It was an Apple Betty Kind of Sunday

 

The cooler weather, the fall leaves, I don’t know it was just calling me. Besides I bought some Honey Crisp Apples yesterday at Target… it just seemed the right thing to do. I got no complaints.

It has been dark here all day. We had thunder earlier that sounded like war planes had hit the field by us. Was very unnerving to the dogs.

 

I was thinking yesterday and this morning both about what seems to be a difference of late on how distraction affects me when writing. For the longest time I never seemed bothered by conversation in the same room. Television, or any excessive movement around me, I just took in stride and kept on writing. This has however become increasingly annoying to me and I’m not sure why.

It could be that I am trying to be more attentive to what people around me are saying. However this would not explain why the TV was not annoying to me before when I wrote but can be not at times. There definitely seems something has changed; but what? Before this mysterious development, I always prided myself in the fact that I could pull out my journal and pen and write anywhere, anytime. I just know some smartass out there is thinking I’m going through the writers change in life.

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Robert Pinsky at Midwest Poet Series

The Midwest Poet Series has hosted some wonderful poets over the years and yet last nights reading by Robert Pinsky is a standout among the many readings I’ve witnessed there myself. This is my first personal encounter with Pinsky, who by the way turned 69 this week and doesn’t look it.

His reading or let me call it an interaction with the audience was a lot different then most poetry readings in that he was very laid back and mingled stories with his poems and mid way through took questions and requests for poems to read. Yes, requests. This was particularly impressive because it implied on one hand, that he was confident there would be people in the audience well enough read on Pinsky, that they would have poems in mind that they wanted to hear; and that he would be able to produce those poems from his volumes of work quickly without fumbling through said work. It went perfect!

According to Pinsky, he would be a musician rather than a poet were it not for one thing; his lack of talent. Still, he is more than a casual musician and his love is the Sax is evident. I think the lyrical aspect of his poetry suggests that he is very tuned into sound.

Another strong component of his writing is the way he threads history through his poetry. He suggests that he writes for the dead, and quotes a mantra, “We do not worship our ancestors, we consult them.” He is big on the past, big on culture and the mingling of them together.

His presence is on of reassurance. He’s a very peaceful man. Even when he talked of his anger of the things he saw during the Bush years, he was even tempered and never raised his voice, but you knew he was indignant.

A few of the poems he read, Poem of Disconnected Parts, Shirt and The Night Game.

Poem of Disconnected Parts is such a terrific example of his pull of history and culture together to inform his poetics. Shirt is such a moving poem. Again history meets the art of poetry.

It’s no wonder Pinsky was Poet Laureate for three years- he is the perfect ambassador for the art. After a brilliant reading, he was most humble to the audience as he left the stage. You felt it was he, who was honored to be in our presence.


Hear and Read Shirt

Read Poem of Disconnected Parts

Idle Hands...

Finish this sentence: Idle hands are ___________. Did you answer the devil’s tools or devil’s plaything?

How long can you sit with idle hands? Do you ever? Is this how you start to write?

In the most recent issue of Poets and Writers magazine there is an article about a writer who talks about stillness as he writes. “I’m very tolerant of stillness. I don’t mind sitting there for half an hour. I’d rather not move my hands just to move them; I’ll wait for the right thing.” Jonathan Lethem is a novelist not a poet, but his approach to initiating work on a page is maybe not a bad one even for poets. I sometimes will start with a line of something that comes to me. Maybe two or three different lines till something I feel something take hold. But when I think about my blog post on Monday and the Anne Sexton quote that I committed to thinking about all this week I’m thinking a lot more about the idle hands approach. The wisdom in the Sexton quote suggests listening hard. “Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard,” Sexton says.

It’s easy when you have a routine that says your take thirty minutes and write that you want to start writing as you sit down. The clock is on. Go! Such routine can probably create bad habits just as well as it can create good ones. But just as silence can be useful on a page, maybe it’s not a bad place to start to center yourself / your writing. In “The Artists’ Way” I think the morning pages are meant to drain out of your system all the residual sludge that can otherwise stain your work if you can’t get your mind off it. So maybe to start with, we should pause. A nice pregnant pause of sorts and then begin to create on the page as something surfaces.

Thought for the Week from Sexton

I saw where Cecilia Woloch celebrated the launch of her new collection of poetry titled Carpathia on Sunday.  I’ve read Woloch’s book Late which was outstanding and will be interested to read Carpathia at some point and see how it compares. If anyone gets an opportunity to read it soon, I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Robert Pinsky is in town Thursday for the Mid-West Poet’s series at Rockhurst University. I’ve got his reading on my calendar and looking forward to it.
Thought for the week from Annie Sexton - “Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard.”

Calling it a night – or whatever

Is the weekend coming to an end? Where did it go. I’m not rejuvenated yet.  As my wife would say, if I go to sleep morning will come and another day (workday)… sigh!

I did get a new rough draft of a poem together today. Read some Sexton… it (she) was speaking to me.

Submission -  yes I forced myself to get one out tonight. 

Squeezed in an Open Mic. I didn’t read tonight, just wanted to be a listener. A critical ear.

My daughter texted me yesterday to tell me she saw Where the Wild Things Are. I was so jealous.  Loved this book!  The movie looks really good.

The winner is...

I’m excited for Kelli Agodon - winner of the White Pine Poetry Book Prize! The judge for this year was Carl Dennis, poet who wrote Practical Gods, which won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 2002.




Kelli’s winning manuscript Letters from the Emily Dickinson Room will be published in fall 2010.  Her book Small Knots, published 2004 is already among my favorite poetry books. I can't wait to read Letters. Congratulations Kelli!

Tides

There is a real tidal wave that has come over me and is pulling me back into the sea of writing. I feel I need to write to stay afloat.