February Blues

A busy month, some thoughts on reading, writing, and editing, plus a couple of poems from another project

This photo of our house dragon, Graham, is actually from last winter. Until the last couple of days Graham was completely buried. Now, with some warmer temps and a bit of rain, he is just getting his head above the snow. Much like me.

Hello, friends. I’m a little behind with my writing and editing this week. In case you haven’t been playing along, The February Poetry Adventure has been going on and I’ve been trying to keep up with it. I did great until just a few days ago when I started running low on poetry. You know when you make a batch of cookies and you have just a little bit of dough left - not enough to make a whole other cookie, but too much to just stick onto one of the ones on the baking sheet? That’s how I’m feeling. I haven’t got enough poetry left to make a whole cookie. Huge thanks to

Petra Hernandez

for hosting such a lovely, productive, supportive adventure. But that muffled sound you hear is me crying “UNCLE!”

I’ve also been keeping up with the weekly posts over at The Public Domain Poetry Project, trying to set a good example with a new poem each week. I think all of this would have been entirely manageable had it not been for a crazy spell at work. We’ve been undergoing a data migration and training on new library software. I’ve been working more shifts than usual, in addition to extra days of training. February has been quite a month, full of snow and ice, cold temperatures and busyness.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how I’m using my time, as a writer, as a reader, as an editor of my own work. I love sharing poems here on Substack, and I intend to continue doing so. But if I’m going to keep producing poems I feel good about sharing here, I’ve got to devote more time to reading and editing. Reading refills my tank, editing is how the twenty or so poem attempts from The February Poetry Adventure become real poems.

My plan is to post here when I’ve got something I’m excited for you to read. Maybe that’s weekly, but sometimes it may be less. I’m trying to establish a rhythm that lets me devote time to what feels the most fruitful each week. Maybe I need to spend a week reading other poets who approach things differently than I do. Maybe I need to focus on editing, or pulling together a group of poems for a submission.

What I have for you this week are a couple of the poems I’ve written in The Public Domain Poetry Project. If you’re not familiar, I started the project in January as way to rev our creative engines in the new year. We’ve taken a poem in the public domain (Edna St. Vincent Millay’s, “Travel”) and we’ve used a line each week as a poetry prompt.

We’ve reached week eight, meaning we’ve written in response to eight of the twelve lines in the poem. We’ve got four more lines/weeks to go, and I’d love it if you’d join us. You really can jump in or out at any point, respond to past prompts any time you like. No rules.

Below are a couple of poems I’ve written since we started. I’m including the line they were written in response to, and a link back to the original post.

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Week 1: The railroad track is miles away

Here I simply used the line as the first line of the new poem.

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Cacophony by Moonlight

The railroad track is miles away 
so I know the sound I hear
is not a train, not the pulsing
grind of wheels on track, 
not the moaning squeal 
of metal kissing metal
that kindles sparks for free

The sea is near, yet on this placid night
I cannot lay blame 
on its tidal head 
for this pounding crash,
this surging hiss
Tonight the sea is but a whisper, 
holding its breath,
playing softly on its shore

I cannot shake my fist from the stoop
at the truck rumbling 
up and down this street, 
metal seams creaking over bumps, 
breaks whining 
like an anxious hound
For the streetlights pool
on empty pavement, 
the quiet cars sleeping
in rows along the granite curb

So this pulsing, crashing, whining din
is of my own design
It is the product 
of the words, 
the wishes, 
the worries
in this head, 
that live each in their place
when it sits upright
upon my shoulders

Yet once I lay it down
upon my pillow
they slide from their nooks,
rubbing round each other
like a cat through ankles
bouncing forward and back
over and under 
until the small chamber 
of my skull echoes 
with their sound 

Then slowly, and with mercy, 
they come to rest again 
in new company and fall 
silent in the quiet night

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Week 2: And the day is loud with voices speaking

This week I used each word in the line as the first word in a line of my poem

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Memory

And when I tell you that she cannot remember,
	cannot meet you there in the middle,

The thing you must know and hold in your palm, 
	the thing you must tell yourself each

Day, is that memory is a country lost in time, 
	walled off by mountains, its border

Is closed to all travelers; if she cannot go, you 
	cannot go, and the mountains grow taller each day

Loud may be the call of the past as you stand 
	on the shore looking for sails on the horizon, yet

With her transmissions cut, her visas revoked, she cannot 
	board any vessel and you cannot sail alone

Voices are like water running through a sieve,
	and spiraling down a drain, and you will find you are 

Speaking to one who no longer knows her mother tongue
	and looks at you like a visitor from another world

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There’s a lot going on these days. How are you all doing? Are you finding time to write? Read? Edit? Are you taking some time off? How do you divide your time between the different aspects of your creative life? Do you have a schedule? Do you stick to it? I’d love to hear about all of this in the comments

Thanks so much for being here