Family Nature Journal
Option 8

february 25
     

Sunny. The snow melting back

     The long, slanting light of midwinter
     shines back at itself
     from the tinned-over door of an old barn
     among dead trees.
     How many millions of miles has it travelled
     only to find this dented mirror,
     and then to have to pay these cottonwoods in silver.
                –Ted Kooser, from Winter Morning Walks

Writing a poem can be intimidating without some guidance. With guidance, it can be one of easiest ways we have to get outside and write about it.  Ted Kooser wrote a wonderful book of 'walking' poems some years ago as a means to recovering from illness. He set himself on a project to wake in the morning, despite the cold, take a walk, then write a sort of in the moment response to the impressions that he observed.  With thoughtful skill, in these short poems, he captures nature in new light, often capturing very specific and local details with the use of description and metaphor.  Every poem begins with the same kind of simple description as a journal entry might. He begins with the date, then briefly describes the weather outside, and then moves onto some scene with natural players that catches his eye and offers up some dynamic for drama.  In the poem above, a drama is created between the slanting light, a dented mirror, and the cottonwoods, with a fresh insight and straightforward language that any reader can gain some sense of experiencing the scene.

Poetry can be difficult write if we feel we have to do too much, or if we feel we too have write at a higher level, like the masters, than we are ready for capable for. To write a simple journal-style reaction to the landscape by placing oneself immediately into the scene and referring to a series of images is something everybody can do, and relatively quickly!  The first piece of guidance is to make sure and relieve all the self-pressure that goes with trying to come up with a poem. Release from that, and let the language fly, as short as you want, and something will come out, you just have to have an object or two that you have observed to get it started.  The first stanza above is nothing more than an image of light shining and reflecting outside. Light is always a great quality to start with – it is often the power in nature that turns a standard scene into art. Consider the bunch of leaves piled at the front of your house right now. Do those yellows and brows and fading greens look more like treasure on a dark and gloomy day or under a crisp October sunshine? Always follow the light and good things will happen in poetry. What does it reveal? In this case it finds a dented mirror. Even household (barn hold) objects become recognized by the sun. Kooser gives the light some character by asking how long has it travelled to find this object, as though it were seeking a place to land, a beginning of a relationship maybe, or securing its purpose. The cottonwoods, another natural object, finds its place in the poem as the last image. At this point, there is no reason to poke and prod at your metaphors to make sure that they make complete sense -- that is the labor of the professional poet -- but find an 

image splashes out in the end and leaves a strong impression. Maybe we see the spreading of the reflected light onto the cottonwoods which now glitters in silver? Whatever the logic, the guide throughout is nothing more than the action and color and the generosity of light, what we come to feel as a force for good and illuminating things. The image connections have come to reflect a kind of sentiment of good tidings, a kind of gratitude by the poet for such things of the land, the earth, and the sun itself.  Whenever you may be stuck in finding purpose in a poem, provide nature with attributes of the kind of positive values you have come to know. These could be called journal poem of appreciation, and serve as a very powerful practice.

Option 8: Take a winter (fall?) walk and be sure to observe at least 2 or 3 specific things in nature. These things (leaf pile, twig, rock in the lake) might serve as nothing more than an image to describe. When back home, begin describing the image most memorable. If a relationship to some other thing comes to mind, go ahead and begin to transition into that thought: "the river today under the bridge is clear and you can see to the bottom, except where the river grass floats up sideways like a hundred fish tails waving from the bottom. Stationary, they must be sunning, unlikely to leave soon."  This is very simple and the quick visual connection between river grass weaving and fish tails might not work on every single logical level, but the writer has done several things that makes the connection worthwhile. In the end, for the observer, the walker outside, this bright and fluid scene seems something like a gift. We could certainly take a picture of it and send that along to someone else, or we can become part of it, by offering it a place in language, what humans are so good at doing. Finish with another image or another observation of some kind: "Tomorrow, at the same, time, I will come back fishing for sunlight." Now the relationship between sunshine, river grass, and observer has been secured, and all will be back again to offer another poem.