A dear writing teacher/friend of mine hosts silent writing for an hour, 3 times a week. I almost never miss spending that quiet, sacred hour at my desk, doing some kind of writing 'work'. Once, when I was just too ... well, too tired or too sick ... to write, I spent the hour reading. It a multiple-times-a-week reinforcement of how much the writing matters. Sometimes there are two of us sitting at the table, sometimes three or more. Occasionally it will be one of us, intentionally holding space for the others.
To me, the table is a place with other versions of me who want to know the poet even if they aren't poets themselves, and not just a separate space next to the others. In other words, bringing my poet-self to the table is about interaction, inspiration, and incorporation. Does analyst-me or mother-me want to know poet-me, and invite poetry to their tables, their lives? I suspect I've treated my poet-self how I fear others will treat the poet they don't yet know or understand.
Thank you for bringing us into community around poetry. I recognize my own experiences in this essay. The matters you've considered are all vital to our lives as poets. So good for heart and mind. Really, I'm celebrating this letter.
I 100% agree with this, and it's wonderful that you've outlined a feeling I bet many of us share.
It happened to me about a month ago, as I was listening in on a Zoom meeting our CTO talk eagerly about marketing strategies that I thought, "I have no language for the field I'm in." Not only that, I have no desire for it. I let lines of poetry rattle around my head all day. It makes me feel a stranger. Still, I'd rather not dwell on my differences, since doing so will either make me feel an imposter or sanctimonious. The best I can gather is that I'd rather have lines of poetry than boardroom fatigue. So I'll just keep writing.
I can so so relate to this Radha! Deep gratitude to you for sharing. I spent over 15 years in the corporate world in a very go-go-go environment...management consultant, road warrior for at least 4 days every week, coast to coast red-eye flights, life out of a suitcase, airport lobbies and hotels...I was like George Clooney in Up in The Air...I knew all about the autopilot walk through airport security! What and who I didn't know was the poet, the creator inside me. The world (including my dearest and closest!) didn't know her either. My degree was an MBA and they don't honor verses in business school. Yet for all my outward material success (and all that I owe it), I felt bereft inside. I can so relate to that feeling you describe, of sitting in board rooms but never belonging. I would spend 10-12 hours a day in my cold steel and glass confinement while my heart would just yearn to fly out into the wilderness that my soul craved...
And here I am now :) Fumbling...still trying to find my path...get a foothold...but finally Free!
A dear writing teacher/friend of mine hosts silent writing for an hour, 3 times a week. I almost never miss spending that quiet, sacred hour at my desk, doing some kind of writing 'work'. Once, when I was just too ... well, too tired or too sick ... to write, I spent the hour reading. It a multiple-times-a-week reinforcement of how much the writing matters. Sometimes there are two of us sitting at the table, sometimes three or more. Occasionally it will be one of us, intentionally holding space for the others.
To me, the table is a place with other versions of me who want to know the poet even if they aren't poets themselves, and not just a separate space next to the others. In other words, bringing my poet-self to the table is about interaction, inspiration, and incorporation. Does analyst-me or mother-me want to know poet-me, and invite poetry to their tables, their lives? I suspect I've treated my poet-self how I fear others will treat the poet they don't yet know or understand.
Dear Radha,
Thank you for bringing us into community around poetry. I recognize my own experiences in this essay. The matters you've considered are all vital to our lives as poets. So good for heart and mind. Really, I'm celebrating this letter.
I 100% agree with this, and it's wonderful that you've outlined a feeling I bet many of us share.
It happened to me about a month ago, as I was listening in on a Zoom meeting our CTO talk eagerly about marketing strategies that I thought, "I have no language for the field I'm in." Not only that, I have no desire for it. I let lines of poetry rattle around my head all day. It makes me feel a stranger. Still, I'd rather not dwell on my differences, since doing so will either make me feel an imposter or sanctimonious. The best I can gather is that I'd rather have lines of poetry than boardroom fatigue. So I'll just keep writing.
I can so so relate to this Radha! Deep gratitude to you for sharing. I spent over 15 years in the corporate world in a very go-go-go environment...management consultant, road warrior for at least 4 days every week, coast to coast red-eye flights, life out of a suitcase, airport lobbies and hotels...I was like George Clooney in Up in The Air...I knew all about the autopilot walk through airport security! What and who I didn't know was the poet, the creator inside me. The world (including my dearest and closest!) didn't know her either. My degree was an MBA and they don't honor verses in business school. Yet for all my outward material success (and all that I owe it), I felt bereft inside. I can so relate to that feeling you describe, of sitting in board rooms but never belonging. I would spend 10-12 hours a day in my cold steel and glass confinement while my heart would just yearn to fly out into the wilderness that my soul craved...
And here I am now :) Fumbling...still trying to find my path...get a foothold...but finally Free!
Thanks again for sharing...
Even though Shakespeare himself may not have been
Shakespeare, and even though whoever he was
would not become “William Shakespeare” for some time,
if you write poetry in America
you’d better be damn sure you’re William Shakespeare
before you write a word. Otherwise, shut up.
If you still insist on writing poetry,
keep it to yourself, which is easy to do
in America. But here’s an idea.
Why not be a translator of poetry?
That way, you’ll always have someone else to blame.