Posted on by Laura Lee

One Hundred Years of My Antonia

I love the novels, short stories, and poetry of American writer Willa Cather.  She may  be best known for her beloved novel of the prairie, My Antonia

One hundred years have passed since the publication of this lovingly and well-written novel.  The Willa Cather Foundation  is remembering the novel with memories of the real life woman who partly inspired Cather to write about Antonia.

Only a book nerd would love this, and I love this.  Cather’s fiction is not flashy or trashy or shocking; they are loving but realistic looks into the beauty and the desperation of life.

Highly recommended.

Posted on by Laura Lee

Two poetry submissions this week

poetry     Two poems submitted this week.  That’s two more than last week, so we are in the positive direction.  More to follow.  Two rejections or two acceptances or… two no answers.

I enjoyed writing these poems, one a political poem and one simply bizarre–but inspired by a rather unique painting.  Art can inspire art!

Have you had any luck lately publishing?

Posted on by Laura Lee

Writing to and in the voices of fictional characters

writing to characters

       I’ve written to fictional characters for many years; sometimes, I get replies.  When very young, I used to write to Anne Frank to offer comfort, to seek comfort, to wish she had lived.  Imagine what she could have written, what she could have become as an adult. I wrote to her when I was very young, before I really understood her history.  I wrote to her as if she were a character in a book, and I just loved her.

I have written in characters’ voices to other characters, in the form of ekphrastic poems.

I have written poetry in the voices of Levin from Anna Karenina, of Macduff from Macbeth, of Simon from Lord of the Flies.  I have written in the voice of Lucy Gayheart in Willa Cather’s fine novel of the same name.  To characters in the novels of Thomas Wolfe–o, lost!  To characters in the amazing novels of John Steinbeck.  To characters in those many young adult novels I read when a teen–I wanted to tell them I understood.

Do many others do this?  It seems such an incredible thing to me when a writer creates characters that truly speak to me; they help me grow as a person.  They help me empathize, see things from other points of views.

From one mind to another, across the years and the miles? That’s such an amazing gift of literacy.  Literacy means we don’t have to be confined to one place and time, and that is a priceless gift.

Posted on by Laura Lee

Writers: writing, politics, art… Tuck Magazine mini review

journal      As promised, I will continue to post links to sites I find are good for teachers, writers, poets, and more.

Tuck Magazine
–an online political, human rights and arts magazine, because social justice and the arts are important.

From their site:

“Tuck Magazine is a political, human rights, lit, music and arts journal with a difference: we aim to entertain a wide variety of readers globally.”

Now don’t you want to go there and read?  I feel it’s important to have creativity walk with compassion, which is the “slogan” of this site, after all.  I like what they are publishing.

If you have some sites you consider worth reading and investigating, let me know!

Laura Lee

Posted on by Laura Lee

Creativity and compassion should walk together.

teach                     Creativity and compassion should walk together–what does that even mean? Thank you, students.

I had no business entering teaching later on in life, and certainly had no business teaching where I did for my first full-time teaching job. I’d come out of business, gone to graduate school, and entered teaching in my middle years.

Prepared, but totally UNPREPARED for the great needs of the kids. My kids. Yes, I found teachers tend to refer to our students as OUR KIDS, MY KIDS. We love them.

My kids taught me so much, and among the many lessons learned is that it is better to be compassionate than talented.  Does the world need another poet? Maybe, although I love poetry and would argue how important poetry is to the ever changing world. But does the world need better teachers? Oh, yes. (Poets don’t hate me. I love poetry! We need great poets of social justice and to keep poetry alive!)

I found my talents were challenged daily, hourly, even every minute I taught.  I grew so much as a person in patience, humor, and love.  Yes, love. Can we even use that word?

I found my talent for researching resources and creating lessons to engage even the most reluctant learners were challenged every day.

Some time I will write about what I lost by teaching where I did for so long, but for now I want to acknowledge something that has changed my life for the better:

Kiddos, my Kids, all the students even my college students–you’ve helped me become a better person. I had no idea the heart could grow so much. (Can we say heart?)  I had no idea how much my talents that lay dormant when I worked in business would be needed as a teacher.

I know I am a much better teacher than I am a writer, and I am okay with that.  What I’ve gained through teaching is immeasurable, even shocking.  I had not expected that!  I promise I will continue to improve as a teacher, even in retirement years.

Thank you, students past and present–I so hope you are doing well.  Thank you.

Posted on by Laura Lee

Encirclement of Sparrows

sparrow-bird-animal-nature-86591This rough draft came out of a challenge to use the expression “an encirclement of birds”. 

(First draft)

Encirclement of Sparrows
 

Roar like a train through the living room
  extra blankets on windows, surely frozen shut.
  Power lines down
  heat off, lights off,
  all shut down.


 Move away from the windows, he said.
  I want to be near when the sun rises, she said,
  You know me and sunshine-- I’ve got to--
  I know he said,
  I know, and they
  huddled under yet another blanket and shut down.

Listen, she whispered,
  hours or days or moments later,
  I hear the sunrise.
 Gray light through the curtains, and then
  tap, tap, tap
 on the tree branches
  scraping the windows
  an encirclement of sparrows.

 

 

 

Posted on by Laura Lee

So Where are the Poems?

poetry-clipart-poetry_clipart  Okay, Laura, where are the poems?

Oh, yes. Not here.  While I mostly write poetry, I don’t share it much since I am trying to publish poetry.

I write a mostly non popular genre of poetry, dramatic monologues and narrative poetry.  It’s the story teller in me!  I do branch out to nature poetry as well.

I’ll be posting some, however, that has been soundly REJECTED by the very best sites–some so in need of work that it won’t read the same once I am done with the revisions~!

I will also post links to some of my favorite sites.  Right now, I don’t think any site publishes better modern poetry than Rattle.

And I’ve been rejected there for years, as have many of my poet friends and colleagues.  Rattle is also a great site for beginners as well as major prize winners.  They publish at least eight books a year, which is amazing, they pay their poets, and have numerous ways to be included in their site, which is outstanding.  Their Facebook website Rattle Facebook page provides opportunities to not only read great poetry, but to try out publishing.

More to follow~!

Posted on by Laura Lee

First Lines/ Where do they come from? Where do they go?

First lines–I think of first lines a lot as the day goes on.  Sometimes I imagine an opening scene from fiction.  Often times it’s a first line of a poem.  Something will grab me, a sight, a sound, a smell, a memory.  And then the storytelling starts in my mind.

I grew up with parents who were quite the storytellers.  I didn’t know until I was a teenager than many kids could ask a simple question and get a simple answer; I always got a story, and usually a long, convoluted, probably only partly true story.

All three of my siblings are storytellers.  My students say I tell a LOT of stories.

I love stories.

But it all starts with a few words, a phrase, a line or two.

And these are going through my head, a sort of off fairy tale tale of some sort or a poem?

And the child asked, “It cannot get any worse, can it?” And the big one answered, “Oh, yes, yes it can. It can get colder.”

Who knows where the lines will go.  Often they go nowhere, but they do become  a part of me.  These lines have been popping up for days now, so I think that child and that big one have a story to tell.

IMG_7249

Posted on by Laura Lee

On handwriting and the paper load… good-bye to journals & paperback books?

handwriting journal    When one has been writing as an almost sacred act since early childhood as I have, it’s hard to feel any of that skill slipping away.  I was a journal writer, often writing up to 30 (wretched!) pages a day.  From those early journals came some good poetry, some good fiction, and one important way of dealing with the world.  My creativity, my secret world, writing. I was a bit arrogant about my journals and more journals and more journals.  I fell in love with reading as well and became a double snob–give me books and a pen and I’ll reject much else.

But I only imagined making a living as a writer for a few moments; I am too sociable and loving of creature comforts to embrace the garret.  I worked in business for many years, and spent much of my time typing.  I then entered teaching, where I spent decades loving what I did, while damaging my hands, shoulders, spine, etc. Ask a long time teacher and you will hear about the toll lugging around multiple heavy book bags takes on the body!

Did I mention I became a reading, English, and ESL teacher?  Ask a literacy teacher about the paper load!

My hands, wrists, shoulders, all became damaged by overuse.  I could continue to type well, but for some reason, writing by hand became painful and difficult, even after surgery, physical therapy, and more.

Luckily, over the decades, the path from my mind to my hands as they type has become a quick one.  One of my jobs in business was to type up conversations as they occurred, so I learned to be “one with the keyboard.”

But handwriting?  My old friend?  No, that’s a loss to me.

But also a gift to realize not to judge others who need to approach literacy differently than I do.  It’s all right to type journals.  It’s all right to use the phone to write notes.  It’s all right to dictate journal entries.

A decade ago, we moved.  The thought of moving TONS of paper with us was causing my aching back and hands to, well–ache!  No, I let go of so much paper.

I now read mainly online–horrors!  I can carry hundreds of books with me on my phone.  While I do miss all those paper texts, it’s more important that I continue to read.  I now write mainly by typing.

I miss my old skills of being able to carry around the weight of the world in paper books and carrying my paper journals everywhere.But I admit I certainly appreciate the ability to remain a person of literacy by using technology.

Lessons learned? Don’t be a literacy snob, embrace reading, writing, and language in its many forms.

Just don’t ask me to walk through an office supply store without coveting beautiful journals, pens, and papers.