Congratulations HOWL Contest Winners!

Recently my open mic reading, HOWL, sponsored a contest for best poem. I saved the money from passing the hat at every reading and challenged the poets to enter 3 pages of poetry along with a $10 entry fee to win a 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place prize. Since it was our first contest, and the rule was that you had to attend 4 HOWL open mic readings a year, I worried that many of my poets would be too nervous to enter. Reading at the open mic was one thing, entering a contest to be judged was another.

I was very pleased to have 10 entries, nearly 30 poems. The fees and hat would take care of the $300 first prize. I enlisted the aid of two poets unassociated with HOWL to judge the work on a points system. It was a very close contest and highly educational for me. Judging is much more subjective than I ever thought. If you didn't win, it didn't mean your poem wasn't good. That's the truth.

After the points were tallied, I was very happy with the winners. Congratulations to Jeanne, who took first place; and to Jan who won second, and Fran who won third. All three are fine poets and wordsmiths. (Jeanne's winning poem is featured below.)

However, winning was not the most important part of this contest. (Tell that to the winner, eh?) But I think she would agree. The most important part was gathering the courage to enter. If she had not entered (and she is a fairly shy person and a fairly new poet) she could not have won. And you would not have the pleasure of reading her poem in this post.

I am proud of every woman who entered our first HOWL poetry contest. I know what it is like to submit your best work. I know what it is like to win, and I know what it is like not to win. As far as I'm concerned, there are no losers who take such a risk. When you do, you champion your own creativity and earn the admiration of your peers. It's hard, and we do subject ourselves to disappointment at times. It forces us to deal with rejection in a healthy way; in a way that does not hurt our work, but simply redoubles our determination to continue.

Write on, my poets, my peers, my peeps. What you risk, you never lose.

The Catch

Stiff wind
dances points of light
on the friendly pond.
Clear water above thick algae
Hiding minnow, water bugs, bass, perhaps.

Blue Sky
hazy with wisps of clouds--
Backdrop for the stand
of pole-like pines
ringing the dappled pond.

Live oak holds
onto its parchment-dry
leaves, resisting
the wind's call
to let go.

Waist-high grasses, brown now,
Lead me to the water's edge.
I cast and the thin fine line
Of my imagination reels off
And sinks into the rippling water.

I wait, my eye on the bobber,
Impatient for the strike,
the spark of insight
that will pull the words
from my watery soul

To form the flash
and wriggle of the poem,
the story, the work that
once hooked, comes
struggling

Into this fresh
cool winter day,
Into this moment of quiet,
Of solitude,
Of attention to.

by Jeanne Sievert
© 2010

Join the HOWL: Women's Open Mic facebook page at www.facebook.com/howl.openmic

—Mendy Knott is a writer, poet and author of the poetry collection A Little Lazarus (Half Acre Press, 2010). To order your copy of A Little Lazarus directly from the author, please click here. Or, if cookbooks are more your style, get a copy of Mendy's family cookbook Across the Arklatex at www.twopoets.us.

Risk It.

There comes a time in every artist's life when they must take the risk; whether they write, paint, work in clay, metal or wood. What risk? The final risk for every work of art is putting it out there.

I compare it to sending your 5-year-old to kindergarten for their first day at school. In the classroom, they will quite naturally be compared and compare themselves and their skills with others. As parents worry and pace, bite their nails at home, the children size each other up, find out what their strengths and weaknesses are, and determine where they will need work to become better students and to excel.

Such are our feelings when we put our creative work out into the larger world, whether we are entering a contest, submitting for publication, entering a show, or simply standing to deliver our work to an audience for the first time. It's a nail-biting, floor-pacing experience. This is the jumping off place. Believe me, the water can look a long way down from the cliff's edge far from the comparative safety and privacy of our computer, palette, studio. Out in the world, our very personal work (our babies) will be subject to comparison and criticism. It will be, in some way, judged--a scary word. We know if we never go to the open mic, never enter the show or contest, never submit for publication, we are safe in our own little world. There we can believe it's all good and we need no one's input.

The only drawback of confining ourselves and our work to the security of our creative caves is that we never get to share what we've accomplished. The people who need to read or hear our poems and prose, see our pastels, touch our carvings, and hold our pots in their hands cannot be inspired or encouraged in their own creativity. If we don't take the risk of putting our work out into the world, we not only isolate ourselves, we leave others who would create—if they thought they could—without inspiration.

—Mendy Knott is a writer, poet and author of the poetry collection A Little Lazarus (Half Acre Press, 2010). To order your copy of A Little Lazarus directly from the author, please click here. Or, if cookbooks are more your style, get a copy of Mendy's family cookbook Across the Arklatex at www.twopoets.us.

Join the HOWL: Women's Open Mic facebook page at www.facebook.com/howl.openmic

Why We Don't Write: Beginning Again

Buddhist writer Sharon Salzberg teaches us that "with every breath, we can begin again." I find this one of the most hopeful and helpful quotes of a lifetime of reading, writing, and listening to writers. We need this bit of "begin again" wisdom to become something we rely on in times of doubt. I say these things because, I too, fall victim to the "Oh, I haven't written a new post for so long, why do it today? It just seems too hard right now." Until a month, or even two, have passed and all my readers begin to wonder what has happened and wander off to other more conscientious bloggers.

Today I begin again. And not for the first time, but for the first time in a long time. I can blame it on my shoulder surgery which made writing hard; made it, in fact, hurt. Yikes! Or the fact that I broke a tooth and the whole getting a crown thing has been quite painful. Or maybe the fact that I have lupus and experience fatigue and pain most every day, but that hasn't stopped me in the past, and I've been dealing with it for years. The question is not why I haven't written in the past couple of months, but how do I begin again, and how do I continue? I believe this is a question we all deal with at times, especially those of us with a chronic disease or pain. Or maybe it's taxes, the state of the economy, war. These are all very real, not simply excuses. I know that. But how do we write or remain committed to our art anyway?

Because we also know the truth; our art, our passion for words or paint, the longing to somehow capture truth and beauty even for a moment, is one of the most healing things we can do for ourselves and the world. I always, not sometimes, but ALWAYS feel better when I write. And yet my tendency, when down, is to give in and allow my self to distract me from the very thing I know will help most. I can't answer the why of it so much as help with how to pull ourselves out of it. Somehow I'm better at doing the physical, when it's hard, than the mental/emotional/creative. I realize even if I'm tired or my feet hurt already, that a walk will make me feel better. And so I walk and therefore do feel better. Swimming is even harder, so I tell myself all I have to do is get in the water. It never fails. If I make it that far, I swim. I keep my expectations low--if I walk a mile or swim at all, I get a star on that day in my calendar.

Art is not as easy. We have higher expectations of ourselves--to be gifted, to be wise or witty, to make perfect whatever it is we are working on. When what is called for, what is most needed, is just doing something. Anything. Creating crap is better than not creating at all. From experience, I can tell you that writing through my pain has created some of the best poems and songs I've written. I've always loved listening to the blues, so why can't I allow myself to write some, too? Blues singers and composers are quite obviously taking a hard moment and transforming it, through their persistence and unwillingness to cave, into art. We can do the same. I often do. But not always.

That's when we have to forgive ourselves and climb with all our aches and pains and doubts, back up on the wagon of our creativity, trusting that it will take us where we need to go. We have to believe that wagon is our way out; taking us down the road to better times and into the land of truth and beauty. Even if the landscape seems bleak, we are moving! We are headed out of the "valley of the shadow" that keeps us from creating. Don't give up. Don't give in to the voice of pain, doubt, or even despair. First, forgive yourself. Then pick up your pen, and begin again. Start with small goals, short freewrites, small paintings. Write about the very thing that plagues you. You don't always have to be bright and cheery--that's another difficult expectation to fulfill. Just start and see where your life leads you. This is trusting the process to the fullest extent. Believing that all of life is like riding a bike. You don't forget how to live, no matter how long you've parked it in the dark garage. A few circles around the block, and baby, you're back in business!

Creative Collaboration Part 2

Some of the creative collaborators I admire most are songwriters and musicians. When I think of the dedication and talent it takes to learn to play one instrument, I am amazed at people who can play several and then play them altogether in a band. Add to this the ability to write music and lyrics, the idea is practically overwhelming. And yet, music and song abound in our world, and have for ages. One of the reasons this is so, I'm convinced, is that it's fun to write songs and make music. Otherwise, why would there be so much of it? The earth and her creatures crave music. That's what I think, and we follow our natural inclination to create when we participate along with the birds, the trees, and the whales.

Two of my favorite musicians live right here in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Although they have traveled all over the world, and are quite famous among folk musicians, they love their hometown and never slack in their commitment to make it a better place to live. They have a CD and a DVD dedicated to the people, their ways and music, of the Ozark Mountains. I'm talking about the duo known as Still on the Hill. Here, we know them as Kelly and Donna; Kelly Mulholland and Donna Stjerna. (Photos by Jane Voorhees, with cool iphone filters, March 2011.)

I feel privileged to know Kelly and Donna and to call them friends. I participate in the peace open mic they host once a month whenever I can. I'll go to see them play anywhere. They honored Leigh and me by playing at our 10th anniversary party and by writing a song for the two of us which they played on the 'courting dulcimer' at their Valentine's Day concert. (Super fine time was had by all!)

Now, perhaps the greatest tribute of all has been paid to me and my poetry by the two of them. Donna, who is one of the most prolific songwriters I've ever known, loved my book "A Little Lazarus" and shared it with many amazing people. Then she took one of the poems and part of another and combined them into one incredible song. Believe me, it's a whole different creation than the "chicken rap." They invited Jane and me over to see their Ozark Ball Museum, perhaps the finest collection of round objects in the world, and then played my song for me. It was so beautiful I cried. They gave me their permission to put it on my blog post to show you yet another way creative collaboration works. The poem itself is below, then listen to what happens when Donna arranges it and they put their incredible musical talents together to make it sing.

Here is the poem:

Ode to a Day

by Mendy Knott

Day, you awakened me with whispers
early, like a lover who has lain awake for hours
waiting, excited and impatient
for what you thought was long enough
then with a breeze that kissed my eyes awake
began sweet murmurings:
“Hey girl, get up.
Looky here what I have for you.
It’s not Dec. 25th, but it might as well be Christmas.
It’s not your birthday, but I have presents.
Roll on over into me and let me be your greatest gift.”

Then Day, you dripped butterscotch
all down my windowsill; it pooled
yellow on the floor so I was sure to step in it.
A broken blue horizon like a jack ‘o’ lantern’s teeth
grinned in at me while I let you take me unobjecting
let you get inside me deep
let you make me come with you
wherever you would lead.
“Day,” I said, “Take it away..”
And you did.

You, Day, all day, are my lover, mother, my best friend.
You know no limitations.
You shapeshift into my every want and need,
toast me with jam,
celebrate my awkwardness,
remind me of grace,
run your warmth all up and down the length of me
purring like a cat.
You kiss me repeatedly–
sun on back
rain on face
snow on eyelashes, a butterfly kiss.
You throw an arm around my shoulder, Day,
protect me like a shade tree.
I lean against the trunk of you when I’m afraid.
You say, “Listen I’m gonna be with you
all day today. Trust me,
you can have it all your way.”

We act like puppies, yearlings, 5-year-olds.
We roll on the ground with my dog,
weep with a friend on the phone,
sing to everything: a tree, my car, a plate I’m washing.
It’s ridiculous I know, so
I blame it all on you.
You made me love you
even though it was not hard;
made me love your cutting chill
evening shadows
goose and whip-poor-will.
I loved you, glorious tricky Day,
even though you threw those curve balls
straight at me,
hollering, “Catch this!” way too late,
then laughed ‘til the tears ran down your face.

When we lay down at last,
I felt your gentle weight press into me.
You were still chuckling at my antics
forcing me to say, “Hush you crazy Day.
Be quiet now. I need sleep.”
You embrace me,
wrap me up in cozy memories,
then rock me as you make up fantasies
about your twin–
Tomorrow.

And the mp3 of the song, adapted by Donna Stjerna, and played by Still on the Hill (Donna and Kelly) is here. Click to listen or download!

—Mendy Knott is a writer, poet and author of the poetry collection A Little Lazarus (Half Acre Press, 2010). To order your copy of A Little Lazarus directly from the author, please click here. Or, if cookbooks are more your style, get a copy of Mendy's family cookbook Across the Arklatex at www.twopoets.us.

Creative Collaboration Part 1

My friend Jane returned home yesterday after a week-long visit, which is the main reason I'm late with my post this week. Jane is a visual artist: a watercolorist, sketch artist, photographer and bookmaker from Asheville, NC, and one of the best playmates I've ever had. Every creative person needs a playmate like Jane. In truth, every person needs a friend like Jane, and I wish they had one, too. The world would be a better place for it. But the main reason I'm singling out Jane is because the nature of our friendship, its essence in many ways, flows from our mutual joy in the creative experience and what inspires it – beauty.

While Jane was here, our days were spent following and enjoying our creative natures. The English have a saying, "If it moves, you can bet on it." Jane and I believe, "If it exists, you can capture it on paper--somehow." I am writing this post, not simply to sing the praises of my good friend, Jane, but to paint you a picture that inspires and encourages you to play creatively with the friends you have. And if you don't have any friends who seem interested in creative play, I want to encourage you to go out and get you some. (Chicken photo by Jane on her new iphone. Her watercolors—of mountains, sheep & more—can be seen at www.janevoorheesart.com)

I will try to accomplish this feat in a series of posts that run from the laugh-out-loud happiness inspired by being spontaneously goofy with your artistic natures to the beauty of getting down to business with artistic collaboration. Although artistic collaboration may be a rare bird in a world where people seem intent on flying solo, the joy of mutual inspiration cannot be replicated alone.

I call it playtime. We do it when we're kids in kindergarten and preschool but forget about it as we get older and "want to do our own thing." But ask any band member on what their success depends, and they will tell you at least one aspect is the happy collaboration of the group. A director of film and plays might answer the same way. They might also launch into a diatribe about how hard it can be to accomplish this.

So let's begin with just one other person, a dear friend perhaps, and learn to play together. Perhaps your creative gifts even bend in different directions. Don't be discouraged by this. Be excited. These differences can open all kinds of doors and invite brand new opportunities for collaboration. For a long time I titled Jane's beautiful landscapes. She uses one of my poems at the beginning of each new year's calendar. Imagine Elton John tickling the ivories as Bernie Taupin scribbles nearby, while they unknowingly create some of the most memorable songs of an entire age. As in any creative endeavor, you must be willing to play, to create bad art, to be imperfect in order to allow yourself the freedom you need to collaborate at all. It doesn't have to be great, it just has to be fun.

In the short video below, you will see how my backyard chickens inspired both Jane and me to have some fun creatively. We sat among the chickens (who loved the company) and as Jane sketched, I wrote. Then we made this silly video on her new IPhone. Most likely you will not have visions of Elton and Bernie, or even Eminem. But then, who would have expected Elton to give Eminem a hand up when he needed it most? Mentoring is just another form of creative collaboration.

If you are horrified by the "Chicken Rap" and say, well this isn't "art," stay with me for the next couple of posts as we go deeper into collaborative creativity and see and hear what happens on several levels. The one theme that runs through all these posts, no matter how the collaboration was completed, was the pleasure we took in sharing this process we call art. Observe how much of that process involves play, and how play brings us joy. Finally, let me encourage you to go out and find someone to play with today!

Click here to watch The Chicken Rap Video (recorded on Jane's new iphone)

Walking Over Facebook

Facebook, ah Facebook, one of our modern most devilish distractions. I should leave it alone, but I'm driven by curiosity and the desire to look inside peoples' half-open curtains. Can any writer really ignore the possibilities that might be revealed through the flimsy folds or beneath the blinds in the beacon of that yellow-white light, in the flickering strobe of a TV, or in this case, computer screen.

Still, I find that nothing can take the place of a good old-fashioned walk. A million, jillion stories are taking place just a few yards from where you are striding down the sidewalk, supposedly minding your own business. Comedy, tragedy, violence, love, lust, family reunions, family dysfunctions, loneliness, sadness, joy, every "ism" or addiction you can think of are being played out on the small, unintended public stage of a living room, kitchen, bedroom where someone forgot to close the blinds. I look. I always look. Don't you? But I try not to look like I'm looking.

I'm listening, too, trying to hear the story, fill it out with what has led up to the present interaction. Is it another man, a woman, a bully at school today? She says her mother is coming for a week. He says "the hell you say" and a door slams, the volume to the TV rises like a wave into the street. Punk rock, hip-hop, folk songs, Bach stretches between houses like an old phone party line where one voice overrides another until you're not sure which one is speaking to you; or if they all are.

This is what facebook used to look like. Where would we have gotten songs like "Pretty Woman" or "The Girl from Impanema" if writers hadn't been out walking, looking, paying attention? Walt Whitman, Steinbeck, Mary Oliver, Stephen King (he's the only one I know that got hit by a car so don't let that stop you), Thomas Wolfe, Lucille Clifton, Thoreau, Robert Frost, Raymond Carver, O. Henry. All these great authors and many, many more have been walkers and voyeurs. How many stories, poems, even novels got their start from a writer who passed an open window, or from a stranger simply tipping their hat to a lady who strolled down a boardwalk across the street?

Yes, now we have facebook and think we need not go for our story-seeking walks any longer. Why waste the time and energy when we can, with a wave of our hand, bring up a whole community of people and their stories, the ones they're willing to tell, along with the ones who tell too much? Remember, though, most people put on their best face before they write--they don't call it facebook for nothing.

Some, it's true, like my friend, Sue Ann from Maine, are just as much themselves on fb as they would be if you were to run into them on the street on any given day. For this reason, and the fact that she is without a doubt one of the most honest and interesting human beings I've ever met with a thousand great stories to tell, would make a stroll through facebook worthwhile. Occasionally. But she is herself too busy shoveling snow off the roof, driving her tractor, drinking beer with her friend boys, or running the pet squirrel out of the homemade apple pie to spend all her time on face book.

Remember, too, these are your "friends." They are your friends for a reason; mainly because you share interests in common. It's like trying to learn some new style from the people you grew up with--you already know what they'll be wearing and will probably be dressed a lot like them to boot. No, you've got to get out in the streets, travel to a new part of town, or a different town entirely to be inspired. Get out there and go walking, gang! Not only is it good for the creative spirit in you, it's good for the body and clears the mind. Oh, yeah, and it makes you realize you are vital part of a big, diverse world that can't be contained within the four sides of a computer screen, no matter how many friends you may have on facebook.

—Mendy Knott is a writer, poet and author of the poetry collection A Little Lazarus (Half Acre Press, 2010). To order your copy of A Little Lazarus directly from the author, please click here. Or, if cookbooks are more your style, get a copy of Mendy's family cookbook Across the Arklatex at www.twopoets.us.

Apprenticed to Poetry: Part Three

(This is part three of the "Apprenticed to Poetry" posts. If you missed the others, you can read part one here and part two here.)

How will we make a living while we are still apprentices to our passion? Who can help us learn, be the mentor or master tradesman that sets the example? What will we do with the children while we practice our art or our writing or our music? Understandable fears block our way. If we get some gestalt on the picture of our lives, however, we may very well see that we are more afraid of ignoring what calls us, than of giving into the call. We have been graced with the gift of life and blessed with certain talents. We are wasting some of the finest parts of this gift when we consistently tell it no. This denial can lead to depression and despair, even if its expression is oh-so-quiet that nobody knows. We suffer though, and we are aware that we do.

I believe we are here to shine. No, we may not get to American Idol, win the Noble Prize or a Grammy or even an Emmy. We most likely will not grasp Oscar and take him home. But that’s not why we choose creativity. What’s important is the choice that carries meaning in its craw. It’s the choice that gives our lives purpose and a new found happiness.

We make these kind of choices every day, and every day we are alive, we are given the chance to begin again, to choose differently this time. Each time we choose real life over TV, to cook a new dish rather than eat at McDonald’s, to write a poem rather than write on face book, we are empowering ourselves and those around us. We are taking a step in the direction that creates life rather than denies it. We are choosing to make a difference, to go against the grain of commonality and have a life that is sincere and authentic. There is no better feeling, unless it is influencing someone else to make an authentic choice for themselves.

We have the power to change our lives from mundane to challenging. We have a calling, each of us, and we are lucky enough to know it. That doesn’t mean we have to heed it, though. You are free, as I was, to stay in the least satisfying and most dangerous job in the world because I was more afraid to pick up a pen; to learn that, behold, the pen IS mightier than the sword. Any job that is crazy-making or even boring can kill the human spirit. We are meant for joy. And a joyful person is a peaceful person. A fulfilled person brings meaning to the lives of those they touch. Even if a creative commitment is your avocation and not your vocation, you can find the time to include it in your everyday life. Dedication and persistence for 30 minutes a day can change you in ways you never thought possible. Like the moon, we begin to reflect our lives outward so that it is shared and becomes a light by which both you and others can travel when it’s dark. It’s only scary for awhile and it is so worth the risk.

So give yourself, say thirty minutes this very day, to sit alone quietly and remember what it was you always wanted to do before you got that business degree, before you had a family, before you let go of the dream. Then figure out a way to revive that “dream deferred,” choosing now, to begin again.

Before You Jump

by Mendy Knott

She stands firm in a big old Birch.
Its limbs stretch over the same length of river
her granddad swam when he was just a kid.
She is just a kid herself,
rangy as a boy; thick brown hair
pulled into a ponytail shows off her pixie features,
the brown shells of her ears.
Her face gazes at something no one else can see,
some future far away as college
or closer than the swirling water
flowing past beneath.
She waits for her courage to catch up
to how fast she can climb,
stand alone,
take hold of the rope.
Breathless, she considers how her feet
will leave the sureness of the branch and then...
What happens next?
She can only guess.
There are so many firsts for a girl
green as the leaves which frame her
and she will not be rushed.
No “Ready-set-go!” or “Jump!”
will make her leave her perch.
This girl knows her mind.
What happens next?
We are left to guess.

Thoughts zip past like swallows dip and dive
touch the water, fly.
She is not a swallow, though.
Flight depends on courage, heart,
her willingness to risk
adventure.
Shoulders arch wings aching to be tried.
The thin brown feet shift.
What she can’t yet know, she can anticipate:
rush of wind, the muddy water taste,
mouth full of sunshine as she swings
from beneath the canopy of leaves,
body suspended in mid-air when she lets go
as the rope releases her from all she’s ever known.
Momentum, once begun,
will take us somewhere;
of this we can be sure.

Flight, with all its fear and fascination,
will only be first once.
What she appears to know right now
(how quickly we forget)
is not to rush the moment, let it linger.
Stand a moment in that place where you’re familiar
with the feel of everything.
Appreciate your apprehension.
Realize you’ll never be the same.
Know with every act we’re changed.

Then my girl, let fly and take it in:
all the highs and lows
the swing the fall
the grace that lands us on our feet
or sinks us deep in Mystery
the breath that brings us back
the Self that, if we let it, always rises up to meet
both our victories and defeats.

Remind us how time passes fast
and how much more we need to be
open and alive as this young girl
poised in the widespread arms of a tree,
life flowing past beneath our feet.

—Mendy Knott is a writer, poet and author of the poetry collection A Little Lazarus (Half Acre Press, 2010). To order your copy of A Little Lazarus directly from the author, please click here. Or, if cookbooks are more your style, get a copy of Mendy's family cookbook Across the Arklatex at www.twopoets.us.

Apprenticed to Poetry: Part Two

Where I’m From
by Mendy Knott

I am from Dick and Madelyn
Jethro and Jewel
Lillian and John (Jake to his buddies).
I am from deep beneath the tarnished buckle
of the Bible Belt.
Southern states have left traces
all over me like lint:
sweet dark molasses of Big Muddy in my accent
orange dusting of Texas hill country across my cheeks
the wild of a barefoot, small-town Louisiana child.
I’m from a long line of preacher men,
mostly Presbyterian, some Methodist,
all absolutely fundamental to:
my love of language
my tendency to tell a story
the long, lost lonely nights of young lesbians and liars.
I’m from my Mamaw’s front porch swattin’ flies,
Camden street lamps jarring junebugs,
farm ponds catching bream, bass, catfish, carp.
I am from every night a home-cooked meal,
hand-cranked ice cream in the summer
roastbeefriceandgravy on most Sundays.
As I was made once from my Momma’s garden,
I’m now grown up in Leigh’s greenbeans and red tomatoes.
I own the drunk I’m from, the addict born to bear
the brokenness of a woman soldier and big-city cop.
I am living proof there’s a kind of universal grace:
born once, then
born again in AA
born again in creativity
born again in true love
born again each time I open up to hope.
I am from, as much as all of these,
black ink and blank white paper
the will to write, to change, to be.

I was born into a Southern preacher’s family a misfit. But I recognized beauty when I saw it, read it, heard it. I loved poetry from before the time I was able to read it. Mother Goose spoke to me in a sweet enchanting voice. I memorized hymns whose meaning I did not understand and sang them lustfully from my place in the middle pew. I loved early mornings looking out my window at patterns of sun and shade made by the leaves of the backyard fig. I worked hard at learning to read so I could choose books and travel places far away from the restrictions of a religious home.

For a long time, it looked like I would fail. I was a terribly unhappy teen with a tendency to addiction and depression. But I kept reading and writing. I rebelled against everything that smelled even slightly of authority. Much of the time I felt lost, unacceptable and alone. I did not know it then, but I was getting an education. I was learning, as I would for years, the hard way.

Yet, somehow I knew I had a clarity of vision that allowed me to see beyond the surface of ordinary things. But it was painful to me, and lonely, so I blurred the images as much as possible with alcohol and drugs. Because I did not want, with my “tough girl” persona, to appear weak or overly sensitive, I did my best to go against my nature. In my early 30’s I realized that I must get sober or life would soon be over for me. I could no longer stand what I’d become. I joined the police department and stayed until I realized that the job was not helping with my “sensitivity” problem. I had to harden myself or die. For years I didn’t realize there was a third choice: I could quit.

The last year I policed, I began writing a novel, for no other “conscious” reason than to pursue a personal challenge. Once I put pen to paper, some desire long-buried, to be a writer, even a poet, was finally freed. I walked away from my life as a cop and started over again at 37. It was not too late. In fact, the longer I live, the more I realize that it is never too late to begin again. We are surrounded by second chances if we only raise our heads and remember… remember what we loved from the beginning.

When I started writing, I immediately recalled two unfulfilled longings from childhood: I had always wanted to be a writer and to live in the mountains. My first real act of creativity, writing that crazy novel, set these memories free and I was empowered to act. The decision to do what not only seemed improbable, but impossible to my peers, to write that wild first book full of beauty, violence, and sex, set me free. I began, and the answers to those scary questions, like where and how I would live, fell into place. Surely, it’s suppose to be some come-to-Jesus type conversion, but for me it was “Silverwaters: Amazon Adventures for the Stout-Hearted Lesbian.”

We all must face decisions that either free us to follow our forgotten dreams, or bind us to unfulfilled lives of frustration. We know we are called to do more, to do something other than what we are up to at present, to immerse ourselves in a passion that demands the best of us. I think we understand that we could live in an exciting world full of amazing surprises, brought about not only by what we can do, but by what the world will do on our behalf once we have chosen to live by our hearts and creative wits. In this world, the measuring stick has very few markers. Does it bring you joy and does it empower you to share your gift with others?

(Continued in the next post...)

—Mendy Knott is a writer, poet and author of the poetry collection A Little Lazarus (Half Acre Press, 2010). To order your copy of A Little Lazarus directly from the author, please click here. Or, if cookbooks are more your style, get a copy of Mendy's family cookbook Across the Arklatex at www.twopoets.us.

Apprenticed to Poetry: Choosing the Life that Saved My Life, Part One

This next series of blog posts is a written version of a “sermon” or talk I gave at the UU Church in Fayetteville, Arkansas. They are a lovely and lively group of people who believe heartily in allowing the creative spirit to soar. Sometimes we all need a pep rally, though; especially during the dark days of winter. What brings back the light is the brightness we ourselves create. So let these words inspire you to revive your sleeping bear. Whisper in her ear, “Awaken my friend. The child of your creation is waiting to be born. It’s time to re-create Spring once again.”

Apprenticed to Poetry: Choosing the Life that Saved My Life, Part One

by Mendy Knott

The Writer

by Richard Wilbur 1976

In her room at the prow of the house
Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden,

My daughter is writing a story.

I pause in the stairwell, hearing
From her shut door a commotion of typewriter-keys
Like a chain hauled over a gunwale.

Young as she is, the stuff
Of her life is a great cargo, and some of it heavy;
I wish her a lucky passage.

But now it is she who pauses;
As if to reject my thought and its easy figure.
A stillness greatens, in which

The whole house seems to be thinking.
And then she is at it again with a bunched clamor
Of strokes, and again is silent.

I remember the dazed starling
Which was trapped in that very room, two years ago;
How we stole in, lifted a sash

And retreated, not to affright it;
And how for a helpless hour, through the crack of the door,
We watched the sleek, wild, dark

And iridescent creature
Batter against the brilliance, drop like a glove
To the hard floor, or the desk-top,

And wait then, humped and bloody,
For the wits to try it again; and how our spirits
Rose when, suddenly sure,

It lifted off from a chair-back
Beating a smooth course for the right window
And clearing the sill of the world.

It is always a matter, my darling,
Of life and death, as I had forgotten. I wish
What I wished you before, but harder.

Ask yourself, when did I first fall in love with something that was not another person or creature, but rather an expression of someone’s creative passion. Perhaps you fell in love with a landscape, architecture, a movie, a book, a song, or even a poem. And something stirred within you, poked you perhaps with a kind of excruciating pleasure, and a voice inside whispered “ I want to do this, too. I want to re-create this feeling in my own way, in my own words, with crayons or paints or a pencil.” And because you didn’t know you couldn’t or weren’t suppose to, or didn’t know how, you tried it. You loved it! You felt different, good, wonderful, brilliant!

Later on, someone, a parent or a teacher or someone with “authority” on the subject would let you know that you were doing it wrong, that your creation wasn’t really “all that” and quite possibly never would be. Ah, the spirit crushers are everywhere. Not everyone is as lucky as the daughter in the above poem whose father understands the struggle to create, the life and death of it, and wishes her a “lucky passage.” One of my mother’s favorite criticisms was “Oh, you’re so sensitive.” This was not a compliment coming from a Depression Era child who smirked at what she perceived as weakness of any kind.

Most of us will face our creative longings several times and turn away before we finally embrace the challenge; shoulder the courage and determination it takes to immerse ourselves in our truest passion. Because of the spirit-crushers we let the paint set harden. We allow the clay to dry to brick. The pens are a dried flower bouquet in a jar, untouched. The books about writing, the poetry we loved, and our notebooks remain high on a shelf above the mysteries and romances that are dog-eared and worn. Because it does takes courage. It takes believing in ourselves, and faith. A certain amount of “screw you” is called for. We must have a desire or need big enough to override our fears of imperfection.

It takes dedication, persistence, and practice; some would say a sort of benign delusion or obsession. We must be willing to become “rogue scholars” learning all we can on our own, doing homework nobody makes us do. Often, we must be our own mentors and cheerleaders. The road can be long and rough, but the personal rewards are oh so sweet.

(Continued in the next post...)

—Mendy Knott is a writer, poet and author of the poetry collection A Little Lazarus (Half Acre Press, 2010). To order your copy of A Little Lazarus directly from the author, please click here. Or, if cookbooks are more your style, get a copy of Mendy's family cookbook Across the Arklatex at www.twopoets.us.

An Artist's Responsibility

Two events urge me to write on this cold, gray, weepy Sunday: Congresswoman Gifford's assassination attempt and the birthday of a truly great writer and intuitive speaker, Dr. Martin Luther King. These two people, separated by an entire generation, took their creative gifts and their responsibilities into the arena of personal sacrifice. Their courage both inspires and intimidates me. How do I hold myself to be true to what seem like such impossible ideals? How do we as artists respond to their personal sacrifice?

What is the artist's responsibility in a time of crisis and turmoil? Do we have one, not only to ourselves, but to the larger community? These questions plague both artists and critics alike and there are as many answers, it seems, as there are people with opinions. Since I have a blog and write about artistic responsibility, among other aspects of the creative individual's life, I feel a need to address this issue.

All King and Giffords were doing, in reality, were practicing their first amendment rights; the same rights with which every artist and individual in this country are endowed. We have a responsibility to practice these rights. Everyone knows if you don't practice you'll never get good at anything, right? If the artists and teachers and public speakers are afraid to express themselves openly, then who will stand for the citizen on the street? Who will use their gifts of writing and rhetoric to rise to the occasion of justice and freedom and take the risks that prove responsibility, even if it costs us our lives? Surely this is too much to ask of our artists, a quiet and reclusive people. That image, even when true, can no long serve as an excuse for us to remain quiet around the injustices we observe or experience daily.

These are questions we at least must ask ourselves. I'm not sure anyone can decide the answer but the individual artist. I cannot make a proclamation for each and every creative individual. Nor can I say what form that responsibility will take. Some of us are natural street corner speakers. Some of us do our work with introspection inside our rooms or in the solitude of nature. But we all know the work is not finished until it is shared. At some point, we must all take a stand in public for the ideals we claim to believe in our writing; in the work we practice at home, alone.

As for me, well, I've been about this work for a long time now. I am accustomed as an "out"spoken lesbian poet and writer to speaking my mind in public. As an ex-cop, I am completely aware of how devastatingly messy the consequences of "speaking truth to power" can be. Dr. King and Congresswoman Giffords knew absolutely the risks they were taking every time they decided to speak directly to the people. And yet, they found the risk worth taking.

So do I. People have been killing or attempting to kill poets and politicians for as long as they have existed; a very long time indeed. Those who refuse to follow the rules (not law) of the status quo, who insist on shaking up the apathy of the well-heeled and well-fed few, will always be suspect and subject to disappearance, by way of bullet, bullying, or by the simple refusal to acknowledge. But hey, this is our job! And we have a right, perhaps even a responsibility, to do it to the best of our ability even in the face of adversity.

We are the poets, the writers, the artists of our generation. We cannot, nor should we ever, "hide our lights beneath a bushel" or let the people down. It is now, and always will be, our job to accept the risks and speak out. If this is not true for you, Artist, perhaps you should look into a different line of work. Consider it said.