NaPoMo poetry party.23

This morning’s guest is Amanda Kelly, a dear friend of mine. Amanda is currently studying Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia in Kelowna. Her poetry has been published in her debut chapbook Heartstrings, Room Magazine, UBCO’s Paper Shell and Camosun College’s Art-Poem-Art-Experiment. Amanda just finished 120 pages of her first draft of a novel exploring themes of how can queerness and faith co-exist and what that looks like in the face of religious rejection.

Check her out on Instagram: @amankelly @twoqueerbeans

Lesley-Anne: This photo of you makes me so happy, Amanda. Can you give us a little window into your life right now?

Amanda: I’m enjoying creating a sacred home with my partner, we have been moved in for five months now, and are both homebodies. She has her amassing collection of plants and I have my stack of to be read books that will last me for the next six months. Currently Tinga de Pollo is the recipe on repeat, a glass of red wine, and Modern Family to alleviate the seriousness of our times. I am currently reading “Bear Necessities” a heartwarming and quirky novel about a widowed father who chooses to be a dancing panda street performer in the face of unemployment. The characters breathe and exist effortlessly, so it’s been lovely to share mornings with them.

Lesley-Anne: We often say we wish we had more time for certain things. Are you spending your time differently in view of our current world challenges? If so, how?

Amanda: I spend less time getting from Point A to Point B. It is nice to move through nature, a commute for the soul, without any end goal or time restraint. Getting out into the forest is no longer a bullet point on a list, but instead is an assumed part of my day. I now figure out a way to feel the sun on my shoulders, let the roar of Mission Creek wash over me or feel the shade of a forest canopy.

Lesley-Anne: Why is art important?

Amanda: It connects us to the broader human experience, where we can see how we are bound to one another through suffering and beauty. It’s therapy, regurgitation, necessary and it makes us feel a part of a rhythm or pulse beyond. Art is like sediment; it builds upon itself.

Lesley-Anne: What is one surprising thing that happened today?

Amanda: I don’t tune out birdsong anymore. It’s the soundtrack to this time in my life, they are always there. It always surprises me how much of the day contains birds trilling.

What a pleasure it has been to introduce you to Amanda, and vice versa. I imagine a day, possibly not too long from now, when we might meet together and read one another the poems that have been born during this time of COVID. Wouldn’t that be fine?

For today, we’ll sign off with Amanda’s A Kiss on Mount Baldy.

A Kiss on Mount Baldy

We perch on the valley bowl’s rim, her fly-aways
interrupt a dry mouth vista, brush shoulders with 
cerulean lake waves swallowing- gulp. Oh, try to grasp 
these stray thoughts. The desert air thin with summer,
either we breathe too much or too little.

Dare our humid hands on hips, cup chin, jaw, shoulder

and breast. Eyes close, I stumble on loose shale-
my body comes into hers. Fingers connect in and 
out, choose less footprints, more exposed 
stone, and kisses that confer with souls lodged in throats.

We expand and exude as frogs in day’s descent. Blurry 

balsamroot and purple lupine pepper thighs. Look, at 
their survival in the desert heat. The striated notes, our spines 
attune to the crisp and clear intent- do not rush to the sun. 

Acknowledge the night’s heavy-lidded blink and the 
morning return.

NaPoMo poetry party.8

Bernadette Wagner and I recently renewed our decade long friendship when she swung through the Okanagan Valley with her new poetry book The Dry Valley, from Radiant Press. Bernadette stayed with me for a couple of days, and being in her energetic and encouraging presence, talking about meaningful things, was a reminder to me of how important creative community really is. Bernadette joins us from Regina, Saskatchewan, where she lives with her husband and son. She has a daughter attending university in Ottawa.

Bernadette’s way of putting herself and her work out into the world is inspiring. She is similarly tireless in supporting other poets, because as she says, that’s just what we do!

Thanks for joining in this virtual poetry hootenanay, Bernadette! In response to my three questions this is what you said;

1. What is this quieter version of life teaching you?
Bernadette: The COVID-19 times has taught me that I already live a quiet life, take care of myself and family, and educate community.

2. We often say we wish we had more time for certain things. Are you spending your time differently in view of our current world challenges? If so, how?
Bernadette: People going on about having more time on their hands now certainly don’t live in my house! Until a couple of weeks ago, I was pretty much home alone from 7:45 am to 5:45 pm Monday to Friday. For the past two weeks (or has it been three?) I’m sharing the house 24/7 with my husband, an immuno-compromised civil servant working from home. And, as of yesterday, our son is also home 24/7 with COVID-19 symptoms. Our daughter, living out of province and also with symptoms, will be home from grad school in a month. 

My life is radically altered and altering. I am the heart-centre of our family, the nurturer, chef — domestic goddess, if you will — and I’m spending more time on the computer ordering food and supplies or in the kitchen cooking, than on writing, though I do try to do a writing sprint or two every day. 

I’m getting through it all by leaning heavily on the meditation practice I’ve had for almost 20 years. I meditate at least twice daily and for longer periods than I used to. Colleagues have been hosting free meditations online. I think there’s one almost every day and I’ve always loved communal meditation. Community is really important to me. And these sessions — there’s one specific to writers now — help me remember that I’m part of something bigger. That’s especially important now. 

I’m also grateful to social media for that sense of community. But I was quite shocked by people’s initial fears so I spent a significant amount of time talking people down, sharing positive messages. And there’s so much ugliness and negativity coming from a certain leader of government south of here and so many people sharing it that social media isn’t as much fun for me. 

I write a daily report, or try to, of the Prime Minister’s news briefings. It’s my public service, I suppose. I am a fiercely political animal but I have to say that thus far PM Trudeau is impressing me. And believe me when I say that it takes a lot for a Liberal Prime Minister to impress me!

3. What is one surprising thing that happened today?
Bernadette: The robins have returned and their song relaxed and inspired me yesterday.

You can learn a little more about Bernadette here:
www.bernadettewagner.ca
@thereginamom
https://www.facebook.com/bernadettewagner62

Those who attended your book launch in Kelowna in early March had the treat of listening to you read the poem that you are also sharing with us today. It is so lovely in its imagery and strong sense of place. Thank you for the gift of these words.

Peace, and continued good health to you and yours,
Lesley-Anne

Fieldnotes from the Qu’Appelle
(in memory of Robert Kroetsch)


Morning bursts apricot and yellow
on the lake. Gray driftwood floats on sky.  
White sails, a blue breeze.  


	~	



Water gurgles, chugs. 
Beeps announce coffee.

This place allows 
for human
and more-than-human connection.  

Wings, skin, 
bark, fur co-exist.


	~	



Just around the bend, 
	maybe three miles north
		somewhere between the hills
		 				hanging

			in a mist that curves 
		around land and heart,
	insistent wind holds hawk high.
She swoops

drops 

then climbs, feast tightly taloned.  
	Soars over trees, birds, insect, 
		over chattering squirrels, 
			water, blood.


	~	


Number Eleven highway,
two blades slicing skin, 
how progress scalped this valley.


	~	


Two turkey vultures spiral high, 
closer, closer to the hillside 
abattoir. 


	~	


Orange-breasted robin pecks apart huge moth.
Families of swallows, inhaling insects, dip,
rise, dip again.



	~	


	Qu'Appelle Valley green is 
        silver sage,
a treetop's lime,
river bank hay,
	market garden crops,
stands of spruce, stretching,
	short commercial lawn,
		sea of forest holding a hill,
a yellow clover stalk.


	~	


Living sky 
shapeshifts colours,  
a river of vulnerability
pinpricked by light.


	~	


Peace filters through 
singing elms,
beneath their fluttering gold,
rippling grasses.

 

NaPoMo poetry party.1

Back story

Yesterday a friend reached out to me and asked if I’d be willing to share some poetry on his lit blog. Rob said he’s planning to host a full month of guest poets on his long time blog in celebration of National Poetry Month 2020. Yes, I said. And as I looked at what poems I might send to Rob, I felt a tiny shift in me that felt a wee bit like I mattered again in the world (cue all the feelings). And then I began wondering how I might be part of a ripple effect within my own creative community.

Bringing us here: day one of our NaPoMo poetry party!

Please say hello to our first guest and my friend, Anne Linington. Anne and I met through Faithwriters, an online writing community in 2006, and have continued a virtual friendship every since. Anne is a lay minister (Reader) with the Church of England, and lives on the picturesque Isle of Wight. Anne reads her poetry at open mics, and leads a monthly poetry group at Carisbrooke Priory.

Before you share your poem Anne, I’d like to ask you 3 questions, questions I will be asking each one of our poetry party guests:

1. What is this quieter version of life teaching you?
Anne: The importance of structure for the day which will be useful as we head to retirement.

2. We often say we wish we had more time for certain things. Having been given this gift of more time, what are you spending it on?
Anne: Sharing more of my writing, not necessarily new material, but older articles and poetry.

3. What is one surprising thing that happened today?
Anne: I offered to share my seventeen years experience of “Contemplative prayer” with others via Facebook.

Thanks for starting us off so well, Anne, and for sharing your beautiful gift and heart.
Blessings,
Lesley-Anne

The Plough

How could I have known
When I opened the creaking gate
to the field of my life,
And invited you in
To do the necessary work,
That your activity would be so painful
And yet ultimately
Bring about a harvest?

Setting your plough
To dig down deep
To turn over
And break up
Almost touching the deep bedrock
Of my soul
Revealing me in all my created
Rawness.

Leaving me exposed
Rich pickings for hungry gulls
Whilst all that I had previously
Thought worthwhile
Is torn from its root
Dies
And is re-interred
In the soil
Of my life

Now I lie open and naked
As my neat furrows are
Rained upon
Reduced
Frozen
Broken down
Emptied of all former life
Waiting

Then one day
The returning sun of your love
Gently warming
O'er lengthening days
Begins my re-awakening

Precious seed is sown
In prepared ground
Watched over
Anticipated
And the Autumn pain
Brings life
And hope.

Anne Linington ©