All Categories - Neo-Victorian Poetry

Lingering on the wayside ...

1/1/2021

William Allingham, who lived between 1824 and 1889, was a prolific Irish poet. He is famous for his often quoted poem The Faeries in which he wrote, “We daren’t go a-hunting, for fear of little men.”

In his quote, “Pluck not the wayside flower; it is the traveler's dower.” he used the word dower in the sense of a dowry: that part of an estate of a deceased spouse given by law to the surviving spouse.

The Cambridge Dictionary defines wayside thusly: If someone falls by the wayside, they fail to finish an activity, and if something falls by the wayside, people stop doing it, making it, or using it.

I tend to view “the wayside” in a less negative aspect, as it refers to that swath of ground which runs along the side of a road where wildflowers grow undisturbed, along with the occasional bus stop.

In that sense, this blog sometimes falls to the wayside, though it does not do so merely out of abandoned disuse. Rather, it bobs to the inclinations of my muse, much like a wildflower dances in a breeze.

I have learned that it is less than ideal for me to attempt to write when my muse lies obstinately silent; when no amount of prodding elicits any useful response. So it is with my poetry and with this blog.

Whenever it seems that I have run out of steam here, even for months at a time between posts, you can trust that merely waiting beside the road for my muse to arrive with a viable poetic itinerary.

In the meantime, I wish you a very Happy New Year!!!

Image: http://www.picturequotes.com

The "oops" factor ...

10/17/2020

American novelist, Chris Pavone, who worked as an editor at various publishing houses before writing his first novel, The Expats, said “Although no one loves a typo, it's close to impossible to eradicate every single little mistake in a manuscript.”

There was a time when we, as a family, didn’t just run out and purchase a game for our home computer. No, we used a book that contained line after line of Atari Basic code and tediously typed it in.

One missed symbol in all that code would mean utter failure, and good luck finding that missing comma. It was like today’s leisure games of “find the backward R” in a page full of r’s, but not at all fun.

Typos in one’s own text can be downright invisible to the author, and multiple editors can miss errors in your book. There are a slew of famous authors whose published works are known to contain typos.

I’ve come to realize that the best editors at my disposal are those readers who point the errors out to me. I take this as a great favor, though it may sting bitterly, for a great while, as I repair my text.

… sigh … At least I'm in good company.

Today, 10/17/2020, my second E-book, Echoes ll, More Neo-Victorian Poetry, is FREE for digital download. Click here to get a copy. Enjoy!

Untying some knots ...

10/10/2020

I’ve been writing a poem about my daughter’s travels abroad, and I am on page six, so far. When I tried to compose it as a narrative story the tears wouldn’t stop. Much of it was still too close to home.

It’s those unfortunate sections that hold me up and shake me, and the hurt was too dear. But as a poem, albeit a long poem, I am finding myself very focused on the rhyme scheme, meter, and flow.

This has granted me the distance that I need to walk through those more troubling memories of pain and near loss that I recall clearly, and to unknot the rest. As usual, my art is a buffer for my heart.

This blog post is, of necessity, a short one owing to my muse’s insistence that I get back to that piece. And so, onward to page seven and beyond …

In the meantime, I wish to let you know that my Amazon.com Free Day cycle, my very first E-book, Echoes, Neo-Victorian Poetry is, once again, FREE for download today, (10/10/2020). Just click here.

That perfect moment ...

9/25/2020

“Opportunities are like sunrises. If you wait too long, you miss them.” So said inspirational author, columnist, and poet, William Arthur Ward, who penned many influential inspirational maxims.

There are those scant few moments in the wee hours when an idea, phrase, or needful rhyme will pop up and hover in the ether of my too, too sleepy brain, and I think, “I’ll jot it down in the morning.”

But, when morning comes, “whatever it was” has vanished, leaving not a trace of itself behind, and there is nothing that I can do to jog it back into being. Such missed opportunities can be rather painful.

They leave me with the certainty that I have just lost out on a most brilliant and extraordinary morsel, and this can nag at me for hours and hours. “You should have written it down!” my muse chides.

Some nights, just as I am on the very verge of succumbing to sleep, I will very reluctantly get up, snatch my nearby pen and pad, jot the idea down, and gratefully climb back into bed.

The next morning I might find an illegible scrawl waiting for me on my notepad, or it might even be clear enough to read but leave me wondering, “What in the world was I thinking about last night?”

It seems that my muse loves to set me up with a choice between two tortures, both involving some version of amnesia and a keen sense of loss. But, there is a reason why this matters so much to me.

On those rare evenings and very early mornings when my muse prods me insistently to get up and write, I find the idea and the effort are well worth the trouble, which makes the fruitless nights worse.

Fortunately, I am not regularly afflicted by these ill timed bouts with my muse, but that pad and pen are always at the ready, even when I am not, because I may actually compose something epic, after midnight.

Image (above) provided by my gracious friend, Finnigan Livingstone.

As noted previously, My Echoes E-books are available, in rotation, FREE for download each saturday. This week’s offering is Echoes lll, Even More Neo-Victorian Poetry, and is FREE for download on Saturday, September 26, 2020. Click here to go to the amazon.com link.

Poet in hiding ...

9/19/2020

“To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim.” So wrote Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde in his preface to The Picture Of Dorian Grey.

I once had an opportunity to share my poetry anonymously in a college creative writing class. Our instructor, who had allowed me this little experiment during the majority of that semester, was awesome.

He would read us wonderful, published poetry which we would discuss afterward. Now and then one of our own poems would be introduced, read aloud, and the class would discuss it, also.

I was positively brilliant! My poems were appraised with unobstructed honesty and candor. I got to hear what they actually thought of my pieces. Their feedback was the best I’ve ever experienced.

However, after several months of me hiding in plain sight, our instructor approached me to say, “You know, this isn’t exactly fair. How about we let them know who wrote those unidentified poems?”

With some reluctance I agreed. After all, this had been a virtual trove of gold for me, but I did see his point.

During our next class session we discussed the anonymous poems that had been shared, and then our instructor suddenly piped up with, “How about we hear from the poet who wrote those pieces.”

Heads began spinning about scanning the room in utter confusion. There was no one new in the room, and certainly not a published poet. I hesitated ever so briefly before I said,”That was my work.”

The shock which reverberated in that classroom was palpable, and I felt a bit embarrassed, but I was also very grateful for the experience. After all, how often does one get to hide behind ones own art?

By the way … my second E-book, Echoes ll, More Neo-Victorian Poetry, is once again FREE for download … today (9/19/2020)!!! Click here to get it!

Any road will do ...

9/5/2020

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, author of Adventures of Alice in Wonderland, and Through The Looking-Glass, famously known as Lewis Carroll, said, “If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there.”

Being serendipitous by nature, I’ve never really tried to figure where I was going. Instead, I’ve always lived a “put one foot in front of the other and repeat” sort of life, which has gotten me this far, so far.

No one in my childhood blue collar neighborhood seemed the least bit interested in poetry, and I never had any expectations that my poems would ever matter to anyone, but that didn’t hinder me. I kept writing.

When I was eleven years old I fell into writing rhyming metered verse, much like someone falling into the deep end of a swimming pool and suddenly realizing that they could swim, even though they’d had no lessons.

During my first fifty years of composing poetry I never once considered publishing my pieces in book form. It was my daughter’s idea to publish them after she had published her own first novel, Clockwork Twist, Waking.

To date, we have five books of my poetry in print, and I am currently working on another volume of my work. I still don’t know where I’m going, but I’m pretty happy with where I am, and I love surprises.

Today, my E-book Echoes lll, Even More Neo-Victorian Poetry is FREE for download on Amazon.com. You can get a copy by clicking here.

Enjoy!

~ How To Write Rhyming Poetry ~

8/27/2020

Welcome to the show notes of my presentation on Turning Readers Into Writers with Emma Dhesi. You can view my episode as well as episodes with any of the other authors featured there at: www.facebook.com/groups/turningreadersintowriters If you would like to interact with this live presentation, please grant StreamYard permission to see your name at streamyard.com/facebook.

~Overview~

● Rhyme
● Meter
● Stanzas
● How to construct a poem
● Finding inspiration
● How I learned rhyming meter
● Resources that I use

~Let's begin with a few basic concepts~

Rhyme is the use of words which have similar sounds such as boat goat and moat. They are often placed at the end of each line in a poem in an agreeable way.

Meter is the basic rhythmic structure of the lines in rhyming poetry, which is also called verse. Meter is a poem’s heartbeat or pulse.

Stanzas refer to how the lines of a poem are grouped: blocks units of four or more lines separated by an empty line between each block.

~Examples of Rhyming Schemes~

Perfect Rhyme

Song of the Witches From Macbeth by William Shakespeare
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg and howlet’s wing, ...

Internal Rhyme

A Rare Day
Sweet comfort breathes into the eaves
Imbuing all who dwell
Within this gentle hostelry
With peaceful ease as well.
A subtle breeze begins to tease
The window’s wispy veil
While white waves breach the sunlit beach
And otters ride their swell.
Enveloping and nurturing
Composed to sooth and quell
This all too precious rarity
Consumes me with its spell.

Imperfect Rhyme

The Hobo Code
A knocking on the door frame.
“Ma’am, you got any chores?”
She sends him, with instructions, to the barn,
Then to her kitchen scurries
To stir the stew once more
Sweet biscuits in the oven keeping warm.
Her husband home and tired.
A day of labor spent.
He notices the table set for three.
Just as the lonely drifter
His head bent in respect
Reports that he is bidden to come eat.
A thankful grace is offered
Then dishes passed around
The husband asks the drifter how he knew
That he would meet no trouble
When coming to their door
The neighbors being contrary and rude.
He points out towards the fence post
Says that he read the sign
Etched there for every vagabond to know.
The couple, clearly baffled
The drifter smiles to say
Some hobo came before and left the code.
It indicated “Friendly,”
That work and food were here.
The other fences warned to steer away.
So, up and down the byways
As drifters tend to roam
They know where aid, or tribulation, lay.

~Examples of meter~

Iambic Pentameter

In the following example there are 10 beats per line which repeat, (ta DUM ta DUM ta DUM ta DUM ta DUM).

How far I’ve flown I neither know nor care.
Much as this open deck my plans are bare.
Of star or compass I have nary need,
But follow as these downy cloud tops lead.

Iambic, (metrical feet), Pentameter, (consisting of five metrical feet) is written in block units, (stanzas) of four or more lines. Example: Sonnets.

Limericks

In this anonymous example the third and fourth lines are shorter than the other lines, and they also share a different meter.

The limerick packs laughs anatomical
Into space that is quite economical.
But the good ones I've seen
So seldom are clean
And the clean ones so seldom are comical.

Limericks are short four line poems which tend to be funny and sometimes bawdy, (lewd).

~Constructing a Poem~

Beginning Steps
There are many ways to construct a rhyming metered poem. So, how do you decide which rhyming scheme, meter, and stanza framework to use?

Seek out published poets who rhyme, rhyming lyrics in music, and immerse yourself:
Poems by: Edna St. Vincent Millay, Robert Frost, Ogden Nash, James A. Tweedie
Songs by: Paul Simon, Tom Petty, Paul McCartney, Billie Eilish, Troye Sivan

Then, begin by rewriting a line of text. Play with it. Write another line and make them both rhyme.

~A Few Basic Rules~

● Consider the atmosphere, temperature, time of day, aromas, (how red is your red?).
● Manage your meter, beat, tempo, and stay within the lines.
● NEVER force a rhyme.
● Poetry's muse is a two-way conversation.
● Editing is weeding.
● The naming game; titling your poem.
●Knowing when it's finished; listen to your poem. When in doubt, ask someone who is acquainted with your work, “Does it feel finished to you?”

~Focus on an image for inspiration~

Consider this dry, barren desert landscape. It looks as if no one has been here. But ... Breezes have been here, ascribing wave-like patterns in the sand. Sunlight is here, kissing the dunes with golden heat. Moonbeams were here, bathing all in their bluish hues. Caravans have traversed this sand. Scorpions and other critters live beneath it.

This is an example of Anthropomorphism, in which the writer attributs human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities. Even in an abandoned landscape there is potential for poetry.

Stories, fables, and all manner of lore which you have read or heard about can become poems. What impression did the story leave you with? Don’t worry whether it is true to that initial story.

Write a line of text on what you remember about it or how it makes you feel. Write another line of text using the exact same meter. End both lines with words that rhyme.

How I learned to write rhyming metered poetry in a bubble

When I began writing poetry, I knew no one else who did so. My sixth grade teacher gave us an assignment: “Look at the piles of dirt I’ve placed on your desks and write what you see.” My response was to write a rhyming metered poem depicting the dirt, as mother and the tiny weeds in the dirt as child. He read my poem and yelled “I have a poet in my class!” Okay, what is a poet?
Fortunately, my dad collected scads of books. They reached from the floor to the ceiling in what was referred to as “the back room.” Amongst those books I found several volumes of classical poetry. So, I began to study the works of William Blake, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Lord Byron and many other classical poets and I began to emulate them.

Emulate: To strive to equal or excel, especially through imitation. Wordnik.
I didn’t encounter the works of my contemporaries, the modern poets, such as Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, or Ezra Pound during this time, and not until much, much later. By then, I had developed what I call Neo-Victorian poetry ... my contemporized version of Victorian-esque verse ... from within my exclusive little bubble.

~Resources that I use~

● The Society Of Classical Poets https://classicalpoets.org/
● The Oxford Book of American Verse, by F.O. Matthiessen
● The Oxford Book of English Verse, by Arthur Quiller-Couch
● Literary Devices: https://literarydevices.net/
● Song lyrics: https://www.lyrics.com/
● RhymeZone: https://www.rhymezone.com/
● Dictionary: https://www.dictionary.com/
● Thesaurus: https://www.thesaurus.com/

My blog: Neo-Victorian Poetry https://www.janice-t.com/

My Amazon.com author page:
https://www.amazon.com/JaniceT/e/B00CEHQHFO ?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_3&qid=1597812399&sr=8- 3

My pen name is JaniceT (no space)

Today, Echoes is FREE for download!

8/22/2020

Today, August 22, 2020, my first ever E-book of poetry, Echoes, Neo-Victorian Poetry is free for download on amazon.com. I invite you to click here to obtain a copy of your own!

Every Saturday one of the E-books from my Echoes series will be FREE for download on amazon.com. These are set to be offered in rotation each week. If you missed downloading your FREE E-book, here’s your chance.

Also available on Amazon.com are my other books of poetry:

A Compilation of Echoes
When None Command

A Compilation of Echoes includes all of my poetry from my Echoes series:

Echoes, Neo-Victorian poetry
Echoes ll, More Neo-Victorian poetry
Echoes lll, Even Neo-Victorian poetry

These smaller books were released yearly as a way for me to introduce my work. Eventually, I compiled them into a single volume. Hence, A Compilation of Echoes.

To see my currently avaIlable books and E-books, please click here to go to my amazon.com author page.

Enjoy!!!

Today, Echoes lll is FREE for download!

8/15/2020

Today, August 15, 2020, my third book of poetry, Echoes lll, Even More Neo-Victorian Poetry is free for download on amazon.com. I invite you to click here to obtain a copy of your own. Enjoy!!!

On another note ...

Matt Haig, novelist, journalist, and author of How To Stop Time is quoted as saying, “Beauty breeds beauty; truth triggers truth. The cure for writer's block is therefore to read.” Ordinarily, I would agree.

The problem for me is that I have been reading a rather lush novel; so lush, in fact, that I am feeling a bit deflated, and have begun to compare that novel with the blog posts and poems that I write.

So, I have decided to put The Starless Sea, by Erin Morgenstern down for a while and return to my many books of rhyming poetry. Reading pages and pages of verse always feeds my muse amply.

My problem with writing in my blog is not a matter of writer’s block so much as my need to feed on an appropriate literary diet. Come on Yates, come on Samuel Taylor Coleridge, let us sit down to feast!

Echoes ll, FREE digital download today!

8/7/2020

!!! Announcement !!! My e-Books ... FREE !!!

Today, Saturday, August 8, 2020, my e-Book, Echoes ll, More Neo-Victorian Poetry, is available free for download at Amazon.com. So, if you’ve missed the chance to get my books, please click here.

As a matter of fact, one of my three Echoes, Neo-Victorian Poetry e-Books will be free for download on subsequent Saturdays. I have arranged for them to be available, in rotation, each week.

On Saturday, August 15th, my e-Book, Echoes lll: Even More Neo-Victorian Poetry will be free for download. On August 22nd, a digital copy of my very first book, Echoes, Neo-Victorian Poetry will be free.

At the moment I am working on a new book of my verses, but it is proceeding slowly. Unlike many writers, I cannot simply sit down and write every day, but only when my muse is in the mood.

During these unsteady times, I've written about twenty-five new poems; not quite enough to warrant a new book yet, but I’d like to share a little teaser poem with you … a sample of things to come.

Impetuous Wife

His adept eyes are searching
As he sits within the grove
In his mind he holds an image
Of a certain herb. Behold!
There it is, as if in answer,
So his ready legs unfold
Rising up he gently gathers
Only one of manyfold
Then prepares a precious poultice
With a touch of Marigold
For his sweetheart who was wounded
When she clumsily let go
Of the arrow she was aiming
Towards him but an hour ago.

JaniceT

When None Command is Number 1!!!

5/1/2020

Announcing: My eBook, When None Command, is now rated Number One, in three categories, on Amazon.com!!! To celebrate, I have made this edition FREE for download today, May 1, 2020!!!

Whoa! It's been a long time since I posted here, and it feels good to be back! I ran out of steam, blog-wise, but I've been busy writing poems for my next book, tentatively titled Planet Janice.

As Sridevi, the Indian actress and producer, said, "Acknowledgement and recognition from authoritative quarters are important to every artiste." Yes, I can heartily attest to this.

Reader reviewes on my work on Amazon.com, and elsewhere, have been hard to come by, which makes this Number One rating so important. Validation, of any sort, is key.

When I received a negative review on A Compilation Of Echoes, Emily Thompson, author of the Clockwork Twist adventure series, told me, “You know you’ve arrived as a writer when you get your first bad review.”

However, this acknowledgement on Amazon.com is a huge, and hugely appreciated, encouragement. I would be writing poems regardless of accolades and ratings, but this feels really, really nice.

Please celebrate with me by downloading an eBook copy of When None Command today. Click here to get your copy!

Enjoy!

Ringing in a new leap year ... !

1/1/2020

"Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come, whispering, 'It will be happier.'" So said Alfred Lord Tennyson.

The year 2020 is a leap year. The term leap year came into being in the late 14th century, and may be so called because its causes fixed festival days to "leap" ahead one day in its respective week.

Every four years an added day is inserted into the calendar because seasons and events do not perfectly align with 365 days and such events tend to cause them to drift out of sequence over time.

However, there are exceptions to this. Specifically, a year that can be evenly divided by 100, but not evenly divided by 400, is not a leap year. For instance, 1900 is not a leap year.

In essence, we have an extra day this year in which to hope that it will be a happier one. A New Year’s resolution is potentially a device one can use to insure it will be so, like a personal promise cast forward.

It is said that New Year’s resolutions were first made by the ancient Babylonians about 4000 years ago. They also were the first to hold new year’s celebrations, according to historical records.

I rather agree with the artist Henry Moore’s way of thinking “in terms of the day's resolutions, not the year's.” However you celebrate, or whether you celebrate such things, I wish you all a very ... Happy New Year!!!

Image: Charleston Style & Design Magazine

Armchair, and other, Travelers ...

12/22/2019

Patrick Jake O'Rourke, (P. J. O’Rourke), an American political satirist, journalist, and correspondent famously said, “The one thing that's terrible about traveling for fun is writing about it.”

There was a time when the only affordable way to travel was through the writings of those who actually traveled, including Jules Verne, who spent endless hours at the local library researching the globe.

Eventually, Mr. Verne was able to actually travel, but as recently as a few hundred years ago, the average person rarely ventured far from their homes. Travel was often dangerous, very expensive, and limited by transport availability.

Though this can still be true, for some, today it is less likely to be an issue. This is just a little post so that I can wish all who will be traveling this holiday season ...

Safe Travels and a very Merry Christmas!!!

Image: ilikepaints.blogspot.com

Striving for endurance ... or not ...

12/13/2019

“At Christmas play and make good cheer, for Christmas comes but once a year.” Thomas Tusser

Born c.1524, Thomas Tusser was an English poet who wrote during the reign of Queen Elizabeth 1. Educated at Eton and King’s College and Trinity Hall, Cambridge he served at the British court until he left to become a farmer.

Tusser wrote a long, continuous poem titled, Five Hundreth Pointes of Good Husbandrie to as many of Good Huswifery (1573), which served as an informational poem, a calendar, and a how-to book, written in rhyming couplets.

He penned many verses which have become common idioms, such as “A fool and his money are soon parted” and “Sweet April showers do spring May flowers” from which we get April showers bring may flowers.

Oh that my poems might leave such a mark and endure as long as his. It helps to have published my work, so that’s out in the world, but I’m writing during an era in which poetry is not valued as it once was.

Even so, I can’t help but hope, while I write my verses, that they will live on in some meaningful way; that they might touch, console, and delight others as they have done for me. Well, as some say, “Fingers crossed.”

Image: outlandishobservations.blogspot.com

Oh, for a fluffy white Christmas ...

12/5/2019

Matthew Gray Gubler, an American actor, filmmaker, fashion model, painter, and author, said, “I love the holidays - any holiday - but Christmas has always been sort of special because I grew up reading Charles Dickens.”

Indeed, Charles Dickens is ideally cited as the inspiration for our propensity toward snowy Christmases. Born in Portsmouth England in 1812, Charles Dickens lived during the latter portion of what François E. Matthes called The Little Ice Age.

This was a time of prolonged cold, dry seasons, so cold that the Thames River in London froze solid, and is said to have lasted from about 1300 to about 1850. There are myriad theories about what caused it.

Dickens was born into an unusually cold world. Then, when he was four years old, Mount Tambora, on Sumbawa island in Indonesia, erupted. It is the most powerful volcanic eruption in recorded history.

Soon, the Northern Hemisphere was plunged into The Year Without a Summer. Average global temperatures dropped, it snowed during the wrong seasons, and particles ejected from Mount Tambora reflected sunlight away from the Earth.

Charles Dickens experienced several white Christmases during one of the coldest decades in England (1810-1819). From my readings I’ve come to realize that many of the hardships depicted in his novels are rather autobiographical, and especially those snowy Winters.

As Christmas Day quickly approaches, I wish you a very Happy Holiday Season, and some snow on Christmas day.

Image: cartoonpicks.blogspot.com

... and all the fixin's ...

11/27/2019

Sarah Joseph Hale, (1788 - 1879), author of Mary Had A Little Lamb, is the acclaimed Godmother of Thanksgiving. She worked tirelessly to make sure that Thanksgiving was recognized as a national holiday.

In fact, the entire layout of our annual feast is modeled on her accounts of early New England celebrations, which emphasized a roast turkey. In 1863, Abraham Lincoln declared it a national holiday.

                         Thank you, Sarah Joseph Hale!

                                             \(^0^)/

                          That said, I wish you all a very

                               Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Image: https://www.thefreshmarket.com/

Caged Heart: the flavor of my poetry ...

11/23/2019

Some time ago, I wrote a post about my friend, Friday Elliott, who is gifted with Synesthesia, which is a perceptual phenomenon in which the stimulation of one sense causes the automatic experience of another sense.

In Friday’s case, she is blessed with “Lexical-gustatory synesthesia , a rare form of synesthesia in which spoken and written language causes individuals to experience an automatic and highly consistent taste/smell response.” Wikipedia

So, I sent Friday a copy of my book, A Compilation Of Echoes, and asked if she would create a tea blend based on her experience of reading it. What she created is a delightful blend which she titled, Caged Heart.

The taste of this tea blend is bright yet subtly complex with an underlying cozy depth, with hints of honey and butter. It also has an amber hue reminiscent of the low-lit windows in my poem, Johnny's Tavern.

Previous to this, Friday had read the first novel in Emily Thompson’s adventure series, titled Clockwork Twist, and subsequently created the Clockmaker Tea blend. This blend tasted exactly like the tea that Emily’s protagonist, Twist, would drink.

I am ever so happy to announce the Caged Heart tea blend as a companion beverage to my poetry. To purchase this tea blend, click here, or request it by name on her website: Friday Afternoon Tea.

Enjoy!

Image: Janice T

Poetry ... and a well-aged cheese ...

10/31/2019

According to Helen Hayes MacArthur, the American actress whose career spanned eighty years, “Age is not important unless you're a cheese.” She was an exceptional lady who aged very well.

This brings to mind the French term, à point, which refers to that precious moment when a cheese is sitting at the perfect point between fully ripening and spoiling. So too, with composing poetry.

It is not always easy for me to determine whether a poem I’m writing is underdone, done, or overdone. It might need time to breath: to mellow a bit with age, or to needle me about its incompleteness.

Sometimes I become impatient with a poem and just want to be finished with it. I’ll wonder why the flow was uneven, and the last few lines awkward, as if my muse, like gears, isn’t totally engaged.

But I’ll declare it done and prepare to move on ... until I share it. My family is very well versed (pun intended) in my work, and they can recognize when I’ve become carelessly lazy with a poem.

They’ll say “You’re not done with this one,” and I’ll skulk back to my writing desk in a peevish mood, grumbling to myself, “Yeah, I knew that.” The difficulty then lies in refraining from forcing it to work.

And then there are those poems which effortlessly roll out of my pen and onto the page like a satisfied sigh, requiring only modest tweaks here and there. That’s when I suspect that I’m taking dictation from my muse.

To be fair, my capacity to write what I write has been a decades long process of learning, of refining, and of maturing in my craft, yet even now I am still learning to assess whether a poem is à point.

Image: discoverfrance.com

Up and running now ...

10/2/2019

Some phrases appear to be lost somewhere in the bleak back alleys of etymology. The phrase, “up and running,” seems to be utterly untraceable, aside from an association with machinery that is running optimally.

At the moment, following decades of moderate isolation, my poetry sphere seems to be running at a nice click. I am now getting tangible feedback on my work, and I’ve become more involved in poetry circles.

Residing, as I am, in a relatively small community is a huge help in this, and there are myriad poets here who share my passion. Moderating a small monthly poetry circle in a cozy cafe isn’t hurting, either.

The huge lucrative conventions, of which I have attended many at my author table, are either no longer available to me or are too far away. Instead, I am signing and selling my poetry books locally.

A few bookshops, libraries, and cafes now carry my work, minus the table fees, hotel costs, and other traveling expenses of those bygone conventions, and the heady frenetic pace of selling has calmed down.

Here, poets are invited to post their work in poetry boxes: window boxes that have been mounted on the exterior walls of local merchant shops so that someone walking by can chance to read a poem.

A local newspaper has asked for Autumn poems for their upcoming edition. An annual author fair welcomes writers of all ilks to sign and sell their books in a nearby hotel. These days, I am pleasantly busy.

Reading my poetry, along with other poets, from a podium in a comfy library setting was a gentle affair, as I imagine will be the case at the Fiber Festival next month. So many invitations in such a short time.

It’s been easier here to find a community of readers and writers who appreciate the written word. After more than 50 years my poetry sphere is finally up and running, and I am loving this small town feel.

Image: worldarchitecture.org

The inspiration of tethers ...

9/5/2019

Occasional dry spells befall me, but I think I’m learning to take them in stride. The term “take in stride” is an idiom which alluded to a horse clearing an obstacle without checking its stride. (1900).

A few weeks ago, our local skies were adorned with colors and motion when the local kite festival drew hundreds of kite fliers from a wide area. This proved to be just the motivation I needed to write.

My muse woke from its slumber and I began to compose a poem. It was exhilarating to finally be writing again! Words began to tumble onto the page: an edit here and there as I went and it was done.

Initially, I had no idea where the piece was going, which is very often the case. I find the greatest joy in these journeys with my muse, and I, too, get to discover things unanticipated along the way.

With that in mind, I give you Tethers:

Tethers
I stole upon a lusty wind
To gain the Summer sky.
A slender tail
Sustained me well
As I began to climb.

Uplifted to fantastic heights
Yet higher still I sought
But, lo, my frame
Could nothing gain
No matter how I fought.

For from below the tether bold,
A simple length of string,
Restrains my urge
And every surge
Else I would wander free.

A snap and I am reeling hard,
Convulsively I spin.
Untethered I
Am wielded by
A juggernaut of wind.

Oh would that I were tethered now,
Complicit with the breeze.
It's where I ought
To be and not
Entangled in these trees.

Image: baileygillespie.com