Returning the Blood to Words

At almost every AWP Conference (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) there is a moment, a panel, a writer who reminds you of why you became a writer in the first place.  The annual conference is in Denver this year, and Martín Espada, the master poet, was the man for me this year.  Last year it was Marie Ponsot.

Espada: “Writers should return the blood to words.”

Espada said so many things on his panel, “Justice, Community, and the Republic of Poetry,” with Tara Betts and David Mura.  But that sentence encapsulates his ideas about writers fighting the deadness of language used by politicians and even the deadness of perspective given our busy and often compromised lives.

Espada read and sang in a way only poets do, to uplift the literary sprits, to call us to the social mission of writing, to dethrone the accepted, to criticize the unjust, to delve roughly and humorously into ourselves too, lest we forget that not only is the world the issue, but also the self.

Years ago I had a similar reaction the first time I heard Curbstone’s Alexander Taylor speak at the Hudson Valley Writers’ Center.  Sandy, who died in December of 2007, may he rest in peace, invigorated me and gave me purpose.  I write to change the world, to prod myself, to seek answers to questions often unasked, to lead the good life as Aristotle may have envisioned, which is hard and unrelenting.  And I try to do this with good stories that engage the reader.  Philosophy in literature, some have called it.  So hearing Sandy, just like hearing Martín, captured my soul.

I dropped everything, even the panels I am missing as I type this, to write this entry.  This is what great writers do: they cause you to act.  They don’t just entertain you (although they have to do that if they are storytellers), but they prompt you to do, to change your perspective, to ask yourself tough questions, to believe in a just republic and imagine the impossible.

Martín Espada and Sandy Taylor were great friends.  I also remember hearing Martín speak about reading poetry to Sandy as he lay in the hospital during his final hours.  I knew Sandy, since I had been briefly on the Curbstone Board.  But I do not know Martín except from afar.  I am lucky to have paid attention to their words.

I have been pondering why it is that poets, recently, have been the ones inspiring me.  It is their exceptional use of language, and their thinking beyond the norm and the staid.  This poetic thinking I believe is deeply philosophical.  These writers seem to pose the question of ‘seeing’ without assuming what it means, or what it has meant, or what it can mean.  ‘Seeing’ for these poets is a new act with every poem.

During breaks, I am finishing Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass,” and have already received recommendations from poet-friends on what to read next.  It has been a great conference so far.  But now I need the solitude and quiet that beckon me even in a crowd.

Marie Ponsot

I returned from the Association of Writers and Writing Programs’ Annual Conference in Chicago this weekend inspired by the most unlikeliest of writers: Marie Ponsot, a poet. I do not write poetry, but I do care about the role of the writer in the world and the craft of writing. I worry that my sense of how and why I write is antiquated, to help others into explorations of ideas often unmarketable and unusual. As a contrarian, a loner, and an Aristotlean, is there still a place for me?

In the panel, “The Duty of a Writer,” Marie Ponsot said simply, “The duty of a poet is to write poetry.” The work of writing defines a poet, she said. The struggle to write a poem. The action of writing a poem. Not the thought, nor the hope of writing poetry. “The mastery of skill is the mastery of oneself.” This mastery is internal; it is inexpensive; it is ongoing. Above all, this is a practical mastery. To listen is one of the most important skills a writer must cultivate; to listen in a world full of noises and phenomena is difficult. The act of work sharpens and deepens the writer’s listening skills. I am paraphrasing Ponsot’s words, leaving out so much, and perhaps distorting her at once complicated and simple message.

To improve as a writer, I have tried to slow down my thoughts, and my fingers, to ponder words and sentences before they become entities on the page. Every writer, I believe, must work against his or her weaknesses. Mine are that I write too fast and too colloquially. I can create a story (plot plot plot!), yet I often find the care missing from my words. I do often ‘see’ beyond what others see: I read as much philosophy as literature and I do not care for the crowd. But often that ‘sight’ is not translated into the words that reveal a new world on the page. I am trying to improve.

In a recent essay, “Trapped,” I wrote about how my body and its “loin energy” at once give me an advantage and a disadvantage. I love to work; the more I work, the more I can work. Yet this nervousness, or incessant thinking and doing and wanting to do, hampers my listening. To write better, I need to quiet myself. Reading poetry and studying the mechanics of poetry and listening to poets have helped me to counter my weaknesses as a prose writer.

I returned from Chicago, and discovered that I already knew Marie Ponsot’s work. Scott Hightower, another poet-teacher, had long ago recommended Beat Not the Poor Desk, by Marie Ponsot and Rosemary Deen. This is the best book on teaching writing I have ever read, and I had forgotten the authors but remembered the impact this book had on my work years ago. Without friends like Scott and teachers like Marie Ponsot, where would I be? These good writers are good people who care to teach.

Incidentally, I attended another panel, “Big House/Small House,” with LeAnne Howe, Rilla Askew, Tracy Daugherty, Molly Giles, and Allen Wier. This was also, in my opinion, another excellent panel at the AWP. In particular, Tracy Daugherty’s thoughtful reflections on the right expectations of literary writers for their careers, their relationship with an editor, and ‘what should be enough for the good writer’ brought me back again to how and why good words on the page matter most of all. I will be in Denver next year, again to listen and improve.