It's April and the world hums with poems.
Time to get in the groove for Poem in Your Pocket Day!
(Yes, it's a real thing).
So, tell me:
What's in your heart & on your page?
What do you clutch & what do you give away?
What poem is in your pocket?
Where Art Is Made
We are builders, makers, hopers, doers.
From clunkers and junkers,
out of shards and clay,
we shape and frame, sort and stir.
Each of us turning grime into gold.
Against fence and lock,
a door swings, a window opens,
a sunflower reaches for a fresh day.
Everything is always growing.
Dirt dusts places not yet alive
and in this gravel of possibility,
we honor the old and worn, the faded and frail,
know that good bones are worth holding.
Deep against rock, trains clack and roll,
we press into paper, scissors and paint,
splattered, gathered, mixed.
With each ding-ding-ding, solid freight
floats our dreams and we clatter, wide awake
in dark, in light, in love and hope.
The day opens, the sky widens, you are here.
Hand in hand, arm in arm, each grip
is a dare to you declared:
Breathe, work, sear and sculpt.
Sew and hold, paint and saw.
Mix and mingle. Break rules, break ground.
Create your self, your world, your now.
On the bridge of progress, we dance and dive,
wonder, wander, taste and make.
With each how and why and what next?
we dig in and reach out
to build in the mind,
a step, a ladder, another sky.
Let’s scaffold the unknown.
In every thing, promise.
— Drew Myron
I love a good collaboration, and this special project brought together all my faves: image, sound & words.
"Where Art Is Made," by Futuristic Films, celebrates the many makers who continue to shape and define the River North Art District (RiNo) in Denver, Colorado. Conceived by Tracy Weil, RiNo's Co-Founder/Creative Director, the film features the spoken word talent of Toluwanimi Obiwole, Denver's first Youth Poet Laureate (2015), and an original poem by Drew Myron (me!).
As we celebrate National Poetry Month, this artful blend is proof that poetry lives in everything, everywhere, every day.
According to Chinese tradition, a garden landscape without poetry is not complete. Poetry, along with rocks, architecture, water, and plants, is one of the five necessary elements of a Chinese garden.
I'm honored to celebrate National Poetry Month at the Lan Su Chinese Garden in Portland, Oregon. Please join me for this free workshop.
Come to Your Senses
— a writing workshop
Lan Su Chinese Garden
Portland, Oregon
Wednesday April 12, 2017
3 to 4:30pm
Free with admission.
Writing comes alive with the detail our senses provide. Using the sense of smell as a trigger, we’ll focus on fresh writing with prompts and practices designed to energize and inspire.
From poetry to prose, fact to fiction, this 90-minute workshop will serve as a creative springboard in which you’ll generate new work, meet other writers, and share experiences that will help shape, shift and propel your own writing.
This workshop is free with admission to Lan Su Garden, and open to writers of all ages, experience & interests. No registration is required. Drop in, bring pen, paper & your writing mind.
About Lan Su Chinese Garden
One of Portland, Oregon’s greatest treasures, Lan Su Chinese Garden is more than just a beautiful botanic garden. It’s an inspiring experience based on a 2,000-year-old Chinese tradition that blends art, architecture, design and nature in perfect harmony.
About the Instructor
Drew Myron is a former newspaper reporter and editor who has covered news, arts, entertainment and travel for AOL, Northwest Best Places and other publications. For over 15 years, she’s headed a marketing communications company specializing in literacy, health and advocacy for the vulnerable. Drew is the author of several books and art collaborations.
[Art] has been reduced to an insult:
"It's a bunch of squiggles that my kid could do" . . .
You want to know how I think art should be taught to children?
Take them to a museum and say, "This is art, and you can't do it."
— An Object of Beauty
a novel by Steve Martin
This is how to bloom
— for Dee, of daffodil season
And you,
From damp earth
and newborn grass
Born among daffodils.
The sky strains to grow.
You are ruffled edge,
a burn of gold.
And you, in resurrection
In this tender-sun season
Made from burden and stone
In an urgent quiet, whisper
What are you waiting for?
— Drew Myron
Talking about the weather is a sure sign of:
1) A dull wit.
2) An old crank.
3) A long winter.
Yes, all three! It's been a long, wet, gray winter in Oregon. But, wait, this is not a weather report. This is my how-to-survive guide.
A Guide to Gratitude
Or How to Be Thankful When Life is Sucking The Life Out of You
1.
Drink Coffee
Or tea, warm milk, warm water . . . anything that soothes.
2.
Watch Flowers Grow
So much better than watching paint dry or water boil. Did you know daffodils — my favorite flower — are only $2 a bunch? That's a pop of sunshine for less than a latte! Go ahead, splurge.
3.
Wear Something Soft
I love cashmere, and regularly stalk Goodwill for thrifty luxury. But a soft scarf works too, or snuggly mittens, a smooth blanket. The world can feel so hard, cocoon in softness.
Caution: Don't park yourself in comfy clothing. Bursts of comfort are good. Living in sweats (or yoga pants) is bad.
4.
Bathe in Books
This is a two-for-one pick-me-up: take a bath and bring a book. Or skip the bath and just bathe in words. Either way, you'll immerse yourself in sensory pleasure.
5.
Eat with a Friend
Or drink and eat. Try not to drink alone or eat junk food alone (for me, chips and cookies are guilty binges devoured in the shame of solitary over-indulgence). Still, to be of healthy mind and body, I try to eat with others. And rarely drink alone — that's just sad.
6.
Move
I loath exercise until I actually do it, and then I wonder why I didn't get moving sooner. When you're feeling low the pit of lethary is deep, so you gotta start small. Get off the couch, then out of the house, then take a walk around the block. Fresh air is invigorating, no matter the weather. And that first jolt is usually enough to make you want more.
7.
Write
Start easy. One page. One line, even. You're allowed to write junk. You're allowed to babble. This is just for you. Keep the pen moving. Keep your mind open. Just write. Like moving your body, moving the pen across the page reinforces that you can. Keep on. As Naomi Shihab Nye says, "No one feels worse after writing."
8.
Get a Chia
I don't like dirt or gardening and rarely remember to water the plants. But my Dad — bless his goofy heart — recently sent me a Chia pet. Remember those ceramic pots shaped into animals and objects in which you place seeds and they magically sprout? Yes, so kitschy and corny and fun.
9.
Pray
For sun, for spring, for just a hint of light in the sky. For patience.
10.
Forget Yourself
Read with a child. Make soup for the sick. Hold hands with the lonely. Listen to a neighbor. In short, get out of your head and into the world. There's a lot of hurt, be a balm.
How do you get through?
It's Thankful Thursday, a weekly pause to express appreciation for people, places, things and more. Joy contracts and expands in relation to our gratitude. What are you thankful for today?
1.
I haven't written in a while because I talk too much and say only one thing: rain, rain, more rain.
It's grey again and my stomach rumbles, or is that my hip? Something is rusted, shut.
This long winter. This season of life. I celebrated a half-century and a friend reminded me that there was a time when 25 seemed like a feat I would fail. Oh, but for the grace of . . . protecting me from myself. I did not know what I did not know.
2.
For months now, we hurry up and wait. Each day is crisis or calm.
At the nursing home where I work, people die. And I am always surprised. Not that they die, but that it always feels sudden even when I know it's coming.
I want to say life is long stretches of gray. Not just the sky but day-to-day. It's murk. You think you'll make decisions, or have time, or just know. But such defining moments are rare. And yet we keep expecting to offer a yes or no or now. As if we have control. As if we hold both charity and clarity.
3.
Today I drove for hours across farms and fields and rain-soaked road. As a young reporter, wide-eyed, eager, open, I traveled country roads just like this.
I'm trying to say I've circled back and have learned so little. And yet the mind, the body now hold much more. Is this of use? Am I of use? I do not know.
4.
I was once charmed by these small towns half asleep. This would pull me: empty storefront, broken window, wide sky. I'd search for the sagging barn, a falling down house. I was camera and focus, giving image to a brokenness within.
Now, I feel a numb sort of sad for the struggle of getting by, of nothing stretched across years of it'll do. Even the silos seem to be mourning. Never full but not quite empty. A perpetual vacancy.
5.
Yes, I've gained weight . . . there is a heft to me now, in years and experience. I'm not so much "older and wiser" but living with a lens that offers a longer view. In this, some perspective, some relief.
See Me | an adverpoem
Sleep is the ultimate luxury. Buy it for bragging rights.
The best seats in the house are no longer in your house.
Love is complicated. Make room for more.
The choice is simple, and it’s yours.
You’re an expert in the art of compromise.
Convenience. Convenience. Winsome.
Be the breakthrough. Do beautiful work.
— Drew Myron
A found poem, featuring ad taglines from: Novartis Pharmaceuticals, Beautyrest Mattress, Moen, Ford Motor Company, LaraBar, Cost Plus World Explorer, Genentech, Delta, Amazon, Toyota, Pepperidge Farm.
Inside the car, it feels like
the devil is grilling sinners.
— We Need New Names
a novel by NoViolet Bulawayo
My gratitude grows but my attention is short. Let's make a list.
On this Thankful Thursday, I'm thankful for:
1. No knowledge
My new reading trick is to avoid book flaps, blurbs and best-seller lists, and to dive in without preconceptions. This approach worked recently when I read The Girls, an engrossing and engaging novel by Emma Cline. I liked the book very much, and it was refreshing to learn about the backstory and author after I had finished the book.
Is this how we use to read, before fevered promotions and author platforms?
2. Noteworthy
A friend sent me a card. She is "remembering to send handwritten mail every now and then" and I was the lucky recipient.
3. Retread
I rarely watch movies more than once or return to books I've already read. But this week I found myself bookless. In desperation, my eyes darted across cereal boxes and classified ads. Words, any words. Without time for a book run, I reached for my bookshelf and one of my favorite novels: Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner.
Over the years I have gifted this book to dozens of friends and family but could remember few details (I can barely remember the book I read last week, and I read this one 15 years ago).
Much to my relief, I slipped back into those creaky yellowed pages and still liked the book.
4. Pie
Though I dislike Valentine's Day (forced affection and obligatory gifts), I'm thankful I ditched my sour mood and allowed a sentimental groove. Now we're eating cherry pie and we're both happy.
Sometimes, most times, it's good to get out of your head and into your heart.
It's Thankful Thursday (on Friday, because life gets full), a weekly pause to express appreciation for people, places, poems and more. Life expands with gratitude. What are you thankful for today?
It's a great time to be alove.
That's what I saw. At second glance the word was alive but, really, I prefer alove. I imagine alove is similar to in love but more immersive and inclusive. Weightless through a cloud, a fog, a thicket of feel-goodness.
It's said that creatives — writers, painters, dreamers, dawdlers — need down time to replenish the well (and maybe get new glasses). The garden metaphor is often used: plant, germinate, grow, harvest, or some such. I tried to be a gardener but I dislike dirt and prefer chips to kale.
Still, the metaphor works.
There is a time to plant and a time to sow. A time to write and a time to rest. A time to produce and a time to consume. I fear, though, I may have taken consumption a bit far (see: empty chip bags and me on the couch). But hey, it's winter; I'm sowing.
In my ravenous state here's what I've consumed:
BOOKS
The Book of Unknown Americans
by Cristina Henriquez
A moving story of immigrant life, freshly and poignantly told.
The Wangs Vs. The World
by Jade Chang
Flip and easy, this riches-to-rags story about a wealthy Chinese family is a funny yet touching observation of vapid American culture.
TELEVISION
Call My Agent
An engaging French television series about a firm of agents working with a cadre of colorful, high-maintenance actors. It's light and fun but the subtitles make me feel a little more smart, a little less cheesy. See it on Netflix.
Sensitive Skin
Kim Cattrell is best known for her spicy role in Sex and the City but in this Canadian series she shows greater depth playing a widow navigating a new life. Because there are so few shows featuring intelligent, thoughtful, stylish mid-life women, this one has me hooked. Available on Netflix.
FOOD
Oh my gosh, have you binged on (err, I mean tasted) Caramel & Cheddar Cheese Popcorn? Skip dinner. Skip lunch. This is the only meal you need.
Okay, yes, I do sometimes eat "real" meals. Lately, we've been making Pho. This quick and easy version isn't the authentic Vietnamese soup, but it's darn good.
YOUR TURN: What are you consuming? and what's consuming you?
And even more important: Are you alove?
I wasn't looking for a poem. I was gathering pieces, making a word bank, trying to write my own. But instead, I found this poem. Today as the world feels so ugly with division, these lines seem just right, just now, timeless.
My heart is moved by all I cannot save:
so much has been destroyed
I have to cast my lot with those
who age after age, perversely,
with no extraordinary power,
reconstitute the world.
— Adrienne Rich
This is the last stanza of Natural Resources, a poem by Adrienne Rich that appears in the collection, The Fact of a Doorframe: Poems Selected and New 1950 - 1984. This is an excellent book. My copy, now over 20 years old, is dog-eared and falling apart. I return to the pages again and again, with new appreciation of an old friend, a firm foundation.
The Week in Review
I bought soft socks. Ate too many chips. Got lost in books.
An old woman and I held hands. "I don't know if I'm coming or going," she said. "I don't know why I'm here."
I went to a ranch and met the cows. Wide-eyed, we shared a certain numbness.
Snow met sky and erased horizon. Everything silent and still. I didn't reach for camera or phone. Didn't reach at all.
In the distance a thin ribbon of blue broke through.
It's Thankful Thursday, a weekly pause to express appreciation for people, places, things and more. Some weeks are tougher than others, but every week offers some small thing that redeems and heals. What are you thankful for today?
“It's not that I have a way with words;
it's that I have no way without them.”
― from Private Citizens, a novel by Tony Tulathimutte
I've been enduring a long stretch of perfectly fine, readable books that failed to move me. I failed to feel. Is it the book? Is it me?
So much of "good" art — books, film, paintings, music — is timing. When we are tuned in, when we are in time, art moves in us, through us. But when the timing is off, it's just a bunch of words, splotches of paint, a dull rerun.
But last week I hit the jackpot. I was moved by a novel, a television show, and music.
BOOK: A Little Life
a novel by Hanya Yanagihara
Everyone was talking about this book so naturally I turned away. I like an underdog. I wasn't going to cow to the crowd and read the latest big-deal book. But I finally did, and "they" were right. This is a brutal, beautiful, moving book. I read it in two days, with minimal breaks (my husband made me eat so I put it down, then scurried back).
Here's a tip: I didn't know anything about this book but the title and awful cover. No plot. No blurbs. No reviews. It was refreshing to enter a book without expectation or explanation.
TELEVISION: Good Girls Revolt
on Amazon Prime
This 10-episode show, inspired by the book by Lynn Povich, tells the story of the sex discrimination lawsuit filed against Newsweek magazine in 1970. Though soapy at times, the show captures the era and centers on the young women at the magazine who work alongside male reporters but are given none of the credit, opportunities or financial reward their male colleagues enjoy.
Sadly, the show has been cancelled and will run for only this one season — a decision that was reportedly made without any female input. Still, and again, it seems as much as we move forward, we always have further to go.
MUSIC: Lemonade
a visual album by Beyonce
I know, I know, Beyonce? I'm as surprised as you to discover I'm enthralled. Lemonade is both concept album and short film/long music video, and it's gripping. I don't like blockbuster movies or trendy tunes, and so I ignored the hype when this was released last year. Recently I heard an excerpt and the sound was haunting. Watching the film — an elegant and moody hour-long experience — reminded me of watching Pink Floyd's The Wall so many years ago. I didn't understand what it all "meant" but I was moved by the mood. Lemonade stirred me, in large part because of poet Warsan Shire, whose words stitch this album together to create a heightened state of love and ache.
What's moved you lately?
Hello dear friend.
For the last month, two words have hung in my head, circled my heart: comfort and joy.
A holiday card offers these wishes. A song is sung. And later, I spot the words in huge black letters blazed across a downtown building. Words have power, we know this, and while I can't explain — other than longing — why these words hound me, I know enough to take notice when words won't shake away.
Comfort, in the throes of grief, illness and loss, seems a tall order. Joy, in this state, seems impossible.
And yet. And yet, we spend a few hours together and you shine with a rare smile, laughter even, and the room breathes open. Against our long wall of sadness, for a brief time the air turns light with comfort. And in this small opening, joy.
I'll keep looking. For half-smiles, softness, and slices of light. I don't yet know but want to believe our grip will loosen and love will hold us tight.
Where the Map Begins
A Blessing for Epiphany
This is not
any map you know.
Forget longitude.
Forget latitude.
Do not think
of distances
or of plotting
the most direct route.
Astrolabe, sextant, compass:
these will not help you here.
This is the map
that begins with a star.
This is the chart
that starts with fire,
with blazing,
with an ancient light
that has outlasted
generations, empires,
cultures, wars.
Look starward once,
then look away.
Close your eyes
and see how the map
begins to blossom
behind your lids,
how it constellates,
its lines stretching out
from where you stand.
You cannot see it all,
cannot divine the way
it will turn and spiral,
cannot perceive how
the road you walk
will lead you finally inside,
through the labyrinth
of your own heart
and belly
and lungs.
But step out
and you will know
what the wise who traveled
this path before you
knew:
the treasure in this map
is buried
not at journey’s end
but at its beginning.
—Jan Richardson
It's Thankful Thursday, the first of the fresh year. Please join me in expressing appreciation for people, places, poems and more. What are you thankful for today?
As the year comes to a close, I'm looking back at some of my favorite books.
Though I usually spend most of my time in novels, this year fiction left me wanting. Nothing moved me. But non-fiction pulled me in, with several touching, funny, unbelievable tales. And, as always, poetry never lets me down.
8 Good Books I Read This Year
NON-FICTION
The Bitch is Back
edited by Cathi Hanauer
In a collection of excellent essays, women in their 40s, 50s and 60s — bestselling authors, renowned journalists, and critically acclaimed novelists — share hardwon thoughts on love, sex, work, family, independence, body-image, health and aging.
Heads in Beds
by Jacob Tomsky
This tell-all is a funny, irreverent and engaging book offering a behind-the-scenes look at the highs and lows of hotel life.
Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble
by Dan Lyons
A gripping, entertaining and savage account of the unstable and artifical life in Silicon Valley, written by a journalist-turned-tech insider (who then spent two years as a writer for HBO's hilarious sorta-satire Silicon Valley).
POETRY
Bright Dead Things
by Ada Limon
A slim collection of beautifully aching poems.
I'm learning so many different ways to be quiet. . . There's shower silent and bath silent and California silent and Kentucky silent and care silent and then there's the silence that comes back, a million times bigger than me, and sneaks into my bones and wails and wails and wails until I can't be quiet anymore.
— from How to Be Quiet
The Tijuana Book of the Dead
by Luis Alberto Urrea
A gritty and honest collection of poems about life at the border.
You, who seek grace from a distracted God.
you, who parse the rhetoric of empire, who know
in your guts what it is but don't know what to call it,
you, good son of a race of shadows—
your great fortune is to have a job,
never ate government cheese,
federal peanut butter . . .
— from You Who Seek Grace from a Distracted God
The Cure for Sorrow:
A Book of Blessings for Times of Grief
by Jan Richardson
Though billed as a book of "blessings," these prayers read as tender, unpretentious poems.
Let us agree
for now
that we will not say
the breaking
makes us stronger
or that it is better
to have this pain
than to have done
without this love . . .
— from Blessing for the Brokenhearted
FICTION
You Will Know Me
by Megan Abbott
A gripping page-turner of a novel, tightly wound and wonderfully delivered.
The Guest Room
by Chris Bohjalian
A captivating, chilling story about shame and scandal.
Your turn: What did I miss? What's on your list?
Next week! I just realized Christmas is next week.
No, I haven't been living under a rock (though I have spent some time on the couch in a cocoon of books). In a flurry of planning, shopping and generating holiday cheer, I lost track of days.
In the mad dash of shopping and shipping, the spirit of giving gets lost. I lose the thread of intention. Too often the giving spirit turns into the ugly machine of gotta-get-it-done.
And then I ran across this poem. And then I took a breath.
On this Thankful Thursday, I am grateful for the pause in which I can remember and unrush, in my head and in my heart.
When giving is all we have
We give because someone gave to us.
We give because nobody gave to us.
We give because giving has changed us.
We give because giving could have changed us.
We have been better for it,
We have been wounded by it—
Giving has many faces: It is loud and quiet,
Big, though small, diamond in wood-nails.
Its story is old, the plot worn and the pages too,
But we read this book, anyway, over and again:
Giving is, first and every time, hand to hand,
Mine to yours, yours to mine.
You gave me blue and I gave you yellow.
Together we are simple green. You gave me
What you did not have, and I gave you
What I had to give—together, we made
Something greater from the difference.
— Alberto Rios
It's Thankful Thursday, a weekly pause to express appreciation for the people, places and things that bring us joy. Please join me! What are you thankful for today?
Desperate for a creative jolt, I often thumb through the dictionary for words that catch my eye and stir my mind.
Wanting to go deeper, this week I pulled out a stack of reference books and discovered a random but flush collection of new words, concepts and ideas. I jotted down phrases that struck a chord: lava tongue . . . meander scar . . . a peatbog is a trap. . . passages allow movement . . . related to pass, a way through a mountain. . . between large bodies of water.
And then I stopped thinking and let my hand and mind loose. Words filled the page in that delicious delirium of a freewrite. I was writing about land and scars and passage. A seed was planted, and grew into "a crumble of breath and bone" and other surprising lines.
I'm not sure what will become of the material from this exercise, but I do know that each time I return to the page, and turn off logic, something shakes loose. Each time I'm closer to making sense, and making something that feels solid and true.
Try This:
• Find a reference book — a cookbook, dictionary, history book . . .
• Randomly scan for "poetic" phrases or inviting passages. Write them down (the physical act of writing is important in this exercise, and helps engage the writing mind).
• After you've gathered a good selection, do a 10 minute freewrite in which you write anything that comes to mind, and keep your hand moving at all times. If you get stuck, simply repeat your line until you become unstuck. Don't worry about punctuation or logic. Just write. See what pours out. See what rushes in.
If you like, share your results in the comment section. Don't be shy — let's share our starts and scratches, our works-in-progress and works-at-rest. Let's exercise the writing muscle, aches and all.
Some of my favorite reference books: Home Ground: Language for an American Landscape, Food Lover's Companion, and books on landscape architecture and design.
What reference book sparks your creativity?
My mother said every persimmon has a sun
inside, something golden, glowing,
warm as my face.
— from Persimmons, a poem by Yi-Young Lee
Because attention attracts gratitude and gratitude expands joy, it's time for Thankful Thursday.
This week I am thankful for persimmons. I'm late to discovery — just last year I tasted my first — and now again, this week. A gift. A seasonal surprise.
Lately gratitude comes in small bits: a slice of pie, the relief of sun, a long walk.
I search for big moments but experience no epiphanies. A friend and I once laughed about people who use God to justify dramatic actions, like quitting their jobs or traveling to foreign countries to "save" others. Why doesn't God call me? I'd half-joke. I've got a phone and a passport, why don't I get a lightning bolt or a grand vision?
But I'm not a grand kind of person. I cocoon to soft music, books, quiet. God meets people like me in the library or in other quiet people.
"You can't tell people enough that you love them," a friend said the other day, and it seemed the truest thing I'd heard in weeks. Maybe that was God talking. Sometimes I don't hear, or don't listen, and I miss these moments, small as they are. Big as they are.
It's Thankful Thursday. What are you thankful for today?
