she could – hiking and writing poems with a vengeance. She was still doing online readings while she was losing her ability to speak. I think she ended up with three books by the end of eighteen months (all of which are suberb, and probably her best work.) One of her publishers said she was still texting about marketing the week she died. I call that an incredible act of will. I will say I am so happy she took the time to come out to Woodinville to see me in the last few years, when we were still being cautious about seeing people. Spend time with your friends when you can, and celebrate them while they are still around. I have lost two friends in the space on a year, both of them “healthier” than I am, not friends I would have said I could possibly lose. It makes you realize how precious this “small” stuff is. Let light shine its way on your journey, Martha. Read her poems at the Poetry Foundation here.

Pink Camellia

Spring Goes on Springing, with Cats and Hummingbird, and Rebecca Solnit

I spent several days grieving, I have to admit, and the cats and my husband tried their best to cheer me up. As always seems to happen, the Seattle area brightened and shone with blooms in the days after Martha’s death, and I know she loved the outdoors, so I tried to appreciate the beauty around us.

I also wrote a poem about her, which I don’t know was any good, but if you can’t write an elegy for your friends, then what can you do when you’re a poet?

Here is Charlotte, a hummingbird, frilled iris, and blooming wisteria.

Climbing pink roses

Seeing Rebecca Solnit tonight!

If you are a Rebecca Solnit fan (my brother introduced me to her work during the pandemic, recommending Paradise Built in Hell) she is appearing tonight in Seattle to talk about how to deal with uncertainty and despair during difficult times – feminism, democracy, climate change and power. Rebecca’s work is very accessible and hopeful, while also practical and solutions-oriented. This is my first time hearing her speak, and I’m looking forward to it. A good week to address how to deal with the stress of change and the unknown.

In the meantime, go read some of Martha’s work and maybe order one of her books – you won’t regret it.

Birthday Dinosaurs, Birthday Poems on Daily Kos, Hummingbirds, and More

Me and Glenn on my birthday

Birthday Dinosaurs

My birthday has come and gone, and May has begun with moody weather (sunshine, rain, sunshine again, and that’s just the morning). We had a pretty small celebration, just went to Willows Fireside Lounge for dessert and cocktails and to the Woodland Park Zoo for the dinosaur adventure (plus snow leopard cubs!) I loved the educational interactive bits for kids—they could dig for fossils, or experiment with robot servos to see how the dinosaurs move. Robotics and paleontology – sounds like a great combination! Some of the dinosaurs move uncannily when you get close to them, letting out sounds that might conceivably be dinosaur like, and some had feathers and fur and color.

It also reminded me of one of SNL’s skits that I really liked—Jurassic Park’s Lawyer, with Donald Glover.

Fighting T-Rex with my cane

It did make me feel somewhat philosophical, turning 52. I’m still around, even after multiple doctors said I wouldn’t be. I’ve lost friends in the last few years, friends who seemed much healthier than I am. So much seems random, out of our control. This leads me to think that maybe we should let go of some of the things that keep us from living a full, joyful life, right now. Don’t put off fun, or things you love.

Despite my many and varied health problems, I have a lot to be grateful for. I’ve published books, I have wonderful friends all over the world, I have a husband who makes me a (gluten-free) birthday cake and gets me 52 tulips. I spent time in my garden this week and watched birds and got to play with dinosaurs. Do I have to play catch up with a bunch of doctor appointments I’ve been putting off to have fun? Yes. But sometimes, you have to prioritize fun, right?

Birthday Poets on Daily Kos

Imagine my surprise when I discovered my poem, “Lessons You Learn from Final Girls,” from Field Guide to the End of the World, was up on the Daily Kos this week (right after Yusef Komunyakaa, whose birthday is apparently a day before mine) as birthday poets. See the link here.  

Birthday Hummingbirds

I had the pleasure of observing many hummingbirds as flowers on my back porch bloomed, with coral bells, snapdragons and fuchsias. There were immature and mature Anna’s and Rufous hummingbirds. We also had the return of black-headed grosbeaks and finches and mornings and evenings, even during rain, have been full of birdsong. I hope these pictures bring you a little joy.

We also had a terrific view of Mt Rainier this week, and I captured one as we drove over the Floating Bridge to go to the Zoo.

Springing into Summer, Open Books, Japanese Garden, Spending $11,000 on Book PR, and Birthdays Coming Up

Song sparrow on azaleas

Springing into Early Summer, Open Books, and Japanese Garden

It seems we’ve moved from spring directly into summer, rain evaporating, temperatures rising. The tulip fields have bloomed and ended in what seemed like two weeks—cherry petals litter my lawn as lilacs bloom. It’s a topsy turvy gardener’s problem, because two weeks ago it was too cold to plant seeds and now we have to wear sunscreen when we go out to water.

This last week marked the 30th anniversary of Open Books, Seattle’s poetry-only bookstore, so we visited, picked up a few books, got to talk to Billie and Gabrielle and John (if you know, you know!) and after they closed, went to Seattle’s Japanese Garden to watch birds sing on top of flowers and observe summer flowers—azaleas, rhodoendrons and wisteria—taking over.

Towhee is singing

Spending $11,000 on Book PR – A Shock? Or Reality Bites?

Somehow, I happened upon a Substack post from an experienced PR/marketer who wrote her first novel and spent $11,000 promoting it. Is this number shocking to you? It probably shouldn’t be. The average book doesn’t sell that many copies, publishers aren’t picking up the bill for marketing the way they used to, and even people who do PR for a living are confused and troubled about what pays off and what doesn’t. (Online ads? Travel for readings? Swag?)

The reality of promoting a book—especially for a poet—is that often you spend much more than you’ll make back in sales and royalties, even if you’re smart about where to spend and where to save. I’m interested to see the results of her efforts—and she acknowledges, it’s often more the energy the author spends that makes a difference even more than the money she spends.

Also, side question—should I switch from my blog to Substack? I like the independence a blog gives me, but maybe Substacks are more modern.

Juvenile Goldfinch

Another Birthday and Making Changes

You may have noticed, with the return of nice weather, came the return of bird pictures to the blog. And the time has rolled around to my birthday once again. It always makes me introspective, and though I’m happy I’m getting another year on this earth (never guaranteed), the first four months of 2025 have been awfully challening, personally, financially, health-wise, and even poetry-wise. And that’s not mentioning politics or world news. It’s tough to feel like celebrating.

I did sign up for a class on essay writing and got some tickets to see Rebecca Solnit when she comes to Seattle. I’m also starting to meet with other writers again to talk about work. I’m trying to be pro-active, doing positive things with my money—choosing new charities, looking at (gulp) retirement accounts, and trying to bring in more with my writing—and trying to make new friends and build more community around me. I don’t want to ignore that I’m getting older and be too resistant to change to miss the signs that I should be doing something different.

In the meantime, I will try to pay attention to the singing bird next to me, the timing of the stars and flowers, and some of the gifts that aging brings.

Happy (and Hoppy) Easter, New Poems Up at The Normal School, and a Week of Being Sick (During Beautiful Weather)

Apple Tree Blooming in my Own Yard

Happy (and Hoppy) Easter

Happy Easter to everyone who celebrates. I was too sick to do much this year, but I did revisit some classics, including the children’s book (written in 1939, and re-released in 1967) The Country Bunny and the Little Gold Shoes, which besides having adorable illustrations, contains surprisingly subversive morals on racism, classism, and feminism—I mean, it would be fair to say it’s an anti-Nazi Easter Bunny book. It surprises me what I look back on in children’s lit and see what affected my own values—in this case, learning that being a poor, brown female bunny from the country (being told to “look after her children” and “leave Easter business to the men” by the tall wealthy white male bunnies—sound familiar?) can achieve her dreams no matter what the obstacles.

sick, but still dressed for Easter, with neighboring cherry tree

Anyway, I strongly recommend you buy it for all your children. Meanwhile, I read the account of the Easter story in all four gospels and again noted that the first people to discover Jesus had risen were women, the first person to speak to the risen Jesus was Mary Magdalene, and the male disciples were too scared to check on his grave and refused to believe the women who saw the angels and even saw Jesus himself. So, ha ha ha, not much has changed, right? The church fails to point this out too often I notice. Ah well. You’ll have to excuse this country bunny.

New Poems up at the Normal School

I am very happy to share that I had two poems up at The Normal School this week, “Aurora, or When Firefoxes Spark the Sky” and “Pyrokinetic.” Below is a sneak peek at one of them. If you go to the link, like and share as The Normal School and I could use the online attention.

A Week of Being Sick During Beautiful Weather

First lilacs blooming in Spring.

This week I was supposed to run a book club for poetry month, record a poetry tutorial for Writer’s Digest, and a bunch of other things, but instead, I was sick in bed with a combination sinus/stomach flu bug, which I strongly do not recommend (if I look like I lost weight in the pic above, I did—from three solid days of being constantly sick and another day of liquid diet. Super fun! Like Ozempic without the cost Lol!) And every day I was in bed, outside the sky was blue, the flowers all jumped into bloom at once (cherry blossoms, apple blossoms, and lilacs generally do NOT bloom at the same time in our area, but the late spring really messed up the bloom cycle). So that was a bummer. It was not covid or the official flu (according to tests) but there are a lot of bugs going around, the doctor said, so just be aware.

Glenn and I with cherry tree

Meanwhile, I slept a lot, drank a lot of Pedialyte™ and caught up on a lot of good and bad television. I am hoping to get through my birthday (around the corner) with better health so I can get out and around Seattle to enjoy some blue skies and flowers.

It is almost the end of National Poetry Month, so I hope you have been reading and writing and enjoying poetry this month, too. If you want to cheer up a poet, just buy one of their books or write them a note about how much you enjoyed their work or share their work on social media or leave them an Amazon review or something. You never know when someone needs a little boost to keep them going.

Spring is Here with Cherry Blossoms and Art Shows, Tulip Fields, Pink Moons, and Visits with Family

My pink typewriter with cherry petals

Spring is Here—Cherry Blossoms and Art Galleries

In the days after AWP in LA, spring began springing in Seattle, although a bit colder than usual. The first sign here of spring is daffodils and cherry blossoms. We have several trees that I planted in our yard, and down the street, even more, so although it is a custom to go downtown to the UW quad to visit the almost-100-year-old cherry blossom grove, we usually get our cherry blossom fix closer to home.

Being outside is really good for me, even when I’m tired and feeling a bit sneezy (we’ve had a heck of an allergy season, despite or maybe because of the cold?), so I’m happy to have a bit less cold wind and a rain and at least a couple of partially sunny days.

Dewi Plass – Marvel

Visiting Art Galleries

Another soul-restoring practice of mine, besides spending time with flowers, is spending time with art. So, we went downtown to the new location (hard to find and in a bit of a dodgy area of town, but huge and well-lit) of Roq La Rue, my favorite art gallery in Seattle. They had a beautiful collection of smaller pieces called “Spectacle du Petite,” one of which I was able to take home (happy birthday to me!) Besides this, they had spectacular sculptures and new work by another favorite artist, Josie Moran. They just opened a new show this last Friday, so take a peek at their web site to see what’s going to be there. Worth the trip (and some level of confusion) finding it!

The day we went down we also went by a very friendly-seeming anti-Trump protest and a group of trans folks raising money for ACLU. It was sunny and everyone was in good spirits, even the gathered police, and despite what people on the right say about Seattle, I was happy and proud to be part of such a vibrant and inclusive community.

Annual Trip to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival

Which, because spring is late this year, meant we saw not only fields of tulips, but fields of daffodils, still-blooming cherry trees, and early/late camellias and rhododendrons. I always wish I could stay longer and do more exploring up in the area, but this was a quick day trip (to avoid the work being done on the house—this time, noisy electrical work)—and I wore out after about nine hours out and about in the fields anyway. In the meantime, enjoy these pics—when I posted some of these on Instagram with a guess-where-I-am caption, several people guessed Holland! But you can totally imagine Holland looking at these pictures.

Pink Moon and Visiting Family

The full Pink Moon was actually pink this weekend, so I tried to get a picture of it in its true color which is always challenging but this one got pretty close.

My birthday is coming up soon which is always a time of introspection, as is tax time (how is it possible I did so much freelance work for so little money? I ask every year.) I am hoping to find a new home for my next book, maybe a chance to do more lucrative work teaching or publishing, and of course, balancing the joys of life and the stress plus health stuff. I am trying to find more disabled and chronically ill women’s books to review (so definitely comment if you have a new book coming out), and besides the book club and open mic, trying to get together more regularly with other writers. AWP (and maybe the art gallery and protest, too) reminded me of the strengths of feeling like part of a community, rather than just a lone eccentric trying to live your lone eccentric writer life. Helping others, speaking up, these things are also part of feeding the soul, not to get too cheesy.

I also got to visit my little brother’s newly renovated home (beautiful!) in a lovely neighborhood and got to see the way he and my sister-in-law have already started making it their own—hanging art, arranging furniture, trying to beautify the yard (which the previous owner had left a lot of gravel). I am reminded that someday soon our own home renovations will be done, and we can concentrate on something else, but also, in this area, buying and maintaining a home is no joke, financially, but somewhat more stable than the veering stock market this week, for instance. I always like to touch base with my family, and it felt nice to actually spend an hour or two just talking and catching up.

Wishing you some time with flowers, art, full moons, and family and friends this month.