Halfway Through

I can hardly believe I’ve finished my third master’s degree residency. I’m halfway through! If all goes well, I will have my master of fine arts in creative writing degree next December – and a completed memoir.

This past semester I have focused instead, though, on poetry, and one of the things that surprised me is how much writing poems has affected how I think about and approach the writing of my memoir.

Writing poetry – at least for me – requires a deepening of time and space. A pause, a respite, a lengthening of presence, so that the words that arrive come from a deep place, a place of unseen possibility and unknown potential. They allow for an unlocking of dark places, places that have been embedded in emotion and experience.

So when I began to write poetry in response to exercises over the past semester, verses emerged that evoked ideas and experiences I had not been able to access while writing my memoir. Places and people came forth after decades of burial. And I began to consider the possibility of incorporating my poetry into my memoir, exploring a hybrid work, an experimental form.

One of the guest authors at our residency was the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Natasha Tretheway. She read some of the poetry from her forthcoming book (to be published in fall 2012), and also conducted a 90-minute question-and-answer session about her three books of poetry and her nonfiction exploration of the Mississippi Gulf Coast (where she was born) after Hurricane Katrina. That book, Beyond Katrina, incorporates her poetry into a nonfiction narrative about how Katrina affected her family. I’ve been toying with the idea of blending my own poetry into my memoir, which is my master’s thesis (read this blog to learn more about my master’s degree journey). One of the gifts of doing this program is the realization that a memoir can be an experimental work. It might incorporate poetry or artwork or photography. I want to explore all of those options, (keeping in mind the practical fact that it likely would make it harder to sell to a publisher).

I’m going back to writing my memoir in the coming semester, and hope to have a completed draft by June. Then I’ll spend my final semester polishing it and getting it ready to go out to agents. (Also this semester I have to write a 25-page critical paper. It will examine mother-daughter relationships in memoirs about childhood trauma. I’m looking at three memoirs in particular: Lucy Grealy’s Autobiography of a Face, Emily Rapp’s Poster Child, and Road Song, by Natalie Kusz.)

If you write both poetry and nonfiction (or even fiction) I would love to hear how one has affected the other in your experience. Does your prose become more lyrical and poetic?

Terzanelles and Villanelles and Blazons, Oh My

It’s been weeks since I wrote about my master’s degree journey, so I thought I’d let you know how it’s going and what’s new. I’m making progress! This second semester (out of four) has been intense in that not only am I doing specific writing for monthly packets due to my professor, but I had to complete a field study (more on that in a minute), a 10-week online translation seminar (I’m in week three), and a five-page critical paper (yet to be tackled).

And, I’m in the middle of moving to a new house this week, as well. Yeah, I know, I’m nuts.

If you’ve read any of my earlier blogs about my master’s degree program, you know I’m in a low-residency master of fine arts in creative writing program through Antioch University in Los Angeles. Low-residency means I spend 10 days at Antioch’s Culver City campus every June and December, and work online with a professor the rest of the time.

My emphasis is creative nonfiction, and my thesis will be my completed memoir, which I’ve been working on for about three years. This semester I decided to do something called “genre-hopping,” which means for one semester you can “hop” into one of the other emphases, which are fiction, poetry and a new one: writing for young people. So I hopped into poetry.

I was placed with a faculty member who is particularly demanding and requires his students to write in specific forms, trying them out and then discussing the poems extensively with the others in our mentor group. I had a goal of working primarily with the poems I had already written, so at first I was a little – okay, a lot – disappointed. What do I know? It turns out I really like writing in form. Sestinas, ekphrasis, sonnets, villanelles, terzanelles, postcards, prose poems, blazons, fugues. There is a virtual cornucopia of poem forms out there, and I am starting to dig them! There is almost a mathematical puzzle to many of them, and while I am no math genius (far from it), I appreciate the challenge. So I’m having fun, in spite of myself.

As for the field study, this is a requirement based on one of the tenets of the Antioch University mission, which is to engage in and promote social justice with your writing. You are supposed to do an internship with a nonprofit that incorporates your writing and helps the nonprofit in some way. I have been helping to establish an after-school interactive arts center in Santa Barbara, where kids will be able to drop in for workshops/instruction on any number of art forms for free. We are targeting at-risk youth, but the center will be open to all students, from ages 6-18. For my field study, I developed the writing program for the center. It took several months, but I finished it last week and mailed it off to my professor.

The online translation seminar has also turned out to be an interesting, challenging and fun experience. We are given a poem or short prose each week in another language and have to translate it into English. No, you don’t have to know the source language to do this (though I think it probably helps). So far we have translated a poem by the French poet Pierre Reverdy and a piece of a myth narrative written by the Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano. We are given the poem or prose in its original language, a short bio of the author and a glossary of all the terms in the piece. Then the trick is to translate the poem in a way that captures the intent of the poem but also makes sense as a poem in English. Again, it is somewhat akin to a puzzle, and I am enjoying it a lot.

As you can see, I’ve been busy, hence the few postings here. I’ll try to get back to a more regular blogging schedule. Or maybe not.

Re-entry to Life

It’s been almost a week since I’ve returned from my master’s degree residency at Antioch University in Los Angeles, and it has been an interesting re-entry. I left my almost-19-year-old in charge of the household and the pets (two cats and two dogs) while I was gone, and, well, let’s just say it could have gone better. Think I’ll wait until she’s about 30 before I do that again.

The residency was great, but exhausting and emotionally taxing. As I’ve written before, I am “genre jumping” into poetry from creative nonfiction for the next six-month semester, and the requirements of my mentor this time are strenuous. I also have to complete my field study (an internship with a nonprofit), a five-page paper and a 10-week online translation seminar this semester. If I don’t write another blog until Christmas, you’ll know why. (Kidding!)

A friend said to me last night, Are you sure you want to do this? The answer is yes, unequivocally. I have planned to do this master of fine arts in creative writing program for several years, and while this semester will be challenging, I’ll manage. In fact, I’ll do well, because that’s my commitment to myself. I’m still writing my memoir, which is the main reason I am doing this program. And my poetry can’t help but be improved with the feedback of my mentor, who is an accomplished poet and teacher.

Meanwhile, I’ll keep posting publishing news and writing tips on my Facebook Writing & Publishing group. Look for tidbits there and here. I always love to hear from readers, so let me know what’s going on in your writing lives. And keep writing!

Feeling the Burn

Ok, I hit the wall. Yesterday was the fifth day of my 10-day master's residency at Antioch University Los Angeles, and I was weary as a jaguar after a 60-mile-per-hour sprint. My bones ached. My muscles ached. My head ached. I couldn't remember what day it was. I was emotional and overwrought. Did I mention I was tired?

I love these residencies. They are chockful of seminars, workshops, lectures and readings. But after four days in which I arrived before 9 and left after 9, well, let's just say I can't go the distance like I could when I was 20 - or even 40. So I skipped the cohort dinner last night and went to the movies with a friend, just to clear my head. (By the way, loved "X-Men: First Class.") And I slept in a little this morning.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I am "genre-jumping" - moving into poetry for the upcoming semester from creative nonfiction, which is my emphasis in this program. I had some specific ideas of what I wanted to do this semester. So yesterday my mentor laid out the expected work. Whoa. It wasn't what I had planned, and I spent the better part of the day struggling to get my head around the new agenda. What it came down to is this: I had to let go. You know that old yarn, If you want to make God laugh, tell her your plans? Yeah, she was getting a good guffaw at my expense.

Today, I'm feeling better, realizing I'm likely going to learn a lot of things I didn't know about poetry (and probably writing), and I'll be stretched by that. Also, I'm discovering much about myself, and about giving up control (geez, that lesson just keeps coming up and up). Good thing we're never too old to learn. Yeah, that.

Reading Inspiration at the Electric Lodge

Every night during my master's residency at Antioch University in LA, we have student and guest author readings, and Sunday night our readings were held at the eclectic Electric Lodge in Venice. Funky, off-the-beaten-track, small and intimate, the Electric Lodge is the perfect spot for performance poetry and readings.

Four graduating students started the evening, with powerful readings of poetry, nonfiction and fiction.

Learning how to present your work and read in public is an important skill, a critical diagnostic tool that gives the writer/reader specific feedback on not only the work but the effectiveness of the delivery. 

I tell my students it's important to read one's work out loud. It helps pinpoint problems in rhythm, voice, cadence and logic. And it forces the writer to engage the material as a reader, which can reveal unresolved questions and pitfalls in the narrative.

I have spoken to many groups over the years, but reading my own work sparked feelings of terror and inadequacy like nothing I've ever done. The more you do it, the better you get at it. And the more you can learn from it.

Rounding out the evening at Electric Lodge were readings by Rob Roberge and Peter Selgin, accomplished authors and scholars who this semester have joined the adjunct faculty at Antioch.

Roberge, the author of two novels and numerous literary magazine pieces, read from his forthcoming noir novel, Working Backwards from the Worst Moment of My Life, a hilarious and twisted story about two junkies so desperate for money they dig up the grave of one's grandmother to steal and pawn her gold jewelry. As Roberge read, the audience both guffawed and cringed at the horrific nature of the men's task. His prose was so strong, so descriptive, we were with these two losers throughout the awful deed, from falling through the top of the casket and listening to the grandmother's hip splinter, to squirming as they fished around what once was her neck to find her gold necklace. In the end, we were laughing and exclaiming "ewwwww!" at the same time. That's some awesome writing.

Selgin, the author of Drowning Lessons (winner of the 2007 Flannery O'Connor Award for Fiction) and the novel Life Goes to the Movies, read from his forthcoming memoir Confessions of a Left-Handed Man, which will be published this year by the University of Iowa Press/Sightline Books. He is also the author of two books on craft: By Cunning & Craft and 179 Ways to Save a Novel: Matters of Vital Concern to Fiction Writers.

Selgin's poignant and wry account of his best friends in junior high, including the notorious liar Victor, had the audience roaring with laughter, but also wistful over the evocation of that tender time when we cling to falsehoods, because that's the only safe thing to do.

Read your writing to yourself. Give voice to it and listen. If you can read it to a group, all the better. It's instructive for the writing, but also a powerful way to find your own voice and learn how to express it with strength and confidence. Isn't that what we all want in the end? A voice?