Thirteen

A prize-winning poem that I was ready to retire

Hello, friends. This week I’m reposting a poem I shared last year. I took it down for a while because it was due to appear in print in the Maine Poetry Society’s newsletter after winning third place in the Maine Prize Poem contest. But it's an old favorite of mine, so I wanted to make it accessible again. There has been a flurry of new subscribers to Poetical lately (Welcome!) so it'll be brand new to some of you, at least

Once my kids are both back at their universities next week, I’ll get a back in the groove of weekly posts. I’m currently in Maternal Angst Sponge mode, absorbing all their stress and worries about a new semester until I think "Why is my neck so stiff?” or “Why am I having trouble sleeping?” I scan my life for things that might be simmering under the surface and at some point I realize it’s not me that’s stressed, it’s them. It’s a bit like the old stories of the sin-eater that absolves a community of its crimes. Except it’s not sins, it’s worries. I listen and encourage and comfort and they start to feel better, but then I start to worry. Reminds me of something an older mom told me when my kids were younger. “You are only ever as happy as your least happy child.” Yet I will always be grateful that they allow me help carry their burdens. It is a great privilege and tells me, like in last week's post, that I'm doing something right.

I hope you enjoy this post from last spring. See you next week.

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Winter Sky, 1985, by Will Barnett, United States, 1911-2012

On a gloomy Sunday morning a few weeks back I got some exciting news. A message appeared in my inbox from the Maine Poet’s Society telling me one of my poems had been chosen for third prize in their annual Prize Poem Contest. The judge chose “Thirteen,” a poem I wrote years ago about a car ride with my daughter.

The funny thing is that, as I was pulling together that round of submissions, I had not intended to submit “Thirteen” anywhere. Having already sent it out with hope on four previous occasions with no takers, I thought maybe it was time to retire it to the bottom of the pile.

It was my husband who encouraged me to offer it up again for review. We sat together in the kitchen one night going through my poems one by one. Many he knows well enough that he didn’t need to read them, but there were a number of new pieces courtesy of the February Poetry Adventure that he hadn’t yet seen.

“I really like your new stuff,” he said, which to my mind confirmed that maybe it was better to send some of my older, oft-rejected pieces over to Pile B. As I slid “Thirteen” over that way, he put out a hand to stop it.

“Oh, no,” he said, “That one should stay.”

“Are you sure? Maybe you’re just sentimental because of the subject matter.”

“Of course I am, and I’m sentimental about the poet, too. But that doesn’t mean it’s not also a great poem. It’s one of my favorites.”

So “Thirteen” slid back to Pile A and after lots of sorting and color coding and considering, I sent it off to the the Maine Poet’s Society with three other poems, all of which I had higher hopes for than “Thirteen.” I wasn’t sure it was a good fit, but its mention of frigid January temps and paper mills made it feel like it at least had its feet planted in Maine soil.

Which just goes to show you that you never know how many submissions it might take for a poem to get noticed. And also that there’s no predicting what a particular judge will be fond of. And also that it’s very handy to have a second reader to help keep you on course, because your judgement of overly familiar pieces can be faulty. So keep sending those poems out into the world, friends. And welcome them home again when they return rejected, dejected, and sad, just as you would a spouse, child or friend who’s had a disappointing day.  “Chin up, Poem! Your time will come.”

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Thirteen

We are driving on a bitter cold New Year’s Day. 
The sun is blinding but not warm. 
A newly minted teenager sits in the passenger seat. 
The edges of the leather pressing against 
our thighs are an almost painful reminder of the air outside.

She is thirteen now, an ominous number, even outside of adolescence.  
But Friday the thirteenth has always been lucky for me. 
Thirteen sighs, thirteen eye rolls, maybe thirteen arguments 
before we left the house this morning. But thirteen reasons 
I love her smile, thirteen times she made me snort with laughter. 
Some things are more worth counting than others. 

Passing by the paper mill stacks we see water vapor frozen in the sky. 
Great towering heaps and piles of it, immobilized by the freezing air. 
She asks why it doesn’t drop to the ground, frozen hard in pellets. 
I’m not sure, I say. 
Maybe the particles are too small, she offers. 
Could be. I really don’t know. 

We see a long, thin strand of cloud looping between the two 
huge masses of frozen mist, the edges scalloped like filigree. 
It looks like a watch chain, I say, stretched across some fat man’s belly. 
She laughs and I’m glad we’ve read so much together 
that she knows about watch chains, even if I don’t know 
about why frozen vapor doesn’t fall to earth. 

Counting Crows plays on the radio and we both sing along. 
Do you count crows? I ask. She is surprised from her quiet window watching. 
Wait, that’s a real thing? 
Yeah, one for sorrow, two for joy… It’s an old rhyme, a superstition. 
Huh. She turns back to the window.

What about thirteen crows, I wonder. If you counted them 
what would they signify? An omen or a promise?
I imagine thirteen graceful shapes against the snow, feathers 
shining blue-black in the too brilliant light, the contrast stark and lovely, 
like the wing of dark hair across her pale cheek.

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*The painting above, Winter Sky, by Will Barnett, is one that I’ve been admiring for years at a local museum. I wasn’t thinking of it when I wrote “Thirteen” but this image has lived in my head for years, and I’ve made many return trips to its corner of the gallery, so I’m sure it deserves a bit of a nod for the last few lines of the poem.

Happy Reading, Everyone! Thanks for being here.