wordless wednesday: marginally legible bumper sticker wisdom for poets and parents

you are what you sound like

this beautiful blue ball

Rodeo Beach at Marin Headlands State Park; the photos never do it justice

One of the first things that struck me about California when we moved here last summer was how big everything is. I’m not talking about the expressways and the bridges (although those are big, yes), and I’m certainly not talking about the houses (hello, shoebox, nice to meet you). I’m talking about elements of nature: the trees, the hills, and yes, the ocean.

But let’s begin with the geraniums. In my stunned state of mind, fresh off the plane last July, and driving toward our hotel in the college town, I texted my dear friend, Mrs. Kwood, back in South-of-the-River: “freakishly large geraniums.”

From there, it just kept going: the fucshia growing taller than I am; the arborvitae (well, I think they’re arborvitae) that in the midwest may have stood sentry to either side of a front door — well, here they grow as tall as a 3 or 4 storey building. At first it freaked me out a little. When the evergreen grove at your neighborhood park just happens to be made up of redwoods, it kinda grabs your attention. Everything here seemed to be taken to its extreme, from the line at the DMV to the size of the oak trees. The hills weren’t just hills; they were soaring hills with roads barely carved into them, and surprisingly meager guardrails, don’t look now. The ocean, while appearing calm (as in pacific), crashed into a beach wider than the town I grew up in. Well, almost wider, anyway. And the trees, again; big enough to drive a car through, some of them. I think of Piglet’s house with its endearing sign: “TRESPASSERS WILL,” and how wee and small Piglet looks next to it.

At first, I found this large scale unsettling. Like Piglet would. It’s a constant reminder: you, my friend, are a speck of dust in the universe. Lately, though, I’ve been trying to find comfort in it. And if not comfort then at least inspiration. Living as we do amidst these grand sights reminds me: Every day is a gift. All this will outlast me. Any mistake I make can’t be that bad in the scheme of things. Any good I can do will add to this incredible beauty. Oh, and, you might as well get cracking, girl — who knows where the high water mark will be tomorrow.

I hope someday to be able to write about this landscape, but first I have to give it time to graft itself onto me. Only in the year or so before we moved from South-of-the-River did I begin to feel enough a part of that landscape to invite it into a poem. Someday, California, I will take your soaring hills with me through a few stanzas. The ocean will crash, then spill into a gentle, foamy lace, in a poem. Someday, a final image: the bridges crisscrossing the bay like sloppy sutures. For now, I am taking it all in and letting it remind me not to waste my precious time on this beautiful blue ball, this earth.

friday roundup: drafting in prose, the chapbook rookie, and Linebreak does it again

Happy Friday, Reader. Here in the Peninsula Town the house is a mess and the cupboard is bare. But just because I’ve been procrastinating doesn’t mean I *have* to get groceries today, right? On to the roundup:

drafting in prose  The prose poem form has always mystified me, not because I don’t like it but because I don’t know how to use it. The first time I fell in love with a prose poem was in Fleda Brown‘s collection Reunion. She has a series of prose poems called “Knife” on the topic of a loved one’s brain tumor, treatment, and the aftermath. Shortly after I read that collection, I e-mailed Fleda asking her about the use of the prose poem form — whether she had drafted in that form, or had revised into it; how she knew the prose form was what the series required, etc. Amongst other things, I remember her saying that she felt the subject required a poem/form that was “barely poetry.” Right now, I’m taking a class through Stanford’s online writer’s studio and we are looking at the prose form this week. The professor has talked about using the prose form to write about difficult subjects and/or subjects that are new to you as writer. She also talks about the prose form as a way to take the poet out of the poem, as a way to take artifice out of the poem, and to give everything in the poem equal weight. With these tidbits in mind, I’ve been drafting in prose lately. I feel quite out of my comfort zone, but I have found that I’ve been able to write more successfully about tricky subjects (in my case, my experience with chronic illness). I haven’t been doing much in the way of process notes lately, but here’s a sample of my latest draft:

This morning in the half-lit lab, you ate a radioactive egg. Then spread yourself out on a steel table. On their screens they watched the egg make its tunneled, wet descent into your inmost rooms, the body’s dark drain.

(btw, the radioactive egg thing is true — strange but true)

If you are a poet, I’d love to hear how you have used the prose form — what you’ve learned about using it, how it fits into your work. Share in comments if you like.

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the chapbook rookie  My excellent po-friend and editor of Weave Magazine,  Laura E. Davis, has a chapbook coming out this year from Finishing Line Press. She wrote a great post on promoting a chapbook; read it here. It seems that the bottom line is this: readings sell chapbooks.

The Bay Area has a very reading-centric (new word) approach to literary life. Seriously: throw a stick, hit a poetry reading. This is a bit different from the po-scene in Minnesota, where it seemed to me that readings were fewer and farther between, and mostly reserved for people whose names you already recognized. I am more that ready to blame that on the long, cold, dark winters there — but still, it’s interesting to see the differences in poetry scenes across the country. I’m looking forward to throwing my hat into the reading ring here.

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Linebreak does it again  Reader, do yourself a favor and go read this poem by Nathan McClain over at Linebreak. Do you not love that this poem is set at The Home Depot? I do, too, and I also love its looping, repeating lines and phrases — almost pantoum-y (new word).

Meanwhile, Linebreak, I get that you’re an online journal and that’s cool with me. And I’ve already downloaded your awesome e-book, Two Weeks. But sometimes, Linebreak, I just want to put my hands on you. What do you say to a print anthology sometime? Maybe? Someday?

And now, Reader, let me show you something:

The frig is almost always empty. I don't know how it happens.

I really must go round up some food for my family. Have a wonderful weekend!

learning California

I have a notification on my computer that tells me how many days it has been since it was last backed up to my external hard drive. The last time that happened, we were just leaving South-of-the-River for the west coast. My computer tells me it’s been 212 days since my last back up (No worries — the back up notification is a holdover from my previous setup. Thanks to Husband, I now have a cloud and don’t need to fuss with external physical drives).

Two-hundred twelve days ago, our house was sold, cleared out, and locked. We woke up in the dark in a steaming hot hotel room. It had been 100 degrees for a week and the hotel’s AC was broken. With us, we had our three cubs and all of our most important possessions and paperwork, and five tickets to SFO. Dear friends came to see us off. One drove us to the airport. We got out of her car at departures and went inside the airport, inside the next chapter of our lives.

Sometimes it seems like a lifetime ago that we walked off the plane at SFO. Sometimes it seems like last week.

Meanwhile, I’m learning California’s hills and low places, the ripped seam at her western edge, then the Pacific. The lush foothills and the barren edge of the bay. I’m learning her pinball-style roads, u-turns, parking in a space the size of a shoebox. I’m learning to dress in layers — cold in the morning, warm afternoons, then chilly in the evening again. I’m learning the slight California accent, the vowels a little softer than our clipped midwestern speech, everything more laid back here, even words. I’m devouring many, delicious, handmade corn tortillas and fresh seasonal fruits and veggies.

I’m learning to be unfazed by signs like this:

from the archives

And store displays like these:

western kitsch at the peninsula's oldest electronics store -- move over best buy

I remember when we visited last May — a weeklong trip to “look around” — everybody looked so happy here. I was decidedly not happy at the time, so it made quite an impression on me. Now, I kinda get why: it’s a really lovely place to live in terms of topography, weather, and a million cultural attractions to fit every interest. I have a theory that one reason people are happy here is because, unlike in the midwest, they don’t have the psychologically-ingrained worry about surviving the winter (I say that to be funny, kind of — but really, it wasn’t that long ago in human history that you really did have to worry about surviving the winter in colder climates).

There are some things I’m not used to yet: spending 40 minutes driving around the College Town for a parking place; dentists booked out for six months to a year; a line for everything, everywhere; the hyper-focused achievement culture of many Silicon Valley schools and parents (don’t worry, we’ve already hit the opt-out button on that one).

But slowly, I am learning California. What do I know? Not much yet, probably. I’m a long way from claiming this place as my own. But I wish I could show you the 280 — wide open space and soaring hills, livestock grazing. I wish I could really describe the way a thick, grey cloud bank coming in from the ocean curls over the foothills. I wish I could show you the sky at night, sans light pollution, the stars and planets close enough to touch. And I wish I could show you the tumbledown strips of El Camino, shop after mom-and-pop shop: The Happy Donut (those two words belong together), The Glass Slipper Inn (I want to stay there!), Barbecues Galore (need a grill anyone?).

What a long, strange trip it’s been….. but I’m enjoying the ride, looking around thinking, okay, okay, I think I could sink some roots down here…. wait, wait…. was that an earthquake!?

wordless wednesday: be mine

what today asks

these clouds are asking for some hot soup

Happy Monday, Reader. Today we have what Californians call a “cold” rain — 50-ish degrees. Truthfully, 50-ish and rainy has begun to feel a bit chilly to me as well, until I remember (faintly) what 20-below feels like.

I woke up today sensing that I will be much more Mom than Writer this week. The school Valentine’s Day parties, the search for long-term housing, the care and feeding of the young. Over the years, I am learning to listen to each day — to get a sense of what it asks of me. This is a little different than going with the flow, which, if I’m not careful, can turn a bit defeatist: “There’s nothing I can do about it, so I’ll go long to get along.” If, instead, I think about what the day asks of me in a posture of listening and intuition, I feel less pulled and tugged by the crazy to-do lists and the encroachment of regular life upon writing life.

Today, aside from the musts (must punch holes and tie ribbons in 30 Valentine crafts for second grade party tomorrow; must do my reading for the class I’m taking; must make dinner ahead), I feel the day asking for a pot of chicken soup. I think it’s considering also asking for a batch of butterscotch oatmeal cookies, but I have my limits.

Now that I think of it, “What Today Asks” is kind of a cool working title for a poem. Maybe today is asking for a poem after all.

Reader, what does today ask of you? Whatever it is, may it bless you (bless, meaning, amongst other things: “to confer prosperity or happiness upon”).

from the archives: sunday words for valentine’s week

photo by Mike White; public domain at wikimedia commons

These words come to us from the 13th century.  They are from the sacred writings of Hadewijch of Antwerp.

Love’s Maturity

In the beginning Love satisfies us.
When Love first spoke to me of love –
How I laughed at her in return!
But then she made me like the hazel trees,
Which blossom early in the season of darkness,
And bear fruit slowly.

–trans. by Oliver Davies