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Explore poems read by the two authors in conversation with each other, then follow your own fish to unlock your own creativity, and share it with us.
Hello, and welcome to our fourth week of Follower Fish poetry podcasts. I'm Sue Boudreau, and I'm here with Deborah Schmidt, my friend, longtime neighbor, and fellow poet and musician who's responsible for our intro and outro flute music by John Partridge. This week, on the heels of so much frightening world news, we present some activist poetry by the two of us. We've chosen two pieces each. Today, we will read more interior poems motivated by current events first, followed by two more furious get out on the streets poems tomorrow.
Sue:We'll be considering if and how poetry can go from being self expression to making a difference in the wider world. Take a moment and think of a quote or poem, a speech, a song, or anthem that inspires you before we start. I'm going to read my poem first called How to Build a Bridge. The Golden Gate links the city with the Tony County Of Marin, who won't consent to a public transit deck that would let the riffraff in. Tides fill and empty the massive bathtub of the bay.
Sue:Winds and currents toss boats unexpectedly, even on a sunny day. And yet the spans were strung across the strait initially with a rope towed from tower to tower by coast guard boat. Strands were spun back and forth one by one, building in the end a structure that bends and flexes balancing enormous forces since 1938. Fog sings through harp strung verticals, waves and spray rust it, requiring constant paint and maintenance, wind whistles a new tune as recent handrails add a resonance. International orange art deco icon Still Stands Beautiful, started with a single strand spun across a dangerous divide.
Deborah:This is Deborah. Oh my goodness. I love this structure of this poem that begins with a single concrete image and then goes somewhere entirely unexpected. You open by hinting at the human divide, which you circle back to in the end, And then you picture the massive oceanic forces of the bay where the bridge was built. You begin the third stanza with the words and yet alone on a line, defying possibility.
Deborah:And then you use your marvelous parallels, spans were strung and strands were spun, just love the sounds of those, to describe the creation of this most unlikely human accomplishment, which you then depict in all of its musical and visual glory before bringing us in a very understated way, started with a single thread to consider how we can bridge our own dangerous divide. I'd love to know what was the experience that brought this poem into being for you.
Sue:I think it was a mixture of both loving The Golden Gate. It features in a lot of stuff that I wrote in my imagination and in photographs. But also, it was my experience with something called deep canvassing, which is where you find something that you have in common when you're like going around canvassing for an election, for example. And the first thing I do that I learned to do through deep canvassing is find something that we would have in common. So I'd go to a door and I'd compliment people on a plant that they had in their garden, and we'd start chatting about that.
Sue:And then eventually, it would come back to, so what do you think about, I don't know, you know, the local candidates for city council, or these days it's going to be perhaps more urgent issues. But the idea of finding something in common struck me as an incredibly friendly thing to do to then be able to build the tiny bit of trust, to be able to be curious and present because you were relating to somebody in a more human level. And I think honestly, one of the best ways of doing that is talking about dogs. Because people who are Republican, who are Democrat, we love our dogs, we love our kids. And I remember a conversation I had when I was doing phone banking, calling up an old lady in Wisconsin, and she was wavering, she didn't know whether she was going to vote for Trump or not.
Sue:But we ended up having this conversation about sons, and honestly, I think by the end, I don't know if she would have changed her vote, but I think she would be less likely to hate people on the coast. Ah. So I guess that's what I'm sort of taking with me from the experience of deep canvassing and being Wow. Politically
Deborah:I wasn't expecting an answer like that at all. That's just wonderful. Can you reflect on your choice for a subtle ending for this activist poem, which is so unlike a great deal of the very in your face protest poetry that we're more accustomed to.
Sue:I think it kind of surprised me, actually, because I was very taken with the story of how the Golden Gate was constructed. You know, that something so huge and iconic would start from a single strand. But it's an allegory, and I'm always interested in allegory. And so I guess it just almost turned without me really thinking about it.
Deborah:Wow, love that. And how do you think these two very different types of call to action might affect a reader, the soft landing versus the more overt, in your face call to action?
Sue:The softer one, as a listener, would give me a moment to think about it, and to sort of take it into myself and roll it around like a pebble in my hand. And maybe it will make me just a little softer the next time I come across somebody who I know has a very different opinion. And to lead with an idea of shared humanity and curiosity, instead of immediately thinking, oh my god, they must be a blah blah blah. Right. Most people have quite good reasons for example voting the way that they do and some people are just too busy surviving and that was one of the other things I found out when I was canvassing.
Sue:Mhmm. Is that you know, I would go to a door of what looked like an ordinary middle class house in an estate. And there would be, you know, multi generations. There would be a young woman with a baby on her hip. She's got her parents in the background. They're trying to get dinner ready. The husband and wife are both working a job or two jobs each to try and make things work. And it's like, do they have time to be reading the New York Times and thinking about politics? No. And that was a huge realization
Sue:Yes, as I remember that coming to me in a series of phone banking calls that I made at one point.
Sue:I mean, think the in your face kind of poetry also has a place. But I think that those places are kind of different, which is why we've divided up the poems like we have today.
Deborah:Yes, that's right. Yes, you'll hear some of the other kind of poetry in the next part of this podcast. How to Build a Bridge. The Golden Gate links the city with the Toney County Of Marin, who won't consent to a public transit deck that would let the riffraff in. Tides fill and empty the massive bathtub of the bay.
Deborah:Winds and currents tossed boats unexpectedly, even on a sunny day. And yet the spans were strung across the strait, initially with a rope towed from tower to tower by a coast guard boat. Strands were spun back and forth one by one, building in the end a structure that bends and flexes, balancing enormous forces since 1938. Fog sings through harp strung verticals, Waves and spray rust it, requiring constant paint and maintenance. Wind whistles a new tune as recent handrails add a resonance.
Deborah:International orange art deco icon still stands beautiful, started with a single strand spun across a dangerous divide.
Sue:Deborah's now going to read her poem called What I Need to Tell Myself.
Deborah:What I need to tell myself. The tyrant's voice rasps over the airwaves, and I cannot listen. Families in line for food are shelled, and I cannot watch. 4,987 birds slam into the glass towers in one night, and I cannot let it in.
Deborah:This is what I need to tell myself. Only read the headlines if you must. Sometimes don't read anything at all. Sometimes you will just curl up in a ball. But don't shut down.
Deborah:Don't turn into a black hole. Stay open, girl. Ride this gorgeous, threatened planet with your ears unstopped and your eyes wide with your heart as ready to catch fire as it was the day you were born.
Sue:Thank you, Deborah. That was beautiful. It's so relatable across more than just politics, just the basic horror of the news in so many different areas of our lives. I love the dilemma that we all face that you've put into your poem, the shutting down or staying engaged, and the hammering repetition of I cannot listen or I cannot let it in. Also, sparse use of rhyme to emphasize the dilemma in such a memorable way, using the self talk slang, stay open girl, that inspires me to do the same.
Sue:The use of a very specific number of birds dying from window collisions adds gravitas, a fact that is surprising. I mean, how often do we even think of this? I love the turn that you have at the end towards light and exhortation to stay open in the final stanza. So I wonder, when did you write this, and what inspired this poem?
Sue:This poem came to me last summer. I was co teaching a poetry workshop through Bob's Poetry Seminars, and the focus was protest poetry. And I'd always been really resistant to protest poetry, because, as you know, there's a lot of it that just isn't very good poetry, and not very lasting. And maybe it inspires you at the moment, but it's not something that you would live with for your life, or that somebody would want to look at one hundred years from now. But one of the other teachers, my friend Mary Eichbauer, brought in a poem by Laura Hershey, the disabled poet activist called How to Write a Poem, and that just blew me away, and Mary used that as a prompt for us.
Deborah:We had a writing component in the workshop So this poem of mine came about as a response to her prompt.
Sue:And we'll put a link into the show notes for that, shall we? Yes, perfect. That's great. So what does persuade you not to shut down? What would you like to, you know, what kind of messaging, who from, how do you save yourself from just curling up in a ball?
Deborah:Yeah, really good question. I think my main spiritual teacher right now is my little granddaughter, Juniper, who's now two and a half years old. And of course, she possesses the child's innate openness to the world, and the sense of wonder and delight that she carries from moment to moment in her life is just purely inspirational. And of course, I think about it. If we shut down, if we don't witness what is going on around us, then how can we protect what is important and beautiful for all the junipers of the world?
Sue:Because noticing is the first step on the way to feeling something, knowing something, connecting with other people, and doing something perhaps.
Deborah:Yes. Exactly.
Sue:So clearly, concerns for nature right now are being subsumed by the political threat, at least in America. And I I can see that you're really concerned with nature from the, piece about the birds colliding with glass, which is kind of a little known tragedy. When you add it up, it's really significant. It affects the populations of birds all over the world. Yes.
Sue:What aspects, what other aspects of nature are concerning you now since you wrote this poem?
Deborah:Mainly it's opening protected lands to exploitation, and all of the environmental deregulation that's going on with this administration.
Sue:I think we had talked about our next podcast being on the theme of nature. Yes. Because I think nature is something that's going to add kind of a balm and a way to help us deal with staying engaged, while also knowing the beauty of the world that we live in.
Deborah:Absolutely.
Sue:What hope what purpose do you hope poetry like yours can serve?
Deborah:I guess, you know, I really wrote it for myself, but I was also thinking that maybe it could just provide comfort and direction for other people, because I know that we all are facing that same dilemma, just the onslaught of difficult news and the very human response of wanting to turn away and close your eyes and shut your ears and hide your head. You know, we have to honor that in ourselves. We can only take in what we're able to take in, but at the same point, we have to find a way to come back out of the sand and open our eyes and ears again and at least witness what was going on. Yeah.
Sue:Thank you, Deborah. I'm going to now reread Deborah's poem, What I Need to Tell Myself. The tyrant's voice rasps over the airwaves, and I cannot listen. Families in line for food are shelled, and I cannot watch. 4,987 birds slam into the glass towers in one night, and I cannot let it in.
Sue:This is what I need to tell myself. Only read the headlines if you must. Sometimes, don't read anything at all. Sometimes, you will just curl up in a ball. But don't shut down.
Sue:Don't turn into a black hole. Stay open, girl. Ride this gorgeous, threatened planet with your ears unstopped and your eyes wide, with your heart as ready to catch fire as it was the day you were born.
Deborah:For today's prompt, I am borrowing from my friend Mary Eichbauer, who used this in a seminar on protest poetry. Read Laura Hershey's poem, How to Write a Poem, and write the poem you need for the current times. You can respond in any way it strikes you. Maybe set a timer for ten minutes and just keep writing. Anything at all.
Deborah:All words welcome. Then read back what you've written and switch your brain to editing mode to see if something interesting has swung up from your subconscious. Then take a chance and send it to us at curiositycatpodcastgmail dot com. Unlike the usual publisher black hole, we will respond with some specific positive feedback, and we'll read the best ones on an upcoming podcast and or send us a voice recording as a .wav file. We are excited to be able to announce a poetry open mic that we're organizing to be held at the Good Table Cafe right here in El Sobrante, California.
Deborah:Times and date TBA. Be brave. Be inspired because only specific positive comments can be made by an audience of your friends and neighbors. For those listening from afar, if you'd like to do something similar, let us know, and we will set up a Zoom version as well. Please check out the written poems with added artwork on our website at curiositycatpodcasts.com.
Deborah:It's linked in our show notes. And of course, please rate and review us, and of course, subscribe and share this with your friends. Looking forward to hearing from you, and thanks for listening today.