Brynn, that's great news! Will you post a poem here?

Of course. That is as soon as I can dig up an edited copy. I know most of ''Unwritten'' by heart but a friend and I just ammended some line breaks before it goes to the final stages and print prep begins, so I'll have to dig into my school account to pull up the edits. Pretty sure I can do that using Telnet, but I will wait until my SO calls me here tonight so I don't mess-up my stepbrother's comp in the process.

Thank you, deb, and Susan and erika.

(That poem kicked my ass up and down the street for six months. I'm still working on the next-to-last stanza, which does feel mostly as though it's just treading water.)

Wow, six months. I don't work at poems much, if I don't like it the way it first presents, I'm likely to abandon it.Maybe it's a leftover self image issue. Or possibly a good argument for not having kids in the next few years.

I write virtually no poetry anymore, but when I did, I generally wouldn't read it for a few years after it was done. That was deliberate. You look at something five, ten years down the line and bits of you want to change this or that, and it's a sensational way to mirror the you that was with the you that is.

I've been to poetry readings and waited after to buy a copy of the writer's work and/or have it signed. Several times the poet would flip to a certain page and change a line--cross out the printed line and write the "corrected" version in--before signing. I don't think a poem is ever necessarily "done."

I'm still working on the 'edited' Juice III poem, but I thought I would post a little something here for kicks. Anyway, I submitted for this little start-up 'zine (check it out at milo.porridge.ca )and the first issue did well, so a second is in the works. The deadline is June so I was trying to brainstorm if/what I wanted to write something else and the other day I decided a series of 'Travel Haikus' would be fun (more appropriate if I was in Japan and not Germnay, but meh...). So, anyway I am no expert on the Haiku format but I am a purist in that I think it should contain elements of nature... Here's the first one I came up with.

I.

I dreamt of the dark

sea below, stirred and awoke

to light turbulence

Brynn, niiiiiice. I also lean first towards natural elements in haiku.

Okay. Here is the piece I'm reading on the radio -- taping is tomorrow (Monday) afternoon.

Here are the things you need to know about this piece: (1) It's a Mother's Day show. (2) This piece is a reminiscing piece, about my Mom when I was 5-ish. (3) As such, it IS very very sweet and sappy. I know this. I admit it. (4) I wrote it in class when our teacher gave us a prompt to write about "First Love." Everyone else wrote about their first boyfriend, but me? My Mom was the first thing that popped into my head. (5) As part of the in-class writing, our teacher had us go through what we had written and see if any images popped out that could spark a haiku, so I have 2 haikus at the end. (And no, they are not traditional haikus because they don't have elements of nature in them.) (6) If the essay part feels like it could be tightened, well, the radio host *asked* me to pad it out for time. So I won't tighten it. That bugs me, but I have written as much as I can on this.

So. You have all the info. This is a sappy little piece, but it's all true. (And if you asked me to, I could write an equally vituperative piece about my Mom -- just so you know I'm not a Stepford Child.)

********

First Love

My very first love, of course, was my Mom. Memories of my first 5 years are full of scenes of just the two of us - buddies whose birthdays were only 3 days apart. Sure, my dad was there, too, but he worked all day, leaving so early in the morning that even the sun was still in bed. So all day, until quitting time, it was Mom and me for 5 years. We were the only family on our street with kids, so I didn't have daily playmates my own age. But Mom was always there, and she was all the playmate I needed. She took me everywhere - out of a mother's necessity, I realize now, but at the time I felt privileged. We'd shop for groceries, visit my grandma, run errands for the church council. I got to do everything with her.

She always made up stories for me, although I read at the age of 3, so I could entertain myself with books and didn't actually need someone to read to me. But she didn't read stories someone else wrote; she made up her own - vivid stories of fanciful creatures and golden-haired princesses, embellished with different voices and gestures. It worked to entertain me, and to get me to behave and not cry when she washed my hair. Of course, it helped that her princesses conveniently had the same long golden hair I did, and so I listened intently to find out what happened next.

She was the first thing I ever knew. Like in those sappy love songs, it was fate - there was no way I wouldn't fall in love with her. Small wonder that I was born early. I had to get out and meet my mom!

Once I started school, I found that my Mom was way more interesting and funny than my classmates were. They were oddly literal and not nearly as imaginative and fantastical as Mom was. Playing make-believe with them always degenerated into some tired old version of playing house or playing school, but Mom knew about dragons and trolls and princesses. Not even an army of 6-year-olds could compete with that.

Her creativity sparked my own, and soon I was making up kingdoms and princesses, AND Mom listened when I told her my stories - something else, I should add, that my classmates had no interest in. I was one of those strange children who liked school, but still, I was always excited at the end of the school day to rush home and tell Mom what we did that day, what I learned, and oh! Listen to what I did!

I'm not surprised that as an adult I still constantly have stories running through my head - only a fraction of which ever make it on to paper. With the example that my Mom set, and her interest and encouragement, I was never destined to have a dry, dull life. Instead, I have a brain full of characters and plots and odd little scenarios that play out in countless ways, all day long - almost as background noise. I am deeply indebted to my Mom for my creativity. (As well as my complete lack of rhythm and my oddball sense of humor.) As a child, I think that in a lot of ways, my Mom was a better source of knowledge than my grade-school classes were. Even, so, she was involved in my school, as well.

She was a room mother at my grade school - helping the teacher on field trips or at class parties. I'm sure it was only to keep an overprotective eye on me, but at the age of 5, and 6, and 7, it felt like my swoony love was returned and she wanted to be with me as much as I wanted to be with her.

And I think she did.

********

haikus:

(1)
the first thing I knew --
I had to get out and meet my mom.
I was born early.

(2)
stories made for me
creatures and princesses
swoony love returned

Steph L: Sappy or what have you, that's a really beautiful piece. My CW instructor was mad about 'family' writing because she says it is our family (especially close family) that rouse in us the most profound and emotional reactions. She found family writing to be the most 'real'. I think she's right.

I love this line:

She took me everywhere - out of a mother's necessity, I realize now, but at the time I felt privileged.

One of those moments where someone puts an idea that has crossed your mind down in such a tight little way and you go ''of course''. Brilliant.

Cereal: Here is that (Juice III) poem, finally:

Unwritten

I want to write you
a love poem,
answer the whisper of your breath
with delicious metered lines;

Want to wrap you
in warm
words: the heat from your
fingertips melting
in thick couplets;

Want to feel the shape
of each syllable rounding
your tongue, spilling
from your lips;

I want to write you
a love poem
But you turn,
and hungry hands devour
your flesh
as my pen
clatters
to the floor.