So begins National Women’s History Month in this often unstable March. For writers an examination of the immediate family might be a good place to start daily writing as a little prompting can result in poignant dives into memory’s deep pools. Especially for those just beginning to write, there’s usually a bubbling brook or a cesspool filled with just about anything one can imagine when it comes to relatives. Workshops often abound in poems about parents, particularly mothers or grandmothers. My plans this month include poems on Margaret Fuller—the feminist, Annie Jump Cannon—the astronomer, and the childless Maude of my youth—the fourth-grade teacher surely spawned from the groin of Satan.
In my free-write writing workshops, I rarely use prose examples as fodder and prefer the use of poems as they are short in length, require less in analysis, are rich in metaphor, and shorter still on adverbs. A favorite go-to source is the work of Mary Ruefle as her prose poems are a hybrid that isn’t as “poetry” feeling to those who haven’t read much. Her newest book, The Book, brims with delightful prose poems.
If you’re going to write a mother poem, this poem and much of Mary’s work in her books should be fodder aplenty. Her erasure work is also very inspiring.
“we are all one question, and the best answer seems to be love — a connection between things” Mary Ruefle
To learn more about Mary and her thoughts on life as a poet please check Poetry Foundation site. It’s a deeper dive into a writer’s life and many articles there provide much rich insight and discussion. I have always enjoyed her work especially since I’m both an artist and writer and linking things has been a major theme in my life’s work. It seems impossible to exist in a vacuum although I still know creatives who refuse to read or enjoy other’s works for fear of being “influenced” by them. I embrace influence!
If any of my thoughts inspire you to write poems during Women’s History Month, my hope is you will discover additional ways to explore and express the many themes of what it is to be ‘woman’ in the present day. If you want a chance at publication that has no entry free or monetary award, but has a fairly large distribution circle, an interesting site is Silver Birch Press which blogs poems to a large FB following on their FB and blog site. The theme is Mothers.
Write something this month about women even if mothers are not on your list of things to write about. There can never be enough creativity energy used to generate works about the women in this world. If nothing else in this month dedicated to women, register three young women to vote who aren’t already registered. Write them a thank you note in cursive if they do register. If they cannot read cursive, your work with them is not done. Have a great month. Taylor