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At the Crossroads of Imagination and Fate
Monday Morning Musings:
At the Crossroads of Imagination and Fate
The enemy’s success or failure rests on our resourcefulness. One woman shot down a drone with a jar of pickles in the Goloseevsky District. Stay the Course. Glory to Ukraine. Glory to the heroes. Plug your windows with soft foam. Sleep by load-bearing walls.
—Excerpt from Mama’s address to the nation from Sasha Denisova, My Mama and the Full-Scale Invasion, Note from Director Yury Urnov, Printed in the Wilma Playbill, Feb. 2024.
Every day we know the sun will rise and set. We watch it, adjust our clocks and our lives by it. Some days it snows, and then the snow melts. The waves sigh, there is smoke in the air, and litter on the ground. Gun shots fly, people die, and we scarcely notice it anymore. In other places, bombs have fallen, are falling. But you cannot remain an island. A jar of pickles can kill. Never question the power and resourcefulness of mama bears. Listen when a crow warns, or the bell tolls.
This thing
of shared souls, perhaps circumstance
leading to connections–
once there was a boy I helped,
we found light, lit our world
and fueled our journey
with the quiet power of held hands–touch
a language that calls and slays the darkest dragons,
we have breathed scarlet flames, have blown white dandelion fluff
into blue-sky breezes–
energized with laughter, we cross intersections,
jaywalk through time’s boundaries, squinting at the diagonals
of the future, check this box, done—
on to the next one and the next,
pick roses, careless of the thorns,
I hear wing-flap, feel the air move
as geese soar into sapphire skies,
into the unknown.
It already seems a while since Valentine’s Day. We celebrated with wine and cheese and a virtual tasting event with Tria in Philadelphia. (We pick up the wine and cheese at Tria, then the online tasting event was that night.)
We streamed the movie, Costa Brava, Lebanon. It looks like it’s from 2021, but I think it’s new to Netflix. It’s about a family “in the near future” who have fled Beirut for their own hillside retreat. They live there in a sort of garden paradise, growing their own food, and swimming in an inground pool—until the area next door to them becomes a landfill site where garbage is dumped. The movie is more of a family drama. We both liked it very much.
Sunday was my husband’s birthday. We celebrated with delicious Indian food, leftover Crémant, and I made him a cheesecake. We saw the final performance of My Mama and the Full-Scale Invasion, at the Wilma Theater in Philadelphia, a co-production with the Woolly Mammoth Theater Company. I really enjoyed this play—at times poignant, tragic, and also laugh out loud funny. It developed from the playwright’s conversations with her mother (born in a bunker while the Nazi’s were invading) who has remained in Kyiv. The playwright imagines her mother talking to world leaders; Biden and “the Putin” both visit her. I learned the word “Ruscist.” Since it was the last performance, the director came out to say a few words, and there was a moment of silence for Alexei Navalny. Find out more about the play here. It was a cold, windy day with a bright blue sky. We walked around for a little while before the show.
Eat the Storms – The Podcast Podcast – Episode 4 – Season 7
I’m so pleased to be one of the muses for our wonderful and amazing Irish bard. This is a fabulous episode. I loved hearing the work of my sister poets, and of course, Damien’s, too. 💙 Listen to Eat the Storms on Spotify, iTunes, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Podcast available on Spotify, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, OverCast, Player FM, Radio Public, PocketCast, CastBox, iTunes, Podbean, Podcast Addicts and many more platforms.
This episode of Season 7 aired first on Saturday 10th May 2023, produced and hosted by Damien B. Donnelly. Below are details and links to the guest stars…
Merril D Smith
Merril D. Smith is a poet who lives in southern New Jersey. Her work has been published in poetry journals and anthologies, including Black Bough Poetry, Anti-Heroin Chic, The Storms, Fevers of the Mind, and Nightingale and Sparrow. She holds a Ph.D. in American history from Temple University and is the author/editor of numerous books on gender, sexuality, and history. Her full-length poetry collection, River Ghosts (Nightingale & Sparrow Press) was Black Bough Poetry’s December 2022 Book of the Month.
Follow Merril on Twitter at https://twitter.com/merril_mds and on Instragram at mdsmithnj
Read Merril’s Monday Morning…
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Tutankhamun: Wonderful Things Launch Feature
I’m waiting for my copy! I also have a poem in this volume. I believe there will be an online launch with readings soon.
Please join me in congratulatingBlack Bough Poetry on the release of this wonderful poetry collection, Tutankhamun: Wonderful Things.
I am proud to have two of my poems included in this gorgeous issue.
About Tutankhamun: Wonderful Things
Black Bough Poetry celebrate one hundred years of the discovery of the tomb of King Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings, Egypt, in 1922. This special edition includes illustrations by Rebecca Wainwright, a musical score by Stuart Rawlinson and is edited by Matthew M.C. Smith, Ankh Spice and Jack B. Bedell. Tutankhamun: Wonderful Things features prose and poetry from across the world. A collection of diverse voices with powerful, atmospheric, imagistic work taking you right there to the Valley of the Kings. Be prepared to be struck, moved and transported by this stunning collection!
ORDER YOUR COPY HERE
Visit Black Bough Poetry’s website and find out more about this wonderful poetry…
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Merril Smith – Guest Feature
I’m so pleased to be featured on Patricia’s Pen today! Patricia is a wonderful poet and novelist. She is a generous supporter of other writers, too.
Patricia’s Pen is delighted to welcome poet, Merril Smith, all the way from New Jersey. I got to know Merril via Black BoughPoetryTop Tweet Tuesday on Twitter. Without further ado, it’s over to Merril to chat about her writing.
My Writing
Merril Smith
Thank you very much, Patricia, for inviting me to Patricia’s Pen! I appreciate this wonderful opportunity to discuss writing and my work.
I have considered myself to be a writer for many years, but a poet for only a few. After the publication of my first book, Breaking the Bonds (NYU Press), I wrote/edited several non-fiction books–monographs, edited volumes, and reference work on history, gender, and sexuality published. However, writing and editing these books did not fulfil me the way writing poetry does. I think I needed a creative outlet, but it needed to be at the right time. It’s hard to explain…
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My haiku for Pure Haiku’s Volcano theme.
now at the nexus a rumbling belch alters world, dragon spews fire © Merril D. Smith 2022 Merril D. Smith writes poetry in New Jersey, where there are no volcanoes--that she knows about. This haiku is part of our Volcano theme.
TheWombwellRainbow #PoeticFormChallenge. It is weekly. I will post the challenge to create a first draft of a poetic form by the following late Sunday. Please email your first draft to me, including an updated short, third person bio and a short prose piece about the challenges you faced and how you overcame them. Except when I’m working at the supermarket I am always ready to help those that get stuck. Already given some folk a headstart by saying the second #prompt is an #Pantoum. I will blog my progress throughout the week. Hopefully it may help the stumped. Also below please find links to helpful websites.
A pantoum is a Malaysian form of oral poetry that features repeating lines that change meaning throughout the poem.
The essence of the pantoum form is a pattern of repetition of lines.
In the first stanza, none of the four lines repeats.
After the first stanza, the repetition begins:
- The first line of the new stanza is a repeat of the second line in the previous stanza
- The third line of the new stanza is a repeat of the fourth line in the previous stanza.
- The second and fourth lines of the new stanza are new lines, not seen before.
But then in the next stanza, those new lines come back as the first and third lines of the new stanza! So they get reused in their turn.
(from https://www.writebetterpoems.com/articles/how-to-write-a-pantoum)
Helpful Links
https://www.masterclass.com/articles/how-to-write-a-pantoum-poem
#TheWombwellRainbow #PoeticFormChallenge starts today. It is weekly. I will post the challenge to create a first draft of a poetic form by the following late Sunday. Please email your first draft to me, including an updated short, third person bio and a short prose piece about the challenges you faced and how you overcame them. Except when I’m working at the supermarket I am always ready to help those that get stuck. Already given some folk a headstart by saying the first #prompt is a #SESTINA . I will also blog my progress throughout the week. Hopefully it may help the stumped. Also below please find links to helpful websites.
Paul Brookes is starting a form poetry challenge.
SESTINA
Quick Overview
39 lines
Six six line stanzas
One three line stanza
End words of each stanza are the same, just rearranged. Below is a link that once you have chosen the end words will put them in the correct order for you.
End words are UNRHYMED, unless you wish them to be rhymed.
No stipulation as to line length, but it must be consistent throughout each stanza.
Sestinas are great ti convey CONVERSATION due to the repetition.
My Blog
I have a choice, either pick six random words that will be the end words for all six of the six-line stanzas, or write the first stanza and use the end line words. I chose the latter. Line length may vary but sonnet crazed as I am I chose a ten syllable line for all my lines. The stanzas are UNRHYMED. I dig deep for a subject, don’t analyse…
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River Ghosts – Merril D. Smith
Resa wrote this beautiful post about my book!
“In memory of my mother, Sylvia L. Schreiber … your laugh still echoes.”
Merril D. Smith’s mother passed away in the early days of Covid, in the days when there was no holding of hands, no kisses, no embraces and a veil of lonely shrouding all hearts.
Nonetheless, Merril does not pour a bucket of inconsolable tears into her poems, but rather flows with a river, a river that has many rocky climbs to solid land and ancient trees reaching over its waters. It is upon this river she reflects.
I was 10 poems into the book. Then, on one of my street art hunts, I came upon this mini-mural. There is a constant flowing of blue, with abstract flowers and leaves. I thought, this is like Merril’s book.
To me the blue ribbon is the river, with all its tributaries. Everything else, each flower and leaf is a…
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You Should Probably Read This: Kin Types
I added to this post. Now it’s an actual review. Sorry it took so long, Luanne.
I have updated and added to this post.
So–this arrived last night. I left it on the kitchen table, and I just started reading it–you know, leafing through it the way one does–and I got sucked in. I had to force myself to put it down because I have work to do. It is a powerful, lyrical mixture of poetry and prose, tragic accounts of everyday life–stories from her family history. Well, at least that’s what I’ve read so far. I’ll return for more in a bit.
OK, back to work now!
Luanne Castle is an award-winning poet. You can read more about her here.
****
So, nearly five years later, I’ll finish this review, which I thought I had done. Though I can’t really argue with my summary or that “You should probably read this.”
Kin Types is a selection of poetry and poetic prose that is based on…
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Yesterday and today: Merril's historical musings 