Thank You, Rochelle

What does your writer/artist-community look like? This week, I’ve been thinking lots about my community, or communities to be specific, and find myself evermore grateful for all the support I’ve managed to find for my creativity over the years. This is not without effort, of course, because the world does not usually come crawling to kiss your feet. Maybe especially the writing world. In many ways, to be an artist is to go it alone – so to gather together, to create, a circle of like-minded or like-creative friends and acquaintances is not an abracadabra-it’s-here happening.

For me, first there was the group that poet-therapist Rochelle Brener led at the Capital District Psychiatric Center years ago, called Relatives Writing Workshop. These were the gatherings that brought me back to writing. To join, you had to have a relative or close friend with a mental illness. Finding this group – and Rochelle – in 1992 was a god(dess)-send, all the way through to its closure in 1995. It was Rochelle who handed me my first brochure for the International Women’s Writing Guild summer conference, which I finally attended in 1995 (and haven’t missed since). When I decided to create a writing group emulating the inspiring, supportive IWWG event’s atmosphere, it was at Rochelle Brener’s newly opened Mandala Center for Creative Wellness that WomanWords first came together. We continued to meet there for almost five years, until my friend moved to Sedona.

I think of all the networking – the communities – that have come out of that life-changing moment when I first saw the tiny blurb about Relatives Writing Workshop in some newsletter. IWWG led to WomanWords, WomanWords to meeting so many gifted women, who led me to the active open mic scene in the Upper Hudson/Mohawk River area of New York State, to the Hudson Valley Writing Guild. WomanWords also resulted in my organizing smaller writing groups- Wild Women Writing, Beach Writers, a 4-person poetry feedback group. Through writers and artists encountered in all these communities, I’ve gotten acquainted with others, attended workshops, friended folks on Facebook. The connections go on and on.

No wonder the WomanWords logo includes a spider web, symbolizing the ever-widening connections between women writers. It goes beyond women to ALL writers. Each thread affirms the spirit and enthusiasm with which we honor our words. Our stories are everyone’s stories, individualized and universal.

Rochelle passed away in Sedona two years ago this past March. How do you thank someone who gave you a gift you already possessed but needed to own? What do you say about a person who gave so much of herself to everyone she encountered, yet would tell you she received as much and more in return? You can’t “miss” an angel when you know she sits on your right shoulder always, and yet sometimes you’d love to hear her voice, get another e-mail from her with her latest poem or announcement about her activities.

Here’s a poem I wrote at a workshop with John Fox, author of Poetic Medicine: The Healing Art of Poem-Making (http://www.poeticmedicine.com/), late last year. I believe the prompt was to write to someone asking their assistance with something, perhaps in letter or prayer form. For me, the result speaks to all Rochelle was, as much as it entreats her spirit for a little help in areas in which I could use it! (Still haven't figured out how to stop Blogger from destroying my poem's format, so this one's off too!)


INVOKING ROCHELLE*
by Marilyn Zembo Day

Teach me to listen, dear friend,
for the bubbling undercurrent,
the spring from which heart and soul
erupts, where words attempt to describe
a life, a vision, a world unseen by others
yet real in its gifts and inevitable losses.

Show me how to focus, to bring myself
inward, to scratch away unnecessary
scrabble that pulls me further from
streams of consciousness, threatening
to scatter me like white wisps of dandelion
to impotent corners far from my creative self.

Rochelle, bring me to your place of discovery,
shared with so many, that I might produce
even a fraction of what you imparted to a broken
weeping world: words, visions, confidence,
empathy, sympathy, joy — folded into star-studded
packets of poetry, prose, expressive arts.

Keep me from spilling into my tendencies toward
over-doing, spreading into multiple layers
of plans, workshops, appointments. Take me,
instead, into the silence I am learning
to cherish where you, my Muse, remind me

I am called
to create.

I ask this, my once and always friend,
in the names of all goddesses we invoked,
in honor of countless lives you enriched,
for warming light you brought to shadowed faces,

because your torch burns still, in our hearts.

Blessed Be.

*Rochelle Brener (1945-2008), writer, editor, poet-therapist, Senior Poet Laureate of Arizona, artist, photographer, mask maker.


Do I think this is the best of poems? No. But, for me, it is healing. It addresses the woman who showed me how to create real community and to sustain it. Remember that movie title, Pay It Forward? This is what I do, for Rochelle, for Judi Beach, for Hannelore Hahn, for every person (most of whom have been women) who inspired and supported me. And for myself, because my mentors have taught me that to nurture the world, one must first nurture and love one’s Self.

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YOUR TURN

• Make a list of your “communities” – groups of people in your life, however formalized or freeform they might be. Writing groups, co-workers, community action groups, art organizations, neighborhood friends, family, etc. Jot down notes about how each supports you. Note also if there are negatives, i.e., do they pull you down sometimes? call your goals pipedreams?
o Choose one group, one member of that group, and write a letter to her/him. Ask their help with something: a project, a personal matter, etc. (Note: all “letters” in this exercise are meant to be “Unsent Letters” although you could really mail them if you like.)
o Write a Thank You note to each community.
o Write a Letter to Self, promising that you will spend more time with the supportive community folks than those making you feel that you can’t write/create, that nothing you will do will ever be good enough, or that you should re-focus on the money-making side of life.

• I re-contacted my favorite high school English teacher years ago, after WomanWorder Judith Prest wrote about letters and meetings with her old English teacher at a WW session where our theme was “Mentors.” While Judy’s teacher has since passed away, I still occasionally have lunch with mine (she moved back to the Capital Region several years ago), often bringing books for the library in her community of Roman Catholic sisters.
o Write about someone who nurtured your desire to write or create art of any kind. Can you recall what s/he looked like? Her/his scent? Put it in the context of the period in time (what did the clothes look like? automobiles driven by this person, if any? anything that will put your mentor in a time and place). How were you mentored? Did this person have faith in your abilities when others didn’t, when you didn’t? Were you reluctant to accept help or encouragement? Do you know where your mentor is today?
o Write a letter to someone who nurtured your creativity. Thank them. Tell them how they did it and what you’re doing now with what s/he taught you. This person may not be alive today; or you might know where s/he lives.
o Write a letter to someone you think needs encouragement, especially in the realm of writing/creativity. Point out specific talents you’ve witnessed in her/her, and give them hope that they can enrich the world with their work. Make them want to make more art, to develop their talents. Tell them about what they may encounter on their artistic path and how to counter negativity.
o Often our mentors aren’t real people in our lives. They’re people in history or books, writers we’ve never met, subjects of news stories who’ve inspired. Write about someone you’ve admired from afar, real or unreal, living or dead—what they did/said that impressed you; how you might like to emulate her/him. This could be in letter form, if you like.

Writing, Like Yoga: Good for You!

Many of my friends manage to make entries on their blogs regularly, some every day. I am in awe. How do they do it? It’s been a year since I’ve touched this blogsite. Luckily, it hasn’t been a year since I’ve written anything, although I’m not as consistent at that as I’d like to be either.

Like yoga, I know a regular writing practice is good for me. Like yoga, I feel better after even one session of at least 30 minutes. And yet here I am, once again, attempting to build into my day (or at least into my week) a pattern in which both yoga and writing co-exist with the other necessities in my life. Like eating, sleeping, cooking, housecleaning (ok, not so regular about this one!), breathing…

This week I’ve spent 30-35 minutes minimum, 3 out of 4 days, greeting the sun with yoga poses, i.e., I’ve been up early and it’s the first thing accomplished. As for the writing, this past year my Wild Women Writing and Beach Writers groups have met sporadically and scribbled words as well as created art together (in fact, five WWWers took a 5-day retreat together at Wellspring House in Massachusetts, http://www.wellspringhouse.net/, in November). Except for a lengthy winter layover, I’ve managed to draft and e-mail several WomanWords E-Newsletters, even as I struggled to convert the distribution list from topica.com to a Google list. I’m currently in the middle of leading a WomanWords series of workshops at Still Point Interfaith Retreat Center (http://www.stillpointretreatcenter.com/). Not to be overlooked, Spirit of a Woman: A Journey of Power, Passion & Place, led by Dorothy Randall Gray and myself last month, brought 17 women to Still Point for an incredible weekend of writing and the making of WomanSpirit dolls. (Note today's photo above: I am holding a WomanSpirit doll and reading what I've written from her.)

So I have written. Several poems, most of which I love, have come from many of these gatherings. Some even emerged from solitary writing sessions over chai lattes at Barnes & Noble cafes.

At WriterSister Leslie Neustadt’s urging, I created a purposely-small poetry feedback group (first meeting early in May) in which the four of us bring poems for positive, in-depth critique. Positive doesn’t mean saying, for every work presented, “This is great!” (even though these poets are amazing wordsmiths). It means that we always start with a positive comment about the piece, what we especially liked, and all other suggestions are couched in wording that honors the fact that this is that poet’s work and it is her decision about what gets edited: “I’d have liked to know more about…” “I love these lines, but wasn’t clear about…” “If it were my poem, I might’ve…” Always, always, always, we are encouraging the writer to keep writing (which is also how every WomanWords session and event operates). Out of this group, in just a short time, I now have five honed poems plus two more from our session this week to-be-further-edited.

Another “event” also encouraged me to write/edit more (this reminds me of a t-shirt I received from Rochelle Brener years ago, still worn around the house occasionally- down the left-frontside, black letters against white, it exhorts, “write/ edit/ write/ edit/ write/ edit.”). Award-winning poet D. H. Melhem (http://www.dhmelhem.com/) invited me to participate in her “Poetry One-on-One” class at this year's International Women’s Writing Guild conference (being held for the first time at prestigious Brown University in Providence, RI, http://www.iwwg.org/). A few years ago, I applied to and was accepted for this individual poetry critique and discussion with D.H. and came away with both an affirmation of my creativity and excellent suggestions for editing many poems (a couple, she thought, were actually finished, no changes needed!). To be “invited” back to One-on-One felt like both an honor and a challenge. It forced me to review my work, pull out 10 pages of poetry for the master-poet’s review, create a 75-words-or-less statement of theme for a proposed chapbook or full-length book of my poetry, and draft a possible table of contents. A worthy exercise capable of making any writer focus. My pages, statement and table of contents have been in D.H.’s hands for a few months, and the effects of such a review of my poetry continue to have a ripple effect—the new critique group, pulling out old poetry to hone them for the anticipated book, and a smile on my face as I look forward to the conference and my One-on-One.

The other effect was to look over a life and its purpose. This year, I moved into the Social Security age bracket. My words spread before me—well, poetry only, in this case—it seemed like there should’ve been more. I should’ve been more engaged with words during my 20s, 30s, 40s. But then, adding in the other writing (fiction, nonfiction, newsletters, a play...), plus writing-related activities, I begin to see why others tell me that I “find more energy in one day than [they] can muster in a week [or a month…].” It wasn’t/isn’t about just my words. It’s about YOUR words too, which I’d encapsulated in this short poem last fall:


MISSION STATEMENT
by Marilyn Zembo Day

Here is what I do:
I scatter seeds
I tell you, You Can.
I give you tools:
paper, pen,
permission.

Seeds require
soil, water, sunshine
Given attention, they birth.
You are Woman.
You are Creation.

Birth. Walk out into the world.
Scatter your seeds.
Tell your stories.
I give you permission.
I give you my seeds.


Still, it’s important that one make time, make space in a life for her/his own writing. To write is to go deep, to witness, to acknowledge one’s place in the world. On that note, I’ll leave you with one of the poems written about my life, my place in the world, originally published in the Akros Review (out of U. of Akron) in 2007 (unfortunately, the formatting for each "date" seems to have gotten lost in the copying from MSWord - something to figure out later on, i.e., how to prevent that).


PROBABLY SOBER
(after Deborah Harding’s “How I Knew Harold”)
by Marilyn Zembo Day

Sometime in 1971 Carol, Chris and I throw snowballs at each other outside Stonehenge Apartments. It is 3:30 a.m. and the bars closed half an hour ago. Our much older neighbors slumber in their beds. Probably sober too.

Sometime in 1947 Mom climbs three flights of stairs to Aunt Mary’s and Uncle Champ’s flat, eats spaghetti and meatballs and goes into labor. I am born with a pointy head. Mom later tells me, over and over again, that I looked like Dinny Dimwit.

Sometime in 1968 Roy sends me six red roses for my twenty-first birthday.

Sometime in 1958 I spend the night at Susan’s house. We practice kissing, just in case Richie corners one of us near the school yard and wants a smooch. Susan tells me how a boy and girl do it but I don’t believe her. It sounds gross… and impossible.

Sometime in 1959 my father buys me a clunky, gray, used Remington office typewriter. He says, “Girls should learn how to type.” He also tells me girls shouldn’t go to college.

Sometime in 1987 my daughter and her friend are in the kitchen with me. I am making cookies for Sunday school youth group. Kristen asks, “How old were you, Mom, when you first did it with a guy? I drop my spatula.

Sometime in 1956 my brother George’s teacher pulls me out of my fourth grade classroom to witness her yelling at him for failing a spelling test. “Why can’t you be more like your sister?” My mother is pissed off but she won’t call Mrs. Benson to complain.

Sometime in 1969 Roy and I park on Krumkill Road to make out. I toss my underpants out the window before he drives me home.

Sometime in 1965 I am accepted at State University of New York at Albany, early decision plan. They require a $50 deposit. My father says girls shouldn’t go to college. My mother takes out a loan against a life insurance policy to cover the deposit and Christmas presents.

Sometime in 1971 Lloyd sends me two dozen roses. He tells me he is married. His wife is expecting their second child. Oops. The night we met, the song playing on his car radio was I Never Promised You a Rose Garden.

Sometime in 2006 my cousin Mary spends an entire day of her vacation cooking her mother’s famous spaghetti sauce with meatballs and sausage. She and her husband are staying with my brother George. I bring home sauce and sausage to freeze for future consumption.

Sometime in 1978 Bill and I host a party. Roy brings a date. Mary says to Carol and me that Roy is probably the only guy at the party who’s slept with four of the women in the room (assuming he’s already slept with his date). We compare notes.

In mid-November 1972 my water breaks at 6 a.m. during the first snow storm of the season. After a half hour of Bill’s digging the VW out of the snow and seventeen hours of my own labor, I have a caesarean section. Our daughter’s head is perfectly rounded.

Sometime in 1968 I quit college, for the first but not the last time.

Sometime in 2005 I begin seeking an agent for my novel. First choices are those who take e-mail submissions because they’re just a few easy keystrokes away. Girls should learn to type.

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YOUR TURN

o Can you write a Mission Statement? What is it you DO or want to Do? This doesn’t have to be about poetry or even about writing. It’s about looking inside yourself and witnessing your life. Look for themes—what ideas, causes recur in your life? Perhaps, these have changed over time (which would be normal!). Make a list of what mattered to you during different stages over the years. Can you trace a pattern, a moving-toward your current needs and desires? Pick up your pen or get into MSWord and let the words flow. If it needs to become a poem, it will. If it’s meant to be prose, that will happen. LET IT HAPPEN.

o What “regular practice” (writing, yoga, t’ai chi, jogging, painting, etc.) would you like to encourage in yourself? Make a list of those potential practices. Choose one and write about why you aren’t already deep into this practice. If you’ve tried and failed to make it a habit, talk about why it didn’t work out. Don’t beat yourself up for it, just note what stopped you and ways you think could counter that happening this time around. Close with an affirmation that encourages you to follow that practice (but won’t set you off on a guilt trip if you falter at times).

o My poem, “Probably Sober,” came out of an exercise published in Steve Kowit’s In the Palm of Your Hand: The Poet’s Portable Workshop (Tilbury House, 1995). Kowit provided Deborah Harding’s “How I Knew Harold” as an example of “a collage of memories out of which the poet created an appealing self-portrait.” He suggested that readers “write a poem with the same structure” as Harding’s, noting that the chronology is “jumbled” so that memories don’t move in a clear progression but jump back and forth. He also says to be sure that at least three of the items interconnect, if only tangentially. He also mentions that you should “hold to a chatty voice… you do not want to get self-consciously eloquent or lyrical.” This exercise worked well enough for me—it even helped me to write a poem that got published. Try it. Let me know what happened!

So What Is a Sestina Anyway?

I started blogging because I needed a place on the web where I could post new poetry written from writing prompts offered from the cyber space group Poem (or JustOnePoem, as it's called on Carolee and Jill's blog). Of course, I'm an eclectic writer so this is about more than poetry. But today is "posting day" for our first writings based on our group's first poem-prompt(s), which happened to be "Delta Flight 659: to Sean Penn" by Denise Duhamel. It's a sestina, a form in which I'd never written. In fact, I generally write in what I guess is called an "open form" since it offers more freedom (I am assuming, based on its definition, that "free verse" is an open form). Mind you, we were not directed to write in any particular format-- just to let something about the poem become a writing prompt for us. I happened to like the challenge of adhering to a form yet letting it allow me to voice whatever I needed to say. In fact, two poems came to me during our "writing week"-- my Voice had a few things to say!

At the International Women's Writing Guild conference at Skidmore College (Saratoga Springs, NY), writer/artist Jan Lawry has led a workshop for several years. Even though there's a multitude of workshop options, I try to drop in on at least one of her six sessions because she always offers something that tweaks my Muse into action. A few years ago her prompts were actual poems by both other writers and of her own. Like JustOneWriter, she suggested we find our prompts in the poems offered-- including the possibility of using the same form, or format, as the author. I found this "spin-off" idea not only helpful but inspiring. I didn't always attempt to follow the same structure but when I did, something seemed to magically flow onto the paper (maybe not in perfect shape, but later to be honed into a final piece).

Before I include the two poems into this blog entry (and I'd like your feedback on them, if you so desire to click onto Comments below and offer it), let me first recommend a book in case you're inclined to try your hand at a specific poetic form. Once I'd read Duhamel's Sean Penn piece, I consulted The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms by Mark Strand and Eavan Boland. It gave me the basic structure of the sestina, some history of the form, its contemporary context and plenty of examples. I highly recommend that, if you're curious about other poetry formats too, such as the villanelle, the sonnet, the pantoum, or the ballad, you check this volume out.

And now, my new poems. Duhamel's poem, in addition to urging me to create a sestina, also prompted me to write a poem addressed to a celebrity. I'd recently viewed the film "The Great Debaters" and was moved by the true story of the courage of this group of young African-American college students who dared to debate issues that, in their time and place (Texas, 1930s), could have gotten them lynched. It helped that Denzel Washington is a star that I admire. Having lived through the 60s and walked in a few local equal rights/anti-war marches, this was a no-brainer as to why I'd choose the topic-- but how to put it into a poem? I discovered that the form served me well, although I didn't follow the specific pattern of words within each stanza to the letter. [Note that I've included a picture from those days, a local march, me & my friend Roy!]


PSEUDO-Sestina:
After Viewing The Great Debaters
by Marilyn Zembo Day

What are we left with, Denzel Washington,
when the music stops and dancers
depart, hopes dashed against white-washed wall,
strung-out children setting a place
for freedom at a skewered table,
imagining Martin, Malcolm… waiting

for Barack? If it doesn’t feel like dancing,
Denzel, if dreams cloud the wait-list,
which hopes then get forever tabled
while corruption pervades Washington?
Opposing agendas from wall-eyed
senators hinder, delay replacement

of archaic laws etched on placemats
from Greensboro, where obedient waitstaff
balked at Langston’s crumbling wall,
legal feet accustomed to a slow-dance
of separation, their guts awash
with the bounty of rancid tablefare.

Picture a traditional southern tableau:
straight-backed Negro servant placing
the evening meal before George Washington,
this man who would not be king, awaiting
the two-step of master-slave dinner-dance.
I ponder the miracle of an image wallpapered

onto a stone-and-cotton cultural wall,
blistered by the fires of a thousand washerwomen
who refused to take the bus, disrupting the waiting
hangman and dictating the tempo of the dance.
I could not envision an emerging replacement
yet I took a seat at the apocalyptic banquet table.

Tell me, I wanted to know, how you choreograph
a revolution. Assure me that the weight of irrefutable
truth will someday uproot complacency.
Denzel, I wanted peace. Handwashing
the feet of exhausted walkers, I, the wallflower,
indulged. I played the game of waiting.

But no one waits forever, Mr. Washington. Elijah’s
unattended place at the table requires attention.
I would’ve danced at the wall just as joyously for Hillary.



The idea for the second sestina came from a picture that my friend Leslie Neustadt sent to me via Facebook, an image of the "melancholy" Mary Magdalen painted by Renaissance painter Artemesia Gentleschi. Leslie knew of my interest in the Magdalen but she hadn't known I'd also become a "fan" of Gentleschi's work long ago-- back when my daughter Kristen did a college paper on this gifted artist. I had never heard of her at the time, but then who knew about women artists from that era? First of all, few women would've been given the opportunity to study art (Gentleschi's father was a painter)-- and then there's the fact that the winners write the history and the "winners" in those days were men (no comment on current status; suffice to say things are improving but we're not there yet).

I'd also read Susan Vreeland's novel, Artemesia, and loved it-- highly recommended. Vreeland takes what she researched on the artist and the times and imagines her circumstances: her art, her being raped and (being considered "property" of her father) having little recourse, and more. Between the novel and the painting of Mary Magdalen, the poem took form-- a sestina form, that is.


Paintboxes and Whores: Inspired by
Artemesia Gentileschi’s Mary Magdalen as Melancholy
by Marilyn Zembo Day

I am writing this poem, Artemisia, hidden
behind a cheap library desk, body
hunched into the absurdity of paintings
of women toting sacred oils, called whores,
and saintly men who thrust that sharp-
edged label upon them. A curve, a breast,

a body should not incite rage. Breast-thumping
testosterone motives aside, what hidden
agenda did he harbor, what sharp-
textured dream haunted his body
that he would violate, then call you whore?
Artemesia Gentileschi, is there enough red paint

on an artist’s pallet, in an entire paintbox,
to depict what lurks below your broken breast?
I am drawn to your golden Magdalen, whore
of your unforgiving Church, and I imagine you hide
behind your easel, building a mythic body
of work, slicing into your abuser with sharp

Biblical strokes, a woman’s sight sharpening,
narrowing, with each layer of paint.
No one said to you, “Love your body.”
Perhaps wrenched from a reluctant mother’s breast,
sensuous touch became something to hide
lest you emulate the first-century whore.

Once someone said we’re all whores
for something or someone. Whether sharp
or soft, sound still breaks into the silence. Hidden
messages, cryptic or decoded, continue to paint
the landscapes of women’s lives. To keep abreast
of terror wreaks another kind of trauma on the body.

Beyond the wall of my bookish enclave somebody
drones on about overdue fines, while I play word-whore,
seizing on every trick to lure the Muse to my breast.
My Critic batters every image, his voice shrill, sharp.
His laugh is a coiled rattlesnake. How could you paint,
with so many ghosts, so much to hide?

Somebody scraped the paint away, Artemesia:
Sharp-tongued whore, in the bosom of feminist truth,
like Mary, I invite you to come out of hiding.


YOUR TURN

1. Try writing a poem, or a letter, to a celebrity or famous person. Perhaps s/he's a particular favorite of yours. Maybe you want to tell her/him how s/he's inspired you, or that you like something s/he's done recently (a film, a song, lending support to a charity, etc.). How were you inspired by this person? Or was it the opposite-- did her/his actions anger or sadden you? What questions would you ask of this person?

2. What's your favorite movie? Or what film most recently evoked strong emotions for you, made you think about an issue or an era? Go with those emotions, thoughts-- let words draw out what needs to be expressed.

3. Either go to a museum or Google a favorite artist. Choose a painting and see what it evokes in you. Think about what the artist was seeing but also let it speak to your own history and feelings. Does something that's happening in the work of art bring back a memory, pinpoint a particular time or person in your life that you hadn't thought about in a while (or have been thinking about but not doing anything about it)? At a recent workshop I attended led by Therese Broderick, one of her prompts worked particularly well for me: start with "This reminds me of..." and, whenever the flow gets blocked, write the same starter-phrase again and keep going.

4. Are you a Baby Boomer? Do you remember the 60s? (Try not to start with the cliche, "If you remember the 60s, you weren't there.") Did you march? Were you a hippie? Did you go to 'Nam? Did you embrace Free Love? Were you a big Beatles or Stones fan? Write the memories. Maybe this becomes a book, or a chapbook-- to be published or not.

5. Write about courage. What is it? How does one find the courage to sit at a lunch counter when your actions could lead to death? How do you survive rape and become an accomplished artist? How do you get from wake-up to sleep-time each day? Give examples. Tell when you've been courageous (and yes, you have-- just acknowledge it).

WHAT COLOR IS YOUR/MY AURA?

I have a new car: a 2009 Saturn. It wasn’t our (hubby Bill’s and my) intent to purchase a new car this year but our daughter’s need for a new/used transport was coming to a critical head (maybe she could take our old Saturn), and then there was that new jumpstart-the-economy tax deduction as an incentive (buy a new car this year, claim tax paid on it as a deduction in January 2010). We couldn’t find a decent used car for her at a reasonable price—at least not quickly—and so the idea of Kristen’s acquiring my beautiful (in my eyes anyway—it’s served me well) white station wagon popped up. In the end, we decided to pay off one car loan to acquire another.

But that’s not really what this blog entry is about.

I am not a car person. I almost never remember what kind of a car someone drives, although maybe its color might be recalled (I know Grandpa Boyd had a blue car and that my mother always said that he never had an accident but he probably caused a few because he drove in the middle of the road). I don’t have the name of auto manufacturers and their model names on the tip of my tongue. Some remain familiar for one reason or another: in my younger days, I recognized Corvettes, Carmanghias (although I probably still don’t spell that one right), Volkswagen bugs, Ford Falcons (my brother George’s first car) and... aw geez, now I can’t even remember the name of that cute little white foreign job that my cousin Diane drove (she’d pick me up at the bus stop on campus my freshman year at SUNY Albany, announcing her arrival a half-mile away with its noisy muffler). I thought the Datsun Z was ultra-cool, but then I was unduly influenced by the fact that a guy I had a crush on drove one.

I don’t even like to drive. If a car runs well enough, has automatic transmission, sports little enough rust on it so as not to embarrass me and, nowadays, doesn’t consume gasoline faster than a camel slurping water at its first oasis in days—I’m a happy camper, uh, driver/owner. I also want a CD player that works.

When I walked into the office the day after we’d looked at new Saturns, I wasn’t jumping for joy at the prospect of a larger car payment—but I could tell my co-workers that we would be submitting paperwork to the credit union to see if they’d approve the loan. Asked what model car I’d chosen, I said, “Oh, it’s a Saturn Acura.” Oops. Wrong model for that dealership (I’m still not sure—would an Acura be a Toyota? Nissan?). We’d considered the Saturn Vue, which had much more room for art materials to be carried to my workshops, but it was worse on gas mileage and much more expensive.

Once the loan was approved and Bill had corrected my model mistake, I was again asked what kind of car I was buying, this time via telephone by my friend Mary. “A Saturn Aura,” I replied. Mary hesitated a mini-second and then said, “How appropriate for you.” Of course I knew exactly what she meant. I have earned a reputation as a more-or-less New Age-y person, mostly because of interests in feminist spirituality, labyrinths, personal altars, mandalas and things of that nature; thus, “Aura” would trigger her reaction. In response to her next question, about its color, I had to say, “Well, I don’t want to tell people that my Aura is gray.” That evoked a laugh.

I am not into “auras” as in the New Age definition (whatever that is) but I do understand the concept. I think it’s really not far from the definition in my Webster’s, which reads, in part: 1. a distinctive and pervasive quality or character; air; atmosphere; 2. a subtly pervasive quality or atmosphere seen as emanating from a person, place or thing…

Years ago, when I worked part-time as receptionist at Mandala Center for Creative Wellness (one night a week to offset the cost of renting space for my writing group), I got to know a well-known, local psychic who sometimes leads workshops on detecting auras. Theresa offered walk-in readings on some of the evenings I sat at the desk, and we hit it off quickly as we chatted—especially once I realized how down-to-earth she was. Once, I asked how she can “teach” someone to see another person’s aura. She told me that we all have that ability but it gets lost as we grow older and more acculturated to Western values. In other words, I surmised, we stop trusting our intuition—which can tell us lots about a person when s/he walks into the room, when s/he first speaks, when s/he gestures in any way at all. What she was doing was telling people how to access their natural psychic abilities.

“But,” I queried further, “what if you just don’t see a color, what if you don’t see anything around that person?” “Make it up.” “Make it up? No way.” “Yes, make it up.” If we don’t “see” anything, we should still feel something. And colors have emotional meanings to us. Is there anyone who hasn’t thought of red as passionate, or painful, or exciting, or sensuous? How about blue as peaceful, or nurturing, or cleansing? It is Theresa’s position that we begin to see auras after we learn to trust our own feelings/ intuition about our people-judgments.

My friend Leiah Bowden creates gorgeous Energy Portraits (www.lightspeak.com), and she teaches others how to do the same. At her workshop, ever the feet-on-the-ground skeptic, I couldn’t follow her into a deep meditation (I have too much “monkey mind” to meditate well) yet I immediately took to the process of adding colors to my Energy self-portrait. Without prompting, I applied Theresa’s make-it-up theory to the activity—only I found that I wasn’t making anything up. Here was the red passion of my creative fire; there, a violet sensuous love of life; in this corner, golden sunlight, my general optimistic nature… and more. Leiah’s portraits are auras on paper. A fleeting glimpse of the soul using color.

My Aura is gray. My 2009 Saturn Aura, that is. But then perhaps, if I want to imagine it, my other aura is tinged with a bit of gray too—steel gray, a gentle but firm courage that buoys me up in harder times and allows that “general optimism” to flourish into abundant joy in better periods. Mary was right: how appropriate.

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YOUR TURN

You’ve read about my Aura/aura—now it’s your turn, reader/writer/artist. Here are a few options:

1. Stand in front of a mirror and imagine your own aura (who knows—maybe you’ll actually see one!). What color is it? How far out from your body does your aura extend? What do you think the colors represent? Does the aura change while you’re watching yourself in the mirror?
2. Write a story about a wo/man who’s never seen an aura before but all of a sudden starts seeing them. One of them, emanating from a co-worker, frightens her/him. Why? What happens, once she sees the aura?
3. Write a “car memory”—your first car; the family car growing up; the first time you made out in the back seat; the last time you went to a drive-in movie; how you met your mechanic, whatever memory that emerges in which a car somehow shows up.
4. You buy a new car with a mystical name. It takes you on an adventure. Where do you go? How long are you gone? Include feelings, sights, smells, noises. Make it a fairy tale or a myth, if you like.
5. Go to Leiah Bowden’s website and check out the Energy Portraits. Try creating one of yourself or someone you know. Make a meditative afternoon of it. Better yet, sign up for one of Leiah’s workshops!

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Let me know if you created anything—writing or visual— from the above prompts. Make my aura shine a little more golden!

Love,

Marilyn

Getting to Know Me...

How much ego does it take to create a blog? I mean, one has to think, "I have something to say..." or, more to the point, something to say that someone else might want to read-- right? On the other hand, there are plenty of people in the world who seem to just talk (or write) to hear/see their own words. Most of us can make a short list of some of those acquaintances in the time it takes to start-up your computer. I don't think I fall into the latter category (?) and yet I still find myself cataloging the reasons why I'm clicking away at the keys on my laptop at 10 p.m. on a Saturday night-- when I could be delving further into the latest book that's caught my imagination or at least washing a few dishes lingering in the kitchen sink.

When I joined the cyber "poem" group started by local poets Carolee Sherwood and Jill Crammond Wickham and touted on Facebook, I read that poetry written from their prompts should be posted on our blogs or websites so members of the group could offer their feedback. Unfortunately, I had no blog (although I'd been saying I was going to start one for over a year) and my WomanWords website fell off the online wagon a few years ago for lack of time (both mine and my daughter's-- Kristen was doing the set-up for me). I sent a note to the FB group saying I wasn't sure what to do about this. Carolee assured me that I could post my poetry on FB in the Notes section. Given recent hype about FB in the press, I'd been careful NOT to post much there that hadn't already been published somewhere else. So this was the kick-in-the-butt I needed. Reason #1 for A Woman and Her Words.

Reason #2 is simply that I love to write. At times I'm driven to tell a short tale or two about growing up, about something I heard, about something too good not to share. I have a friend in California, Pat G., who says she loves it when I "go into story mode." According to Pat, there's a distinct change in tone in my e-mails when this happens, which is when her eyes open wide and she pays close attention. Lots of times this is when I tell a story about growing up in a large family-- not of siblings but of a multitude of aunts, uncles and cousins. Pat and I have been friends since my first attendance at the International Women's Writing Guild summer conference in 1995, when she was housed for the week in a room next to mine. She's only been able to attend that event perhaps two or three times since then (once my husband Bill and I picked her up at the airport and drove her to the campus), and yet I'd bet she knows me better than many of the people with whom I worked for years in a state agency. Stories do that. Shared words can create bonds.

Under other circumstances, I would say that #3 Reason had something to do with my love affair with paper. I love the look and feel of paper. Paper entices me to do something with it. Fill it with words. Cover it with images, color. Tear it up for collage. It's probably why I started writing. I can remember long afternoons as a kid, no one to play with (my brother was off somewhere, most likely), when I'd open a black-and-white composition book and fill its pages with "lesson plans" and lists of imaginary students. Once I walked the block to Woolworth's, a crisp dollar bill rolled up in the palm of my hand, and bought-- instead of a few comic books or something "normal"-- a rent receipt book. It just called out to be purchased and filled with imaginary tenants. More recently, on vacation in the Maryland/ D.C./ Virginia area, I kept my husband, daughter and two friends waiting while I drooled over tons of items in a "paper" store in Old Town Alexandria (I wound up buying four large, and not cheap, sheets for collage). But certainly blogging isn't about paper, not unless I print my entries and put them into a binder. Hmmm... maybe...

This blog is about Expression. Mine and my readers (I'm assuming I'll have a few). My WomanWords E-Newsletter seems to have been well-received since Day 1, with its Quote, Writing Prompt, list of Books I've read and copious suggestions for submitting work, creative events and other possibilities. Some of that is likely to find its way into A Woman and Her Words, but I'm thinking this is more than a newsletter. The plan is to not have a plan. In the beginning, it will be more like the freewrites we writers should be allowing ourselves to do: it will be allowed to evolve. Especially, it will be about my creative process and I'll be interested in hearing how my process resonates and/or differs from others'.

As an opening, I posting (below) a poem written at the IWWG conference several years ago in a class called "Writing from Our Religious Pasts." The workshop leader was Kathleen O'Shea, a former nun and a writer previously nominated for a Pulitzer for her nonfiction book, Women on the Row. The crux of this class was that so much of our religious past forms us. During the week we wrote from childhood and other "religious" experiences, but our final assignment was to write about what we currently believe. As an introduction to Marilynology (I stole that term from a fun exercise currently going around Facebook-- using your name and adding the "-ology" after it is part of the game), here's the result of Kathleen's final writing prompt-- for me-- at that summer conference:


BELIEF STATEMENT, 6/24/04
by Marilyn Zembo Day

I believe the Divine
is Within and Without
but that those who do not seek Her
Within
will find it difficult to experience Her
Without.

That sometimes the answer
is a question
and the question may lead
to more puzzles
the complexities of which
in themselves
might be answers.

That knowing that I will never know
with absolute certainty
all of the answers
or even a considerable amount of the questions
adds to the mystery and affirms
that life is deep and changing
and linked to something greater than ourselves.

I believe that I can name
my Inner Divinity as I choose
but that She is really nameless and genderless
balanced in her love for humanity;
I picture her saddened, tearful
at the violence done in her various names
wanting to pull all men and women to her breast,
to comfort, reintegrate us into her womb
that we might re-learn our Oneness.

I believe that all life is a circle
and that we return, return, return
that, as science informs us,
our energies, atoms, do not dissipate;
all energy in the Universe continues to exist,
simply evolving into different forms
just as all of our stories
shapeshift in our many voices.

I believe in the Soul
insofar as it is somehow linked to our own Divinity
and in that it speaks to us through our creative urges
and that if our creativity is stifled
we become as broken bits of glass tossed aside by the Creator
when we might have been a stained glass window
reflecting back to the world
all that we have become and
all that we leave behind.


Now here's what YOU, reader/writer, can do. You can pick up your pen and start with "I believe..." and just let go. If you get stuck, start again with "I believe..." or try "I don't believe..." This doesn't have to be spiritual or intellectual or anything at all. It only has to flow from your pen (or through your keyboard). It could be that, at the moment, all you can believe in is the t.v. remote and its ability to take your mind off the crappy job or the possibility that your husband is having an affair or your empty nest. Don't judge what you're writing. Writer Emily Hanlon says you get it down and then you pick out the jewels later on. And if there are not jewels this time, there will be eventually. If you don't write at all, there will never be jewels. Write.