The Mystery of Trees

The woods behind the fields are guarded by a crumbling stone wall and a maze of pricker bushes with thorns an inch long.  It takes a bit of maneuvering to navigate a path, and it’s quite difficult to do with a dog who insists on following you on your adventure.  Still, we eventually made it through into the trees’ shadow-filled world.

They instantly reminded me of a favorite book from my younger years, The Lost Years of Merlin, and how the trees have their own language.  The wind moaning, branches creaking and shifting…it isn’t hard to imagine them speaking to each other, wondering what intruder has entered their canopy of twisting vines and groping roots.

Poetry Exercise: Word-Substitution Poem

Exercise taken from Creating Poetry by John Drury.  Page 26, exercise 2:

Choose a poem that interests you.  Using a fresh sheet of paper, write down new words to replace each word of your model.  Substitute your own words for those of the other poem, making sure you keep the same arrangements of parts of speech.  That is, substitute nouns for nouns, verbs for verbs, and so on.  You can write down opposites or antonyms if you like (“hot” for “cold”), but don’t feel restricted by that possibility.  The idea is to keep the other poet’s syntax (or arrangement of words) while providing your own building materials, your own vocabulary.

“A Dream of Jealousy” by Seamus Heaney

Walking with you and another lady

In a wooded parkland, the whispering grass

Ran its fingers through our guessing silence

And the trees opened into a shady

Unexpected clearing where we sat down.

We talking about desire and being jealous,

Our conversation a loose single gown

Or a white picnic tablecloth spread out

Like a book of manners in the wilderness.

‘Show me,’ I said to our companion, ‘what

I have much coveted, your breast’s mauve star.’

And she consented.  Oh neither these verses

Nor my prudence, love, can heal your wounded stare.

Model

Skating with you and only you

under hushed snow, the fallen flakes

rested their bodies on our woolen caps

and the clouds turned into a misty

hollowed sky when we looked up.

I think the grayness of the day excited us.

We laughed over ice and being cold,

our voices a warm smoky apparition

or a lost baleful spirit held out

like a flag of white in the breeze.

‘Tell me,’ I said to your cheek, ‘what

I have often wondered, your heart’s true want.’

And you answered.  Oh, neither this frost

nor your pretense, love, can hide your empty gaze.

What I think:

This exercise helped me think about word placement and parts of speech–I couldn’t just choose anything and hope it made sense.  They had to match the ones in Heaney’s poem.  It’s a good exercise for writers who tend to just throw words together rather than stop and think “Why am I choosing this word?  Does it establish the meaning I’m trying to get across?”  It definitely took more patience than free-writing.

That being said, I adore Seamus Heaney’s poetry, and I don’t feel my exercise could even stand in the shadow of his work…but the point was to try and emulate a good writer’s work, which can only lead to better writing for me.  Eventually 🙂

The Hobbit, with illustrations by Alan Lee

A couple days ago I received my newest copy of The Hobbit, which I purchased off Amazon.com.  Amazon is a dangerous site for me to peruse, as there is always a book I want to buy…anyway, I say “newest” copy because this is the fourth version I own.  I also have: The Annotated Hobbit, annotated by Douglas A. Anderson, the 1966 edition with its original cover and artwork by Tolkien, and a Houghton Mifflin paperback copy that goes with a Lord of the Rings box set.  (By the way, I do not suggest buying the Mifflin paperback copy because it has an unnerving amount of typos.  Usually I’m happy with Mifflin’s editions, but not this time).

The Hobbit I just received was published in 1997 and is a handsome hardcover with illustrations by Alan Lee.  I have to say, this is a beautiful edition to buy if you would like to own multiple copies of The Hobbit.  I’ve been a fan of Alan Lee’s artwork since I purchased his Lord of the Rings Sketchbook years ago, and when I found out he’d illustrated The Hobbit, I decided to give it a go.  I’m not disappointed.

I know, nothing can ever replace Tolkien’s own artwork in the original edition.  But take a look at Lee’s Gollum:

Note: Colors have been changed a bit to make the picture clearer

Tell me he is not creepy.  Though not as creepy as Gollum from the 1977 animated The Hobbit.  That gave me nightmares as a child.

Anyway, I admire Lee’s art because it has a roughness to it–it isn’t all perfect lines or extremely bold colors.  It has that fairytale quality that I love.  And in this edition, there are plenty of pictures to illustrate the scenes.  Not so many that it feels like you’re just looking at pictures all of the time, but enough to make you happy to see the work come alive while you read.  My one complaint is that there’s no picture of Beorn, whom I love, but alas…you can’t have everything.

I haven’t completely read through this edition, yet, so I don’t know if there are typos…I’m really hoping there aren’t, because it’s so beautiful 🙂

Are there any books of which you own multiple copies?

The Problem with Poetry

Note:  I am not a published poet, though hopefully I will be, someday.  These are just my thoughts on what good poetry is and what it should not be.

Okay.  I took a poetry writing class in college with Dr. David Craig–quite a brilliant man, by the way, and hilarious– and I learned something.  (Surprise!)

Poetry is work, damn it.  You cannot just throw words together and call them a poem, which is what many people do (and I used to do).  This:

My heart

is bleeding at your feet

and I cannot

breathe.

Life.

Death.

Hopelessness.

By:  Hopefully nobody.

Is not a poem.  It is a cliché image scattered over an open space.  I am guilty of doing this (though not to the degree of the above example).  So are many beginning poets, I think.  And there’s nothing wrong with starting somewhere.  An excellent poem may come from an exercise where you just write random words and images.  But that initial rambling should not be your final work.

While taking the poetry class, I had to revise each poem at least seven times for my final.  And let me tell you, they had changed a lot by the time those revisions were done.  There were times I would go to revise a poem and think:  “How can I possibly revise this masterpiece?  It’s perfection!  I’m frickin’ T.S. Eliot!”

Dr. Craig would then kindly stick a pin in my ego, and I would quite rapidly deflate and scuttle back to my keyboard.

So what is the problem with poetry?  People think it’s easy.  They think it’s just jotting down haphazard thoughts and cutting them to pieces to form shorter lines and stanzas.  But it’s so much more than that.  It’s dissecting those words and trying to figure out what you’re really trying to say, then completely changing everything.  Over and over again.  Sometimes you may not need many revisions, but most of the time the poem will unrecognizable from what it began as.

And that, my friend, is a good thing.

The Backyard

I spent a lot of time outside, today.  The weather was so beautiful that it would have been rather stupid not to do so, since I had the time.  After I got out of work at 3, I took my new camera and went for a walk in the yard, my dog trailing me (or running ahead of me), everywhere.

February 1st and 50 degrees.  There was some wind, but the chill had a nice brisk feel rather than going deep to the bone.  And the earth was moist with the scent of spring, which always tugs at my heart because of the memories attached to that smell.  They say that smell is the sense most attached to memory.

The wind's chill in the chimes

There are fields behind my house that are still used for hay in the summer months, but in the winter they take on a dead feel–there are the bare trees in the distance, and at night you can see the lights of town way off on the horizon.  I like the emptiness there more than I would like to see houses constructed and plopped down like gravestones, littered everywhere.  That’s what has happened on the rest of my road:  fields turned into driveways and huge houses nobody can afford to buy.

The trees stand between two fields

There are also woods that sit next to the field, and that’s where I spent much of my childhood.  There is a  barn that has since been rebuilt; it used to be all peeling red paint and shattered windows, with a door that hung off its hinges.  Now the only sign of what it used to be is the broken glass all around the perimeter and the silo’s foundation that sits empty.  We never owned the barn–the man who sold us our house still owns it and uses it to store lumber.  He also owns the fields behind the house and promises nobody will ever build on it; he would hate to see the last beautiful land on the road be destroyed by construction.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And then there is the garden.  My parents have worked extremely hard to turn the yard into a place of relaxation.  Though many of the lawn ornaments have been brought inside for the winter, there are still a few scattered in the dead grass.  My favorites are a tiny toad house and a wand that catches the sun.

The toad house

I’ve never seen a toad in that house, but I like to imagine one coming along to find it, one day.  Some people say you become too old to believe in magic, but gardens always make me think about silly “impossibilities” like talking toads and tiny people hiding in the grass.

A crystal wand

 

 

 

 

 

I know I’m very lucky to be able to step into my backyard and see beauty everyday.  Unfortunately, I too often grow bored with the scenery because I don’t look close enough.  Today I made myself look closer and am very happy with what I found.  I think a lot of us forget to look at the world with new eyes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Blink your eyes, and the world you see next did not exist when you closed them […] the only appropriate state of the mind is surprise. The only appropriate state of the heart is joy. The sky you see now, you have never seen before. The perfect moment is now. Be glad of it.”  -Terry Pratchett, Thief of Time

Some Words Desire Beauty

I love to write.  It doesn’t matter what I’m writing on–it could be on the computer, in a tattered notepad, or carving words onto a stone tablet. (I have never done this, but it would be interesting to try).

The words are most important, not the devices used.  But I know some people who can only write in a journal, or who can’t focus unless they’re using Microsoft Word on the computer.  For myself, I do have preferences depending on what I’m writing.  Certain words, I think, desire beauty as much as we desire to make words beautiful.  This is why writers will spend $30 on an engraved or embossed notebook; it feels right to put the words inside of it, as if they deserve to be in there.  I often feel that way when looking at a certain notebook…but like many writers, I don’t have that kind of money to spend on a nice leather journal.

So one day, I decided to make my own.

"There is a place far, far away."

Decoupaging is an easy, cheap way to turn a $3 journal into a one-of-a-kind piece of art.  All you need are some magazines you’re willing to cut up, some decoupage finish (I use Plaid Royal Coat), a paintbrush, and a simple journal.  Just a composition notebook will do.

Cut the pictures or words out of the magazines and put the finish on the back of each piece to glue them onto the notebook.  I like to lay the pieces out first to decide where I want everything to go, and I do the front and back of the notebook separately:  cover first, back second.  After the pictures are stuck down well, use the paintbrush to put a coat of the finish over the WHOLE thing.  Let that dry, and then do another coat.

"The Evening Globe"

I find that you really only need two coats of finish to make it nice and sturdy.  I remember years ago when I first started making collage journals, I used scotch tape to put over the pictures…my mom was the one who introduced me to decoupage, which is much more beautiful and classy.

These two journals, “There is a Place Far, Far Away” and “The Evening Globe,” are my favorites I have made.  I mainly use them for poetry, as I tend to use my computer for stories and a fake leather (but still pretty) journal for thoughts and ideas.

So if you’re a writer, what do you use most for getting your words out into the world?  And do you use different ways depending on what you’re writing?

The Clutter of Crows

A "murder" of crows

Despite the negativity that surrounds crows, these birds are extremely intelligent creatures.  They’re known for collecting random objects (especially shiny things) and storing them in a hidden place.  They never throw these things out, but return and play with them, or even use them as tools if they figure out a way to do so.

We do the same thing, when you think about it.  Many of us have in our homes what we call a “junk drawer”–a place where we store odds and ends.  Usually these are objects we think we’ll be able to use later, or even things we just can’t bring ourselves to throw out.  I have a box dedicated to craft or decoupaging items.  It has beads, old keys, magazine cut-outs, broken necklaces, movie ticket stubs…anything I could use later for a craft project.  Sometimes I open it just to remind myself of what’s in there.

I don’t believe that a blog has to have a main theme–it’s a place for creativity and idea exploration.  Whether or not all of these ideas have to be connected is up to the person writing.  I have an interest in multiple things, as does everyone, and I will write each post as an idea comes to me.  My aim is for this blog to be a kind of online junk drawer of thoughts, ideas, photographs, beliefs, and whatever else there is to write about.  And I suppose that in itself is a kind of theme.