Just a quick submission opportunity. Probably we've all written about loss or grief, and over at the fabulous Literary Mama , I found this call for submissions. I'm thinking of submitting a villanelle I wrote about my baby nephew who died when he was nearly 6 months old. I'm not sure, though. I might decide it's a private endeavor I did to try to force some order into a thing that was chaotic (a villanelle is a form poem, and there are requirements, though of course those are loose). At any rate, check it out. Over at the Literary Mama Blog, they have calls for submission a lot, as well as journal prompts. I ♥ the whole site.
Literary Mama : Columns : The Poetry of Loss: On Mothering and Dealing with Death
Nov 7, 2011
In which the villagers are friendly
All of us Alalas attended graduate school together, Brighid and I having graduated last summer, and Rhea graduating next summer (of course you will, Rhea, hush). Brighid and I met before classes started in 2009, and right away we bonded, being one of the relatively few MFA candidates who were moms. On our first outing, she offered to watch my kids for me. In fact, there were a lot of things about the program that were harder for me because I’m a mom, but that’s to be expected, and I’ll bitch about that in a minute.
But first, I want to mention how great my MFA community was. My partner watched the kids while I went to class, but when he got a job, he had to work one night that I had class. I needed a babysitter, and a cheap one, because we were hurting. I called a new friend, who would like to remain nameless, I’m sure. Even though she was busy as a TA and an all around excellent student, she agreed to watch my kids for 5 hours every Thursday for a whole quarter, for $25 a night. And she wasn’t the only one. Every time I needed a babysitter, nearly always for a school function, one of my MFA people stepped up. One lovely woman I’d only met in passing offered to babysit so I could attend a meeting. Friends took my kids on field trips, and bought them Christmas presents. There was even the wife of another student whose mention that she loved babysitting I took very seriously. And there was the sweet girl who offered me a parking-lot hug when I broke down in tears. And of course Brighid was there for rides and babysitting. She brought me snacks for my kids when we first moved and were really broke and hungry. And then Rhea showed up, and our daughters became fast friends and so did we, even though we’re too busy to see each other most weeks. Every member of Rhea’s family has babysat for me.
I have an amazing partner, too, who without complaint, for two years, in a lot of ways, gave me over to writing, reading, and working. And so when people ask me how I managed to go to grad school while having three young children and working and doing internships, in a new city without a support system, well, I actually had a great little village.
But like I mentioned before, going to grad school was hard. There were a lot more meetings that I had thought there would be. Which meant, once my partner started working, that I had to find a babysitter for every meeting. And an inordinate amount of those meetings took place right at the time my daughter got out of school. Sometimes it involved driving the babysitter, and sometimes the babysitter was late. Sometimes I drove around for 2 ½ hours just to attend a 45 minute meeting. And not only the meetings, but there were a lot of just general events like readings and visiting writers and artsy fartsy stuff, and then even more social invitations to parties and other get-togethers. I was actually astounded when I discovered the amount of partying that the MFA crowd did. I’m not a drinker myself, mostly because I don’t like the taste of almost anything, and I get bad hangovers. But I have to say, pretty much everybody was still pretty damn brilliant, so I guess the drinking didn’t get in their way. It just surprised me, is all. So I attended most of the meetings, a handful of the literary events, and almost none of the parties. I didn’t really miss the parties, and the ones I attended, I had fun at. I even got tipsy a few times. Which means that I drank way more than my usual in grad school, too. Ah ha, and the finger comes back around. Mmm-hmm.
Grad school was tough for a lot of reasons, but it was great fun. I made myself a promise when I got accepted to school. I was going to talk in class and make intelligent comments, no matter how red my face turned or how many times I ended with “..or, you know, whatever.” I was going to make real friends and join organizations. My teachers were going to remember me, and I was going to remember some of the shit I’d studied. So far, so good, y’all. So good.
But first, I want to mention how great my MFA community was. My partner watched the kids while I went to class, but when he got a job, he had to work one night that I had class. I needed a babysitter, and a cheap one, because we were hurting. I called a new friend, who would like to remain nameless, I’m sure. Even though she was busy as a TA and an all around excellent student, she agreed to watch my kids for 5 hours every Thursday for a whole quarter, for $25 a night. And she wasn’t the only one. Every time I needed a babysitter, nearly always for a school function, one of my MFA people stepped up. One lovely woman I’d only met in passing offered to babysit so I could attend a meeting. Friends took my kids on field trips, and bought them Christmas presents. There was even the wife of another student whose mention that she loved babysitting I took very seriously. And there was the sweet girl who offered me a parking-lot hug when I broke down in tears. And of course Brighid was there for rides and babysitting. She brought me snacks for my kids when we first moved and were really broke and hungry. And then Rhea showed up, and our daughters became fast friends and so did we, even though we’re too busy to see each other most weeks. Every member of Rhea’s family has babysat for me.
I have an amazing partner, too, who without complaint, for two years, in a lot of ways, gave me over to writing, reading, and working. And so when people ask me how I managed to go to grad school while having three young children and working and doing internships, in a new city without a support system, well, I actually had a great little village.
But like I mentioned before, going to grad school was hard. There were a lot more meetings that I had thought there would be. Which meant, once my partner started working, that I had to find a babysitter for every meeting. And an inordinate amount of those meetings took place right at the time my daughter got out of school. Sometimes it involved driving the babysitter, and sometimes the babysitter was late. Sometimes I drove around for 2 ½ hours just to attend a 45 minute meeting. And not only the meetings, but there were a lot of just general events like readings and visiting writers and artsy fartsy stuff, and then even more social invitations to parties and other get-togethers. I was actually astounded when I discovered the amount of partying that the MFA crowd did. I’m not a drinker myself, mostly because I don’t like the taste of almost anything, and I get bad hangovers. But I have to say, pretty much everybody was still pretty damn brilliant, so I guess the drinking didn’t get in their way. It just surprised me, is all. So I attended most of the meetings, a handful of the literary events, and almost none of the parties. I didn’t really miss the parties, and the ones I attended, I had fun at. I even got tipsy a few times. Which means that I drank way more than my usual in grad school, too. Ah ha, and the finger comes back around. Mmm-hmm.
Grad school was tough for a lot of reasons, but it was great fun. I made myself a promise when I got accepted to school. I was going to talk in class and make intelligent comments, no matter how red my face turned or how many times I ended with “..or, you know, whatever.” I was going to make real friends and join organizations. My teachers were going to remember me, and I was going to remember some of the shit I’d studied. So far, so good, y’all. So good.
Nov 2, 2011
Brighid's Reveal
To open, some background on my namesake Goddess:
Brighid is a Celtic triple goddess ruling healing, poetry, and smithcraft. She is one of the great mothers of the Celts. Her modern name is Brigit or Bridget as derived from her Christianization into St. Bridget. Her name, Brighid, thought to be derived from Bhrati in Sanskrit, is originally an epithet meaning "exalted one".
Brighid is best known for her associations with healing, poetry, and smithcraft. As a healing goddess, she governs childbirth and the birthing time. Brighid was highly regarded as a healing goddess as can be seen from the numerous healing wells dedicated to her all over Ireland. As a goddess of poetry, she governs not only the inspiration and writing of poetry, but also divination and prophecy. As a goddess of smithcraft, she governs the forge's fire. It is for these reasons that she is considered the "Bright Goddess" and is associated with the element of fire. In all her forms, she brings to one inspiration (a fire quality) and provides the spark for motivation. Her fire associations are so strong that a perpetual fire was set at Kildare in her honor. The fire still burns there today. She also became the goddess of the hearth-fire, the fire of the home, since she contains the mother and fire aspects.
I chose Brighid because of her aspects of motherhood (especially giving birth), her connections to the hearth and home, and poetry as divination.
Now, some things you should know about me: I moved out my parent’s house at 18, was pregnant, married and gave birth at 19 (yes, in that order), dropped out of a state school after two quarters because I got pregnant. I proceeded to go back to college part-time at twenty-two, got my A.A. at twenty-five, my B.A. at twenty-eight and my MFA at thirty…so, essentially I have been in school, minus 2.5 years, since I was in Kindergarten. My divorce to said husband was final last month.
I have been on cash assistance, food assistance, medical assistance, WIC and SNAP at different points in my life. I am pretty liberal in my political stances. I feel the government cannot leave the poor behind, especially the poor who are mentally-ill. Mental healthcare in this country is a huge problem that contributes to homelessness and poverty, but more on that another day. To be brief: I feel that those who are fortunate to make a lot of money should help those less fortunate and that those who are less fortunate should use the services they have and make the most of them so they can get ahead.
I have been a stay-at-home mom (while going to college) and am now a working mom. The stay-at-home mom was the model I had growing up. So charting the waters of working and raising my son is very new to me. I always felt that what I did in the home was indeed work. The best example was thinking of what my then-husband would have to do to replace me if I died: hire a maid, cook, driver, babysitter and personal accountant. I feel all moms are working moms.
In the writing world, I am a poet. I feel my poems border on the metaphorical and rely heavily on metaphors grounded in the relationships between human beings and between human beings and the natural world. I adore the poetry of Michael Heffernan, Laura Kasischke and Sylvia Plath, to name a few.
To pay the bills, I teach on the college-level and do some marketing for a small nonprofit.
My child is the most important part of my life. I plan to have more children in the future, with or without a man by my side.
So, to put it mildly, I love education, being a mother and writing. I love my fellow blog goddesses and am honored to have been asked to be a part of it. Alala!!
It's a girl, er, woman!
Our brand-new baby blog. Isn’t she just cute? I’m one of the Mamas. You can call me Bess, which is not my real name. I am currently eating a sugar cookie and cursing at the crumbs on my keyboard, which is neither here nor there. I chose Bess because I have a feminist-hero crush on Queen Elizabeth 1, who was tough, amazing, and clever woman. I mean, no royal folks had it that easy back then – you turn your head and someone’s trying to assassinate you, or marry you off to some sickly weirdo from across the sea, or usurp your position, or what not. And if not that, you were getting the plague or the English Sweate. But Elizabeth Tudor was most impressive as a monarch and as a woman in the 16th century. Knowing that a husband would lessen if not erase her power as Queen--King trumped Queen almost every time—Elizabeth cleverly sidestepped every effort from Parliament to marry her off. She brought England to a time of prosperity it had never known under her less than prodigious father, Henry VIII. She ruled the shit out of England, y’all. She kicked that reign’s ASS. The dressing down of Parliament when they pushed her to get hitched? I respect the crap out of Bess, and I’m proud to use her picture and name, though I can only dream of the kind of smarts and strength that lady had.
I’ve been such a fan of Elizabeth that I took her side against Mary Tudor, Queen before Elizabeth. At a recent library book sale, in my bag of 25 books for $3 was a book about Mary Tudor called…er…Mary Tudor, by H. F. M. Prescott. Now, the sisters were often at each other’s throats and in each other’s ways. As Anne Boleyn said of Mary in Prescott’s book, so it could be said of the sisters Elizabeth and Mary: “She is my death, and I am hers.” Yeesh, that’s a chilling statement, all the more so because it was matter of fact. At any rate, I've always sided with Good Queen Bess over "Bloody Mary," but I think I gave Mary the short shrift. I mean, she had a rough time of it too, what with her father constantly bandying her about as a prize and then bastardizing her. I think Elizabeth was just a bit stronger-willed.
This is all to say Hi, I’m Bess, and I want to be a strong, fierce leader too. I want to stomp balls too. I want other, softer, kitten-like things, too, but let's save that for later. Because today you need to know that I am going to be a little bitchy on this blog. Because this is my new Bitch Place. I won’t take off my grumpy undies, I won’t, I won’t, I won’t!
So yeah, here goes. I’m what some assholes would call a welfare queen. I ride high on the hog with food stamps, WIC, and Medicaid. Not for long, though. See, I got a raise! And a promotion! I work at home, and this raise is so very needed right now, and I’m grateful to have the work. My promotion involves a lot more work, so I’ve been working pretty much all day long, with breaks to help my kids with second-grade homework or make them a peanut butter and sugar sandwich, or attend a school function. So with my raise and working my ass off, my partner and I now make too much for food stamps and WIC. Which is cool. Which is also not to say that we don’t still need those things. But we will be fine—we are fortunate in many ways. We have a support system. We’re rich with love. Yeah, the kids didn’t really buy that one either.
Now, because I’m all about awkward endings, here’s part of a poem that rocks my socks:
Sacred Trees
By Jayne Cortez
sometimes I feel like a tree
& every time I think about us women
I think about the trees
I think about
the subversive trees laden in blood
but not bleeding
the rebellious trees encrusted
but not cracking
the abused trees wounded
but still standing
I think about the proud trees
the trees with beehive tits buzzing
the transparent trees
the trees with quinine breath hovering
the trees swaying & rubbing their
stretched marked bellies
in the rain
Welcome to Alala Mamas, and thanks for stopping by, Planet Earth.
I’ve been such a fan of Elizabeth that I took her side against Mary Tudor, Queen before Elizabeth. At a recent library book sale, in my bag of 25 books for $3 was a book about Mary Tudor called…er…Mary Tudor, by H. F. M. Prescott. Now, the sisters were often at each other’s throats and in each other’s ways. As Anne Boleyn said of Mary in Prescott’s book, so it could be said of the sisters Elizabeth and Mary: “She is my death, and I am hers.” Yeesh, that’s a chilling statement, all the more so because it was matter of fact. At any rate, I've always sided with Good Queen Bess over "Bloody Mary," but I think I gave Mary the short shrift. I mean, she had a rough time of it too, what with her father constantly bandying her about as a prize and then bastardizing her. I think Elizabeth was just a bit stronger-willed.
This is all to say Hi, I’m Bess, and I want to be a strong, fierce leader too. I want to stomp balls too. I want other, softer, kitten-like things, too, but let's save that for later. Because today you need to know that I am going to be a little bitchy on this blog. Because this is my new Bitch Place. I won’t take off my grumpy undies, I won’t, I won’t, I won’t!
So yeah, here goes. I’m what some assholes would call a welfare queen. I ride high on the hog with food stamps, WIC, and Medicaid. Not for long, though. See, I got a raise! And a promotion! I work at home, and this raise is so very needed right now, and I’m grateful to have the work. My promotion involves a lot more work, so I’ve been working pretty much all day long, with breaks to help my kids with second-grade homework or make them a peanut butter and sugar sandwich, or attend a school function. So with my raise and working my ass off, my partner and I now make too much for food stamps and WIC. Which is cool. Which is also not to say that we don’t still need those things. But we will be fine—we are fortunate in many ways. We have a support system. We’re rich with love. Yeah, the kids didn’t really buy that one either.
Now, because I’m all about awkward endings, here’s part of a poem that rocks my socks:
Sacred Trees
By Jayne Cortez
sometimes I feel like a tree
& every time I think about us women
I think about the trees
I think about
the subversive trees laden in blood
but not bleeding
the rebellious trees encrusted
but not cracking
the abused trees wounded
but still standing
I think about the proud trees
the trees with beehive tits buzzing
the transparent trees
the trees with quinine breath hovering
the trees swaying & rubbing their
stretched marked bellies
in the rain
Welcome to Alala Mamas, and thanks for stopping by, Planet Earth.
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