In my last blog, I wrote about the books and poems that inspired various writers as included in Light the Dark: Writers on Creativity, Inspiration, and the Artistic Process edited by Joe Fassler. If I was asked to say what book, piece of writing, or poem inspired me, changed my life in some way, I couldn’t name just one. But I could say I was inspired by solitude.

In my grandparents’ garden, I created a world for myself. I knew nothing about Emily Dickinson’s Sabbath created by staying at home or W. B. Yeats’ “I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree.” I did know about the Bible, Reader’s Digest Condensed Books and a periodical called The Upper Room.

I had my own collection of books, most of them given to me by my Great Aunt Cec. I liked to display them as if I were a school librarian or a teacher with my dolls as pupils.

Outside, I would set up a house under the plum trees or a store behind the back porch where I’d sell discarded boxes and tins to invisible customers. I was content with the ordinary.

I was free to create my own imagined scenarios. There was such a freedom in that and while I didn’t write poetry in those early days, I learned to love the expansiveness of time when nothing really happened.

Many of my poems now go back to that place and time at my grandparents’ home where Grandpa tended to the vegetable patch and Grandma made sugar cookies in the woodstove.
Poems shine a light on individual moments – the hollyhocks at the side of the house, the pink peonies tied up with string by the front porch.

There are gifts in remembering and there’s a gift of discovery long after the event as a poem has something to tell us. I’m referring to the writing of a poem and there’s also the gift of reading a poem. A favourite by Mary Oliver comes to mind. Here’s an excerpt from “The Journey”:

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice —
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
. . . .
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,

In the last six-week Writing Life women’s writing circle, I passed around sheets of paper with the names of objects on them: A Box, a Rocking Chair, a Notebook of Recipes, A Folder of Menus, a Suitcase and a Large Metal Trunk. Here are a couple of those poems which we created by each adding a line as we passed the papers around. We didn’t concern ourselves with telling a story or needing a line to go with what came before. I really love the spontaneous results from our memories and imaginations.

Although there are images here, we didn’t have images to prompt our writing.

A Suitcase

falls over, spilling open with colourful abandon,
brand new, bright turquoise, its hard sides ready
to protect everything I need for weeks,
empty but for a letter from you,
the words at once harsh and kind,
the way unrequited love always finds me.
The airline label attached says April 1973.
If I have to leave suddenly, it’s the suitcase I’ll take.

A Large Metal Trunk

My mother’s gowns and dresses from her youth,
used as dress-up clothes,
stashed under the bed,
out of sight
far from thought.
The blue one has gone to Scotland and back.
Scent of lilac,
a water stain from the spring flood of ’41 highlights a faded name.
One black metal trunk from Hurare via Cape Town and London
filled with costumes for Halloween.

The poets are:

Antoinette Spoor,
Carol Pelletier,
Carolyn Stuart,
MJ Burrows,
Mary Ann Moore, and
Rebecca Garber.

Rebecca Garber will be launching her chapbook of poetry, Like a Pearl, on Saturday, April 21st at 2 p.m. at Hope Lutheran Church, 2174 Departure Bay Road, in Nanaimo. I’ll be reading a couple of poems as part of the celebration and pianist Cheryl Tastad Satre will be providing the music. The $10 admission includes a copy of the book and light refreshments. All proceeds will go to PEN International which promotes literature and defends freedom of expression around the world. I feel very honoured to be considered Rebecca’s mentor and congratulate her on her first book of poetry launched during National Poetry Month. It’s been a pleasure to have her in the Writing Life women’s writing circle for several years and have her take part in my mentoring program: Writing Home: A Whole Life Practice.

Rebecca and I share a love for all things Frida Kahlo so I’ll mention her here especially as the items listed above as prompts for our poetry writing in the circle were from Finding Frida Kahlo by Barbara Levine with Stephen Jaycox (Princeton Architectural Press, 2009). The sub-title is Diaries, Letters, Recipes, Notes, Sketches, Stuffed Birds, and Other Newly Discovered Keepsakes. Now it’s your turn. Pick one and write.