Writing Up A Storm

 

 Over the last four days, our power has gone out three times. The first two times it was out for over twelve hours. My Beloved rushed to put our frozen food in a cooler on the front porch. Since the temperature never rose above 20 degrees, we were safe. Our second stove, unlike the ’36 Chambers that came with Casa Diva, has a safety feature that prevents even attentive pioneers like ourselves from lighting the oven for heat. I put simmering pots of water on the burners for moisture and some warmth.

On the first day the ice storm was still in full swing, and there was no way we could have even walked up the block. A small house, we managed to keep ourselves warm by bundling up, I in my fancy plush robe that is far too bulky with its faux fur collar and cuffs to wear in anything but a dire emergency, and my Beloved in the sturdy Land’s End plaid wrapper that he has deserved and finally acquired. I read the second of L. Frank Baum’s fourteen Oz books in the span of a few hours. My Beloved began a long-postponed handcrafted clock project. We cooked something on the stovetop and just as we began to converse face to face on the couch, I heard the furnace kick on, and we were saved from ourselves.

One imagines as a writer that all they need is long stretches of undisturbed time to complete their magnum opus. Just a few brief weeks is all it would take to put all those notions into some semblance of order and suddenly Random House would be sending a limo. Soon after that, the Pulitzer people would be texting nonstop. But I know my Muse is not so predictable, not so easily appeased by a few odd hours of available time to allow my creative ambitions come to fruition.

The more aware of mortal limitations and requirements I become, the more anxiety is produced by a storm such as this. This will be one for the record books—the massive outages, the consistent low temperatures that kept the ice from fully thawing until Day Two, the ice itself thick and heavy on branches, beautiful to some. Not to me. All I could see was terror, that temporary deadliness ice and snow manifest. Summer’s lease, short as it may be, is still long enough for us to forget the winter’s struggles, long for the coolness and pretty blankets of white.

Trees too old finally to bear the excessive weight on their bare branches broke, and broke in vast numbers across our county. Lines were torn from houses, old utility poles were split in two. Tho my time was technically free and available, writing or even editing was the last thing my mind was capable of. I cleaned, napped, sorted piles that had been sitting dormant for months. Everything but something creative. Crochet hooks laid still. Mod Podge tightly capped. Only yoga, my new commitment, remained, and even then I skipped one day, one bit of ease for a troubled mind.

When I write, it’s on the sly. This has been my habit since high school. Even advanced English courses bored me, but allowed me mostly quiet time at a desk where I could compose to my heart’s content. I have tried to train myself to hit the desk first thing in the morning, before my mind has been cluttered with the day’s detritus. Many days this desk time only adds to an extended day of sitting, since my work also involves sitting. Once in a while, I’ll be able to decipher some notes I’ve hastily scribbled on a scrap the night before, or find the original thread of inspiration that caused me to jot a word or two down weeks before.

However, poems will come when I least expect them, the best poems anyway. A word or phrase will stick in my ear, and my mind will begin to run with the lines even before I put pen to paper. And yes, I could have written something on that first outage day because mainly I compose on a legal pad with a basic Bic. But it was not there. I spend the weekend proving to myself how clever I could be in a crisis. How resourceful to wash dishes with plenty of soap, rinse them with water boiled in the kettle. How smart we were to convert a woolen quilt batting into the filling for a duvet cover that keeps us warm in any weather.

Reading that second Oz book tho will doubtless come in handy one of these days. I can’t say Baum was the best children’s author ever. Knowing how hard he worked to expand his stories to stage and film somewhat takes the sheen of charm off even the cleverest of plots. But step back further, and the scope of his creation, the world somewhere beyond but not quite ours, is impressive. I have all fourteen of Baum’s Oz books, the only ones I intend to bother with after the dozens that came after his death. I will finish them this year, in neat Barnes & Noble reissue volumes suitable for bedside consumption. And indeed, they were intended to be tales read at bedtime. My sleep has been consistent but a bit shallow lately. If the CBD gummies don’t help, perhaps an adventure with Dorothy and Tik-Tok just might.

 

(photo c. Tom Romeo, tomromeo.com)

What the Heck? Worth a Shot- Dodge Reader Application

For regular readers, it may come as a bit of a shock, but I am in the process of applying to read at the 2020 edition of the Dodge Poetry Festival. I’ll wait for you to pick yourself up off the floor, tip your lower jaw back up to close your gaping mouth. But, wait. Let me explain…

In the last few months, I’ve been trying to seriously up my poetry game. I’m putting myself out there as much as work and life allows. I’ve read in a few places that are totally new to me, to people that are new to me as well. I’m sending work out a little more, and get things published at a higher rate, fulfilling my own theory that there is someplace for every poem you write. I’m even helping out an old friend by acting as Poetry Editor until the end of the year. Well, that last thing isn’t really a burden, so much as offering me the concentrated pleasure of saying ‘no’ repeatedly to 90% of the dreck that comes in for consideration. I know what I like, and I know what’s worth the space at this point.

In any case, as I was surfing the Almighty Internet the other day, I stumbled upon a link to the Dodge Festival, coming up in autumn of next year. Not just a link to the festival itself, but a link leading to the details of the application process to actually be a featured reader. In all these years I’d never considered myself worthy, and even now, I know that the Big Guns of Academia will be chosen before me. However, as I considered all the moving parts required, I realized that it would be a relatively simple thing to pull them together. I could manage to do a bit each day, between calls or before work itself. I certainly had freshly revised poems hanging around—there’s a book deal in the works that I will discuss when things are more definite. For now though, let’s say picking out twenty pages of what I feel is my strongest, most crowd-pleasing work was a relatively painless process.

A Poetry CV, or “Curriculum Vitae,” more commonly found in the world of arts & literature than a resume’ also existed in my files in a rough form. I pared it down to the most impressive credits so that it would all fit on two pages. In the process I brought my records regarding publication up to date. So, ultimately, when I get that letter of “thanks-no-thanks,” the whole endeavor will have been at least an opportunity to bring everything here at Casa Diva up to date.

Now, I have been a pretty vocal critic of the Dodge’s current incarnation. I understand the Foundation has gone through some hard times, and partnering with the City of Newark was the only way to have any kind of festival at all. I am sad that I’ll never wander the hallowed grounds of Waterloo Village, stopping at the mill to hear Lucille Clifton, or rising at dawn to hear Coleman Barks recite Rumi in the early mist. I tried Newark, and it was a different festival. No wandering from tent to tent, no easy forest charm. But, if it was the only way, I have to give credit for ingenuity where credit is due.

And instead of the Big Tent, dancing with colored lights, there is NJPAC. A shining chandelier hangs from the ceiling, modern and classical all at once, and its charm, in all my disgruntled fussing, did not escape me. However, I needed a break. Life was calling, love on a full-time basis was in the offing, and the Dodge fell low on my list of priorities. Now, some of my favorite poets have passed both big names and small town heroes. In fact, like a river we all swim in, the flow carries more and more away each year. I don’t like to think of myself as a time-waster, but so often that’s what I’ve done. I’ve had my rest. What time is left is for passions and delights, blessed by a sudden clarity of thought that can only be described as a star burst not unlike that sun inside NJPAC. I want to see where this poetry life will take me. One of those directions might be south, to Newark. And even if in the likely event my application is rejected, I may still give the Dodge another try. Time, after all, doesn’t last forever.   

**2012: Year of the Chapbooks!**

            2011 ended on something of a downbeat. In October, I was "let go" from my job as manager at the Inquiring Minds Bookstore in Saugerties. This was not a surprise, and I should have been preparing for it long before it happened. And it’s not without a little satisfaction that I now learn that I was replaced by a part-time manager! Onward and upward!

            Eligible for unemployment, I have spent a good portion of the last three months organizing my life. After last summer's horrific storms, I was inspired to begin tackling the piles of goods I have managed to store up in the basement of Casa Diva in the ten years I've been here, and the five my boyfriend has spent here as well. Consolidation, charity, out in the trash-- all options have been exercised. I don't ever want to move as much stuff as I did when I moved in here. The thing is, this house was the first place I was able to have all my possessions in at one time since I lived with my parents. It is time to let go of so much.

            I have also used the time to put together a couple of chapbooks, mainly from existing work, and I'm pleased to announce that I have TWO chapbooks scheduled for publication in 2012. In December, I put together a small chaplet through my own Flying Monkey Press as well. "Coast to Coast" is only $3, and believe me when I say quantities are limited. I'm not trying to be cute; only sixteen of them came out well enough to sell!! The chaplet is an homage to a special person who inspired a number of poems over the years, and although not enough to qualify as a full blown chapbook, I felt I wanted to get what work I had regarding this person out there, and in some kind of collected form.

            I sent a manuscript titled, "My Minnesota Boyhood" to Finishing Line Press back in February for their New Women’s Voices contest and heard nothing about the outcome until just a few days ago. An email informed me that the book had been accepted for publication, outside of the contest. Attached was their standard contract, requiring a presale of fifty-five copies for the minimum press run. Although satisfied that my work was in fact acceptable, I was somewhat annoyed at their total lack of communication beforehand. I had to keep checking their website to find out when a winner had been declared in the contest. In this age of email, I don't see any excuse for not sending a quick note to contestants.

            My friend Guy Reed had a book published by Finishing Line last year, and neither of us was altogether thrilled with the experience. Strange delays, oddly impersonal, form-type emails-- one had to wonder if his manuscript had been read at all. The final product was very nice, though in my opinion a bit overpriced at $12 for a stapled binding, but the content is of course excellent. I highly recommend "The Effort to Hold Light," and it's available through either Finishing Line or Amazon.

            In the meantime, I offered the same manuscript to Dayl Wise at Post Traumatic Press, based in Woodstock, NY. He had already put two months work into the book when I got the email from Finishing Line. He thought I was crazy to turn them down, I supposed because in some circles they might qualify as a "real" publisher. Dayl's press, started to in part provide a forum for the writings of military veterans, is as real as it gets. If I was to receive some sort of cash prize, I would have had second thoughts (see above). But all things being equal, I will continue to "dance with them that brung me," and "My Minnesota Boyhood" will be coming out in the next couple of months.

            A second manuscript, this one a collection of poems inspired by the city of Albany, NY and my experiences there over the last twenty-plus years, is in the works. Dan Wilcox is the proprietor at APD Press in Albany, and a longtime friend. He puts out few chapbooks these days, what with demonstrating and reigning as the Capitol District's Old Beatnik of Letters, but what he does do is carefully selected work. I am honored that he's accepted my work. I think we might be looking at fall for this one, and it's as yet untitled, but I will keep you posted on its whereabouts. 

            In the meantime, I'm writing, revising, and oh yeah, looking for a day job. I in no way believe that I'll be able to earn a living as a poet, and frankly, this gives me the freedom to write what I like, instead of what others assign to me. Better for my art, better for my mental health. Pass along any leads on work, and let me know if anything sounds interesting... anything, really!! It's been too long and I have no excuses for getting at least one update a month up here. Mea Culpa, as the overeducated say.

            Happy 2012!!