IN THE NAME OF SELF-IMPROVEMENT

Check out my 10ers post on self-help for writers.

"Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

New Year's Eve 1988

11:58 on the clock-face
so you pulled over
to the side of Bradford Road
cheeks glowing green
heat humming
eyes never leaving the dial
fingers poised just so
determined to press the tape in
precisely at midnight.

I wanted you to kiss me.

Instead there was
only U2 thickening
the air between us
you closing your eyes
me shifting
and outside the peely bark
on the birches
bristling against the cold.

- Irene Latham

Ever been in a relationship with someone who, for whatever reasons, couldn't give you what you needed from them?

Sigh. It happens. And the only thing to be done about it is to move on, however difficult that may be.

“I chose and my world was shaken. So what? The choice may have been mistaken; the choosing was not. You have to move on.”

- Stephen Sondheim

PEACE LOVE JOY

Happy day before!

"I like to compare the holiday season with the way a child listens to a favorite story. The pleasure is in the familiar way the story begins, the anticipation of familiar turns it takes, the familiar moments of suspense, and the familiar climax and ending."

- Mr. Rogers

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

Einstein's Daughter

Had she been clock or apple,
compass or moving train,
perhaps Einstein would have loved her.

Had she been mysterious,
he might have abandoned
his affair with gravity and the speed of light

and claimed her
as his most important discovery.
Had he taken her small hands, just once,

and kissed each dimple and nail
perhaps he would have puzzled
over a different theory of relativity,

not of black holes,
but of DNA and blood,
how shared time multiplies

and love's abstractions find
definition in bath time and story time
and leaving the light on, just in case.

Instead, Einstein gave his daughter away,
locked himself in a windowless room
with his violin and pipe,

unlocked the secrets
not of life
but of E=mc2.

- Irene Latham

Did you know Einstein had a daughter? Yes, Mileva gave birth before she and Albert were married. Quite the scandal, of course... and easier (apparently) to relinquish the girl than raise her.

This poem is the second (of two) that appeared this month in the wonderful little journal FREE LUNCH. It is merely my imagination at work after reading a coupla biographies and viewing this exhibit.

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."

- Albert Einstein

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

How's this for a non-holiday image? Thank you, Lynn, for sending it my way.

Don't get me wrong, I love the warm family aspects of the holidays, but not the crowded cranky aspects. So this pic is a balm for me, today, as I make one last mad-dash attempt to get everything done before 1 pm tomorrow when the kids get out of school.

Wishing everyone peace and joy!

"If one really loves nature, one can find beauty everywhere."

- Vincent van Gogh

DEAR EDITORS

I am thrilled and honored to find two of my poems in the December issue of Glass, which also includes poems by such poets as Anuja Ghimire, Mary C. O'Malley, Robert Hastings, Caroline Miller, and others. Check 'em out! And if you've got something ready to submit, do consider this wonderful journal.

Now, a question: how do you writers out there feel about being edited?

I was reminded yesterday of the very first time I was edited, way back at the college newspaper. I remember how I picked up that newspaper article, and I was SO MAD to see my byline on something that was so spliced and diced, it barely resembled the words I had originally written. (My beautiful, wonderful words! Gone!)

Now, of course, I've had years to toughen my skin, as well as the opportunity to work the other side of the desk. But I gotta tell you, sometimes it still stings.

But only for a little while.

Then I look at it again (after a piece of Godiva chocolate or a nice long bubble bath) and see all my glaring errors... and suddenly I am overwhelmed with gratitude. To think that another human being took the time to keep me from making a complete fool of myself.... I mean, wow. You really can't put a price on something like that.

So thanks to all you editors out there who dive in again and again and make writers look way more gorgeous than we actually are. We'd be nothing without you.

"A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song."

— Maya Angelou

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

My Dress Hangs There

– after the painting by Frida Kahlo

When the maid asks, must you leave

New York so soon? I will say, it is

just the smell of last week’s uneaten fruit



that makes me long for La Casa Azul.

Then I will gently fold my lies into a suitcase,

and carry my pain to Mexico



where it can live a colorful life

under skirts that swirl as I raise

the brush, paint myself again and again,



until finally I see glimpses not of me

but of what I will become: strong

eyebrows, long neck, eyes wise.



But for now my dress hangs there

in the room where you sleep without me.

I could say I will miss you but I won’t



and when my back aches, I will paint

and when I am hungry, I will paint

and when I want to be loved



I will rest beneath the mango tree

take out my pain

and devour it.

- Irene Latham

This one I wrote as part of a series on historical women, and it is one of two poems that recently appeared in the journal FREE LUNCH. (Look for the second poem next Sunday.)

Also, this poem (along with six others in the historical women series) was selected for publication in the new anthology EINSTEIN AT THE ODEON CAFE, to be released by Churn Dash Press in March 2009.

I could write for days about Frida. She fascinates me.

"Feet, why do I need them if I have wings to fly?"

- Frida Kahlo

A BABY CHANGES EVERYTHING

Don't you love it when someone knows you so very well that they can hear a song and be absolutely certain that you will adore it? And then they bring that CD home to you as a surprise gift, for no reason at all, except that they are absolutely certain that you will adore it?

My husband is like that. And Faith Hill's JOY TO THE WORLD is the CD.

I am a sucker for Christmas music. I love it. It makes me feel happy and joyful and peaceful and just glad to be alive. And this CD has all my favorite songs on it (with a big orchestra!). Plus one more: A Baby Changes Everything.

This song SLAYS me. In the best way possible. Give yourself a little gift and check it out.

"The greatest gift you can give another is the purity of your attention."

- Richard Moss

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF TINNIE PETTWAY

This weekend it was my great honor to spend some time with Tinnie Pettway, one of the famous quilters from Gee's Bend who has authored a new book entitled GEE'S BEND EXPERIENCE.

I first met Tinnie and her daughter Claudia at an art exhibition last year, where I shared with them my book of poems (that includes the poem "The Quilts of Gee's Bend") and talked with them about my forthcoming novel THE WITCHES OF GEE'S BEND. They were simply wonderful to visit with, so I was thrilled to get to see them again. I bought books and potholders, and this time I remembered to take pictures!

Here is a poem from Tinnie's book:

Quilting Women (1989)

Way back then, women had few friends,
Worked from early morn, till the day's end

They would do their daily household things
While on some song they hummed and sang

They would gather together their quilting things
A few old britches, a few little string

A pair of scissors, their needle and thread
Think of patterns in their heads

Begin to sew old pieces together
Some pieces terrible, some a little better, some of that
stuff was almost leather

It may have been wool or it may have been rubber
But when they was done we all had cover

- Tinnie Pettway

IN PRAISE OF YOUNG WRITERS

I spent yesterday in Montgomery tucked away in a private dining room with writing students from Booker T. Washington Magnet High School and their super cool teacher Foster Dickson.

What a great group of kids! And wow, what words they brought to the table.

Thanks to each and every one of you for sharing a piece of yourself. I am absolutely thrilled and inspired by your courage. May our paths cross again.

"First I shake the whole Apple tree, that the ripest might fall. Then I climb the tree and shake each limb, and then each branch and then each twig, and then I look under each leaf."

- Martin Luther

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

Here's a wet picture for a wet day, thanks to my lovely sister Lynn. It just so happens that we were together the day she took this one, so it is extra-special to me.

"What greater thing is there for human souls than to feel that they are joined for life - to be with each other in silent unspeakable memories."

- George Eliot

ALICE IN ST. PIERRE?

First, a confession: I've never been a big fan of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Book or movie. Until now.

See, my novel ESCAPE FROM FIRE MOUNTAIN is set in 1902 Martinique, and my main character is a reader. Which means I've had to figure out what exactly she'd be reading. Enter Alice, published in 1865.

It's a bizarre little book, full of truths and wit and serious word-loving genius. I still prefer the poem "Jabberwocky," but I gotta tell, Alice has really grown on me. I especially like her conversation with the caterpillar. Haven't we all had conversations like that, that go round and round but accomplish nothing?

I leave you with a quote from the book, that totally applies to writing:

"'Begin at the beginning,' the King said gravely, 'and go on till you come to the end: then stop.'"

- Lewis Carroll

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

And There Was an Orange Moon

Last night I waited six hours
for the sound of your key in the door
my body curled in a tight ball
and I thought, this is what it's like
to know you'll soon be born,
here in this white-sheeted world
its walls rising and falling
with each fluttering breath

and you driving toward me
down highways made unfamiliar
by darkness and time
then out of nowhere
(you told me this morning)
moon like a pumpkin
your hand turning the knob,
heart thrumming in its iron cage.

- Irene Latham

My most favorite thing to write about in poetry or prose, is love. And as a reader, one of my most favorite things to read is fresh, new descriptions of love - ones that make me say, yes, EXACTLY....

"It is never too late to be what you might have been."

- George Eliot

FIVE FOR FRIDAY

1. I'm hungry. Was Thanksgiving really just yesterday?

2. It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas 'round these parts. All day we've been dragging out a box at a time. Funny what the guys choose to display and not display. (To all of you out there with little bitties, don't go secretly giving away that Bubble Santa that plays endless Christmas songs and leaves an annoying film of soap scum on the floor. Yep, still a hit a dozen years later.)

3. I'm one-third of the way through the latest draft of ESCAPE FROM FIRE MOUNTAIN, my historical fiction midgrade set in Martinique during the eruption of Mt. Pelee. This go around I've been concentrating on those little nitpicky details that lend authenticity to the story. Things like 1902 fashion and French words of endearment. Big thanks to La Belette Rouge for all your help! I've got a few more questions for you - will send you an email.

4. I am just about finished with a book called THE EGYPT GAME. It won a Newbery Honor Award, and it was recommended to me by another author when I was recounting a very important part of my childhood in which my youngest brother and sister and I created this whole play world based on what we knew about Egypt (knowledge largely collected during our many many viewings of the movie THE TEN COMMANDMENTS). Turns out, we weren't the only ones whose imaginary play was inspired by all things Egyptian. So, yeah, I am loving this book.

5. Must go nibble on some leftovers... peanut butter balls, anyone?

"Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding."

- Kahlil Gibran

PASSING IT ON

The very best part of getting a blog award is passing it on.

And as soon as Kirie sent it my way, I knew instantly who I wanted to send it to: Sarah Frances and Katie at Plot This.

They are gorgeous, they are talented, they are dreamers, just like me. Even better, they are dreamers who actively go after those dreams. They are writers I am so happy to be reaquainted with, and they also have a really REAL blog. Know what I mean? Plus they live in the great state of Mississippi and found the movie TWILIGHT as comical as I did. :)

Check them out. You won't be disappointed. And mark my words: these two are going places in the kidlitosphere. It's just a matter of time.

"There is luck in sharing a thing."

- Irish proverb

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

Many thanks to the lovely Kirie at 3 Little Chickies for giving me this award!

Kirie is an amazing woman who is a mom and artist -- and she is a continual inspiration to me.

Take today's poem, for instance. It was completely inspired by the above link, in which Kirie writes about the gorgeous gown she created for her daughter's Halloween costume.

I have often been moved/touched/inspired by textile arts, no doubt because I grew up in a house where my mother was often bent over a sewing machine making miracles. So when I saw Kirie doing the same thing... well, what do ya know, a poem popped out.

Here it is, Kirie... hope you enjoy my work in progress as much as I enjoyed yours.

Simplicity 8953
- for Kirie

The pattern promises to make a princess
so I gather together tulle, organza,
duchess satin and dupioni silk
to spin a girl’s dream: flouncy slip
beneath shimmering skirt, puffy sleeves,
bodice edged with beaded rosette trim.
I don’t warn her about the clock
or tell her how glass slippers sometimes shatter.
I stay up till dawn, add a tuck
so that it fits just right
and later as she prances and twirls
I vow to hold her close
should white steeds dissolve into skittering mice,
the royal coach to a rotting pumpkin,
the prince lost in moonlight, then
caught dancing with someone else.

- Irene Latham

"Life is pure adventure, and the sooner we realize that, the quicker we will be able to treat life as art."

- Maya Angelou

TWILIGHT, THE MOVIE

Well... I didn't hate it exactly but I sure didn't love it.

The best part was being a part of such excitement. You should have seen the crowd, many of them dressed up as characters in the book or wearing Twilight-related clothing. THAT was fun.

The worst part was how disappointed I was. My most favorite scene - the one where Edward takes Bella to the forest and shows her how his skin sparkles - did not translate at all to film. And I don't know who's brilliant idea the soundtrack was. The whole thing just struck me as cheesy. And hey, I enjoyed the book!

Anyhow, I'm glad I saw it. But I'm also glad it's over. :)

"the soul should always stand ajar,
ready to welcome the ecstastic experience"

- Emily Dickinson

ODE TO SHARON OLDS

Okay, for those of you who don't know, I have two favorite poets: Mary Oliver and Sharon Olds.

So when I found out Sharon Olds was going to be at the Margaret Mitchell House in Atlanta for a reading to promote her new book ONE SECRET THING, I started contacting other Alabama poets about travel plans.

Well. You know how sometimes you can love an author's work so much, that you somehow feel you know that person, then you actually meet them or hear an interview and feel this overwhelming sense of disappointment, like this person had been stringing you along all the while and now you knew the dirty rotten truth, that they aren't so wonderful after all?

I gotta tell you: Sharon Olds is every bit as wonderful as I imagined. What a delightful person! She was everything I expected her to be, and more.

I think I was most surprised by her girlishness... is she really 66? She made a comment on discovering her "quirkiness," and you know, she was funny! I guess I just see her body of work as so serious and bold and meaningful that it sort of took my by surprise when she read a poem about looking at her sagging, dimpled butt in a hotel mirror.

She's not only a real poet, she's a real person. Who gets rejection slips and questions her ability and worries about what she's going to wear to a reading in Atlanta, Georgia. (J. Crew jacket, bought at the mall, that day.)

And you know what, she made me cry. Check out the book. Turn to page 80. Read "Little End Ode."

And look for more odes in her next collection. She said she's been reading Neruda and writing ode after ode. Can't wait!

"See everything; overlook a great deal; correct a little."

- Pope John XXII

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

Letter from Malta
- with thanks to Raymond Carver

This is the letter
I was going to write earlier but didn’t
because I was watching an airplane
fly in from the West, dustcloud maroon in the pink sky,
imagining it was you come to fetch me,
how I would find you on the tarmac,

you’d be wearing a white shirt with buttons
waiting and knowing exactly what to say
but not needing to say it.
We’d kiss then, if it was really you.
We’d tremble and kiss
and exclaim our good fortune.
We’d forget this letter
and the one before
and all the ones you meant
to write but never did.
This island would grow in that moment,
the earth would rise up at the point
of our lips touching,
we would overthrow the ocean.
Snow would drift from another continent
and cover our shoulders.

But it wasn’t you flying in
and here in Malta they have no word for snow;
it is simply the thing that never comes,
the thing impossible even to imagine.
Loving you has never been as simple as that.
I know your face. I know the taste of your skin,

I know the words you would have written
had your pen found paper.
If you dropped from the sky
I would know just what to call you.

- Irene Latham

This poem was inspired by Raymond Carver's poem "The Poem I Didn't Write." It starts "Here is the poem I was going to write/ earlier but didn't..."

I read a bunch of Carver when I first started getting serious about writing and publishing poems. I am really drawn to the simplicity of his writing style -- it's a good reminder to we word-lovers who can get so clever sometimes (and be so pleased with the cleverness) that it distracts from the poem/story/whatever. So often less is more.

"One very important aspect of motivation is the willingness to stop and to look at things that no one else has bothered to look at. This simple process of focusing on things that are normally taken for granted is a powerful source of creativity."

Edward de Bono

SUBMISSION UPDATE

Let's get the rejections out of the way first: Rattle and Indiana Review. Sigh. I sent them my best work and still, I'm just not there yet. WILL TRY AGAIN.

Also, I was super-excited about a picture book manuscript I had been working on, so I sent it to my agent for her feedback. Apparently I am not there yet on this, either. Her comment was that it was still too message driven and that I should concentrate on character development and figure out how old my main character is.

And you know, when she said all that, I was like, yes, EXACTLY. She nailed all those concerns I was too enmeshed with the manuscript to verbalize.

On top of that, I realized the whole focus on the picture book manuscript was just my brain creating an amazing decoy to distract me from what I really need to be working on, which is the next draft of ESCAPE FROM FIRE MOUNTAIN (midgrade historical fiction set during the eruption of Mt. Pelee in Martinique, 1902).

I don't know why I've been avoiding it so heartily. Probably has something to do with feedback I received from Carolyn Yoder way back in June. See, she was right on target too. But fixing a novel is so much heavier than fixing a picture book. It's like almost drowning, the way it grips you from the inside.

Now for the happy-making news: Glass: A Journal of Poetry accepted two of my poems -- "The house on Baltimore Street was not built for battle" and "In my mother's dream." Many thanks to editors Holly and Anthony! Word is they will appear in the December 1 issue. I'll keep you posted.

Interestingly, I had trouble finding a title for each of these poems, so I just used the first line of the poem for the title. (Something to think about if you're struggling with titles.)

"There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom."

- Anais Nin

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

Remember the Mad Bluebird? Let's call this one the Grumpy Prairie Dog. :)

My father took this pic earlier this year (pre-cancer diagnosis), and for whatever reason, it makes me smile. Hope it brings you joy as well.

I've had a hard time focusing this week -- I feel like I am shooting my energy all over the place when what I need to do is grab hold of something and hunker down. I took a break from my angst by sinking into my latest thrift-store find: All Over But the Shoutin' by Rick Bragg. Now here's a quote that resonates...

"I was slowly beginning to realize that the only thing that was worth writing about was living and dying and the trembling membrane in between."

- Rick Bragg

WHEN IT'S RAINING LEAVES

Have I told you about my weekend?

Talk about an other-worldly experience. It sort of reminded me of the movie American Beauty when the kid is filming the plastic bag dancing in the wind?

Truly, it was a beautiful weekend with the four of us women tucked away in a little chalet on the mountain ridge overlooking Lake Guntersville where we talked and laughed and scrapbooked and sewed and listened as the leaves hit the roof. Amazing.

So this is the lake as it can be seen from the top balcony of the Lodge, which is also home to Pinecrest Dining Room. Mmmmm.... garlic-tomato mussels, fried catfish, peach cobbler.... Which meant not only no kids, but NO COOKING. Need I say more?

And this is us: The Mother, The Original, The Great and The Boss. Sadly we were missing Number Two, but we made do.

"Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower."

- Albert Camus

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

Suicide Ghazal

At Bonaventure Cemetery were warnings disguised as birds:
a swarm of Brewer’s black chittering, those birds.

I might have listened had they sounded like trumpets.
Instead I crept past you, forgot about the birds.

Father says the cardinal’s flash is like the apple in Eve’s hand.
I want to know: Is it a sin to want to be a bird?

If I could go back, I would at least crack the window.
I would blink my eyes and toss out seeds for the birds.

Listen: here is a hermit thrush, shyly calling you home.
It sings not of death but of the life of birds.

Come, spring doesn’t start till you see a robin bouncing across a lawn.
When a wedge of Canada geese fly over, I’ll say look at the birds.

And if it is a sin, let us never forget the Bird Girl
who once stood in this garden, arms extended to all birds.

- Irene Latham

As promised, here is the poem partly inspired by The Bird Girl statue that sits in my garden. Here's to all the birds out there, winged and wingless...

“A believer is a bird in a cage, a freethinker is an eagle parting the clouds with tireless wing.”

- Robert Green Ingersoll

GIRL SCOUTS ARE GREAT!

Here's to Lori Ditoro and Troop 182 who earned their bronze award by putting on a Writing Workshop! And what an honor it was to be a part of the day. These girls earned writing badges in one afternoon, and I was so impressed by how they immediately got busy creating and really came up with some good poems, articles and stories. And hey, now I know where to get my Thin Mint cookies. :)

"Don't think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It's self-conscious and anything self-conscious is lousy. You cannot try to do things. You simply must do things."

- Ray Bradbury

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

How cool is this? I told my brother I needed a pic of a hickory leaf, and this is what he did.

Don't you love the change of perspective? It's exactly what I do in the classroom with kids using the jeweler's loupe. Just try looking at things close-up, and your brain will start making all these unusual analogies... like, don't you see water here, and mountains, and a map? Sand dunes, maybe? Crop fields? Highways and neighborhoods? Talk about opening the mind and feeding your creativity.


"There is no better high than discovery."

- E. O. Wilson

SPEAKING OF YELLOW

Michelle said I should share pics of my new and improved garden, so here you go.

The tree with the yellow leaves is a sugar maple (and the inspiration for the "November" poem posted last Sunday).

The Bird Girl is a favorite of mine... and she is the inspiration for another poem, one entitled "Suicide Ghazal." I'll post that one next Sunday.

The little tree that's shaped like a goblet and has a smattering of red leaves is my new dogwood. Can't wait to see how it all looks in spring!

"Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing."

- Abraham Lincoln

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

November


Even the sky

is naked


now, brisk air

having finally


chased off

the clouds.


Trees sway

in the backyard,


wind pushes

my collar up


as yellow-brown

tornadoes


tear across

the lawn


in a dance

that can only


be done

when all else


has been stripped

away ---


like just before

our lips touch,


or just after.

- Irene Latham

I love November. So it should come as no surprise that of all the poems I've written, this is one of my most favorite.

"It takes courage to grow up and beocme who you really are."

- e.e. cummings

FIVE FOR FRIDAY

1. Early this morning when I was driving the kids to school, I spied a beautiful hot air balloon hovering just above the tree line. Talk about a great way to start the day!

2. For those of you who have been so sweet about my father: he is at Mayo Clinic in surgery as we speak. Keep those prayers and good thoughts coming.

3. Just in time for Halloween, I have a new favorite candy: vanilla yogurt creme Hershey kisses. Yum!

4. I am super excited about talking with the Girl Scouts about writing on Sunday. It's gonna be fun!

5. My back yard is now the home of a bunch of new oak leaf hydrangeas, Christmas cheer azaleas, Lenten roses, and a wide variety of ferns. The centerpiece is a Milky Way Kousa dogwood. Now all that's left is to empty the truck of its four giant scoops of mulch. Shovels, anyone?

"The difficult is what takes a little time; the impossible is what takes a little longer."

- Fridtjof Nansen (Nobel Prize for Peace, 1922)

WHAT IS IT ABOUT RABBITS?

So I've just read a really sweet book: THE MIRACULOUS JOURNEY OF EDWARD TULANE by Kate DiCamillo. It about a china rabbit who goes on a very long trip and along the way discovers how to love.

Remember THE VELVETEEN RABBIT and WATERSHIP DOWN? Well, add this title to the list of great rabbit books. Oh, and let's not forget Peter Rabbit! (I still have the itty bitty Nutshell Library set I got for Christmas when I was a kid.) And RUNAWAY BUNNY. What am I forgetting?

I'll leave you with my favorite quote from the book about Edward Tulane:

"It was a singular sensation to be held so gently and yet so fiercely, to be stared down at with so much love."

- Kate DiCamillo

TELLING THE TRUTH

One of the questions I get most often about my poetry is, "Did that really happen to you?"

Or, people make the assumption that everything is true and ask me a question related to the poem, like "How old were you when your mother died?"

Do I have to tell you how awkward it is when I have to say, "Actually, my mother is alive and well feeding horses in Florida."

See, here's the thing: writers use first person to draw the reader closer to the poem. We use fictional circumstances to convey our thoughts/feelings about an actual emotion. So for the aforementioned mother poem, the feeling of loss is real. The fictional death is just the vehicle. (Actually it was written after hearing someone else's story about their mother's death... and it put me in touch with my own grief issues.)

For me, the emotion is always real. Poetry demands it. Truly it is not the genre for faking anything. But the details? Come on, folks.

Here's what a Newbery winning poet/novelist/playwright has to say about it:

"It's fiction. Meaning autobiography seen through weird, wavy glasses."

-Paul Fleischman, BREAKOUT

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

Haunted

We didn’t carve pumpkins
that year – we were too young
or too old, stuck somewhere
in the gutter-line of growing up.
Instead we all piled in a pick-up,
headed north on Highway 11,
bumped and jerked our way
across potholes and through 4-ways
until we spotted signs
for Springville Haunted House.

It turned out to be nothing
more than a trail stalking its way
between whistling pines and shivering oaks,
path marked by signs slashed
with red paint and kids in masks
popping from behind bushes.
At the end, someone’s father
chased us with a chainsaw,
and by that time most of us
were coupled-up, arms over shoulders,
screams shrill but edged
with laughter.

You hung back alone,
hands tucked in tattered denim,
bare arms screaming against the cold.
In the parking lot I grabbed
your hand – to warm you, I said.
You didn’t even blink, just ran
with me back to the truck,
perfect fit of our fingers a sign

we might have noticed
if not for the ghost
gripping my other hand.

- Irene Latham

So here's a teen-angst remember-when poem just in time for Halloween... I love this time of year, ghosts and all.

"That it will never come again is what makes life so sweet."

- Emily Dickinson

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

Many things to Michelle for allowing me to share this pic she calls "Hanging by a Thread." Oh boy, are there days I can SO relate to that! And I love how the leaf looks like a misshapen heart. The misshapen ones are the best ones, I'm thinking.

"I hold an old-fashioned notion that a happy marriage is the crown of a woman's life."

- Beatrix Potter

RED AND RIPE AND READY

So here's the last of the tomatoes. Aren't they gorgeous? And extra-special, as it's the last the garden will give, at least this season. It makes me think of words like red and ripe and ready. Savor and succulent and sweet. Vine and fine and climb.

Delicious. And oh so poem-worthy. (I myself have written two poems in the past week that include tomatoes.)

"We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses."

- Abraham Lincoln

THINGS THAT ARE ORANGE

How 'bout them pumpkins?! I was so excited when my friend Lori invited me to hang out with The Girls Who Not Only Carve Pumpkins Together But Also Read Great Books. And it did not disappoint! To Phyllis, Vonda, Randee, Lisa, Martha, Michelle, Carol, Trina and of course Lori, many thanks, and I can't wait for our Twilight movie date. :)

Also, this weekend I had the opportunity to meet in the flesh one of my fellow Tenners, Lindsey Leavitt, who is just as adorable as she seems online. Don't you love when that happens?

So here I am feeling all glow-y just like the inside of one of those candle-lit pumpkins. And I'm sending it out to each and every one of you.

"Dwell as near as possible to the channel in which your life flows."

- Thoreau

FIVE FOR FRIDAY

1. It's raining! This is cause for much joy, as we here in Birmingham can't quite seem to pull ourselves out of last year's drought. Maybe I'll get brave and put in those new plants in the back yard??

2. My editor says we are down to line edits on THE WITCHES OF GEE'S BEND. Guess that means all the heavy lifting is done. Whew. Talk about relief. And it frees my mind for my latest project: a coffee table photo/poetry book project with those awesome photographers who so graciously contribute to Thousand Word Thursday. I am eight poems in with oh about forty-two more to go. :)

3. Read an amazing book this week: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. Suzanne is also the author of the Gregor the Underlander Series, and we share the same agent! Anyhow, my fourteen year old and I agree: this book rocks. Told in first person, it has just the right amount of life/death struggle, impossible romance, and relevance to our current society. Now my almost-twelve year old is reading it. (While I dig into Alabama Moon by Watt Key.)

4. Southern Breeze's Writing and Illustrating for Kids conference is this weekend right here in Birmingham, so I'll be catching up with author-friends and meeting new ones and learning more about this whole writing biz. Southern Breeze has been instrumental in helping me get where I am today, so I am pleased and proud to once again be attending.

5. Fingers crossed I can make it to Birmingham Museum of Art's Leonardo da Vinci exhibit. They've got eleven drawings on display as well as Leo's Codex on the Flight of Birds. We're not talking reproductions here. It's the actual parchment and red chalk, all they way from Italy! And Birmingham is one of only two US cities who get to see this. (Exhibit moves to San Francisco in November.) I am so there.

Happy weekend everyone!

"A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away."

- Barry Goldwater

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

How sweet is this? Thanks, Lynn! And thanks Anna, for always sending me recommendations. Did I tell you how much I enjoyed Edgar Sawtelle? There was one chapter in the dog Almondine's voice that absolutely killed me. When she is grieving for lost Edgar? A thing of beauty, I tell you. And you knew that even before Oprah did. :)

"You can be cured in fourteen days [of depression] if you follow this prescription. Try to think every day how you can please someone."

- Alfred Adler

A LESSON FROM THE VIKINGS

It has been said that "the North Wind made the Vikings." In other words, they were so tough because of the hardships they had endured. They survived because they had been tested. They survived because they learned to survive.

Which means, of course, that we need the tough times to determine our own strength. To build that strength. To learn.

So to all of you out there experiencing a North Wind, just remember: it will pass and you will be stronger for it.

"What we have once enjoyed we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes part of us."

- Helen Keller

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

What I Thought As I Watched Hurricane Ivan
Take Down the Silver Maple in Our Back Yard

about the black walnut tree my brother
rode through a thunderstorm,
Mama hollering if that lightning don’t
kill you your daddy will

the row of redbuds along the path we once walked,
always the first to purple each spring
eager arms linked in revolution

the sprawling live oak we named
Nephertiri after the Egyptian queen
its branches a womb my sister
and I would escape into,
innocence still supple and green

the tall poplar yellow and exploding
wind stealing its leaves
blustery kisses a shot of whiskey down my spine

the orange grove thick
with sweet rot and creatures feasting
fruit white in the bright light
Grandma calling me home

ancient Moroccan tree alone on a hillside
three or was it five? white goats perched in its branches
eyes stark as the darkening sky

- Irene Latham

Weather provides such great inspiration... great metaphors too! This poem can be found in my book WHAT CAME BEFORE.

Currently it's still hurricane season, but truly our biggest problem in these parts has been drought. I've got plans to put in some new plants, but I keep putting it off because of the lack of rain. (When would I water?! Just the thought stresses me out.)

Speaking of metaphors....

"What makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hides a well."

~Antoine de Saint-Exupery

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

This pic is courtesy of my friend Kim who currently lives in Alaska but will soon be moving back to Washington DC. She said she captured this sunset one night at about 11 pm. Crazy, huh? And somehow more beautiful for that detail.

"Caress the divine details."

- Vladimir Nabokov

AT THE POETRY CAFE

Big thanks to Cheryl Moyer and all the poets at the UUC Poetry Cafe in Montgomery for the warm welcome and inspiring night of poetry! I enjoyed meeting all of you and appreciate so much your support of my work. Now send me submissions for BAJ! I will be so disappointed if you don't.

Meanwhile I am still searching for just the right word to replace "mad" in a poem not about a dog ( but ones that uses a dog as a metaphor) that I workshopped yesterday at the Big Table. I'm thinking maybe "half-starved"??

"Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary."

~Kahlil Gibran

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

If Not For Starlings

We walk the trail
shaded by oak and cypress

watch as the combined
weight of a hundred birds

splits a common cedar
the way a knife sinks

into a loaf of bread,
bending but not breaking.

You've got to admire
their decisiveness,

the way the starlings lift
and turn,

choose again
the cedar,

its strength and flexibility
a certainty to them,

unknown to us
until this moment.

- Irene Latham

This poem was inspired by a video like this one . Only the one I saw was very short and showed just the part where the starlings completely rearrange a tree.

The internet is a wonderful place for inspiration. One of the poems I am taking with me to workshop this morning is straight from a news article published last week: "NASA extends Phoenix Mission." And just now I started a new poem entitled "What the Spider Sees" after visiting 3 Little Chickies. Amazing how a change of perspective can inspire all sorts of things. Thanks, Kerie!

"There are two ways of spreading the light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it."

- Edith Wharton

THE BEST MONTH OF THE YEAR

I love October. LOVE it. There's just something about the cooler air and leaves dancing that makes me feel really glad to be alive. And I'm not the only one.

Check out this oldie but goodie by U2. And this Dylan Thomas poem. My favorite line: "Though the town below lay leaved with October blood."
Also this one by Robert Frost: "Oh hushed October morning mild"

I've written a few October poems, but not lately. I'm thinking today's the day...

"Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets."

—Arthur Miller

BOOKMARK THIS

My brilliant brother just threw this design together, at my request, to be distributed at a program I'm doing for the Girl Scouts. Cool, huh?

Also, I've been tinkering with on my website. These are the time-eaters no one thinks of when they think "writer." For me, it's like busywork in school. Or like what grading papers must be for a teacher. Part of the job, but not the part that feeds the soul. But I've learned I actually NEED the busywork. It gives my mind some distance from those swampy emotions.

What kind of busywork do you do?


"Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it."

- Henry David Thoreau

SHOWCASE SUNDAY

At the Hardware Store

A blonde in blue-jeans stands behind the counter --
she doesn't know socket-wrench from flat-head driver

but her smile spreads easy as strawberry jam
and her fingers glide over the register

like pond-skaters under a mid-summer moon.
Need a half-pound of Nichol's screw-grip nails,

I say, and she furrows her brow then brightens,
blush staining the constellation of freckles

on her chest and I never wanted to be
a freckle so much in my fifty-year life

then that smile again like a flash of lightning
on a black-cloud day, and I suck in my gut,

smile right back, not sure what I'll do with those nails
but ready to erect a steel skyscraper

and empty my accounts, if that's what it takes.

- Irene Latham

Well, that's me channeling a fifty-year old man. :) Way back when, I worked at Sears in the hardware department... my favorite memories are of sneaking kisses with my hot-n-heavy then boyfriend/now husband. Sweet times...

"Very often we travel the world over in search of what we need and return home to find it."

- George Moore

THAT THING WITH FEATHERS

So I brought a nasty little cold back with me from North Dakota. But of course I wouldn't trade a second of time spent with my father. Even the tough moments I wouldn't part with. You know what I'm talking about.

The word for the day is HOPE, and I almost wish I had chosen it as my word for the year. It certainly pops into my head often enough, especially since my youngest son has taken a shine to a girl named Hope.

Eric smiles every time the word hope arises in conversation, and the other day when we were watching Orangutan Island on Animal Planet, he told me at a commercial break that the word hope had been said 18 times already. We found the word hope on the wall at Bismarck Cancer Center, and on the lips of cancer survivors and family members of non-survivors at AppleFest, the big fundraiser for Bismarck Cancer Center Foundation.

Could there be a more optimistic or necessary word?

I leave you with Emily Dickinson's lovely little poem:

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.


- Emily Dickinson

THOUSAND WORD THURSDAY

Okay, I don't have to tell you how much potential this image holds. Talk about ripe with metaphor. Thanks MJ, as ever.

Thanks also to Anna for the book recommendation: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. I got it tonight while Eric had drum lessons and will carry it with me on the plane(s) to North Dakota. Yep, we're off to visit my father. It's all about time, you know? There is never enough time when you love someone.

"Life is a series of surprises, and would not be worth taking or keeping, if it were not."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

THINGS THAT ARE SILENT

I wrote a poem once called Things That Can Only Be Whispered. But what about those things that make no noise at all?

Consider this quote from Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting:

"Winnie watched the sky slide into blackness over the wood outside her window. There was not the least hint of a breeze to soften the heavy August night. And then, over the treetops, on the faraway horizon, there was a flash of white. Heat lightning. Again and again it throbbed, without a sound. It was like pain, she thought. And suddenly she longed for a thunderstorm."

I love that. I am also loving Kate DiCamillo's The Tiger Rising. And hey, it has a poem in it! A very famous poem. Read and see!

OH THE ANTICIPATION

All day I've been a-buzz because my mother and brother (and family) are coming tomorrow. It's such a delicious feeling when you know something good is going to happen... it reminded me of this quote:

"Well, said Pooh, "what I like best," and then he had to stop and think. Because although eating honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn't know what it was called."

- A.A. Milne