The Year of the Horse

On President's Day I went for a brisk walk through my neighborhood and noticed all the Christmas decorations still on display -- a withered wreath hanging on a front door, a poinsettia flanked by two tall red candles in a window, and even a miniature tree all a-twinkle with tiny lights.

One good thing about getting older is I'm not so quick to scoff at other people as I once was. So what if the time to haul off the holly has long since past? I confess I was a little sad myself when I put my own decorations away on New Year's Day. As my fingers plucked each ornament off the tree (my son's paper fish with the glitter glue smile, my daughter's ballerina figurine, and the pale elf my grandmother once gave to me), I felt some tugs in the vicinity of my heart strings. After all, by officially saying the holidays were over and that 2014 had begun, I had to face the fact that my son who was once happy to sit at a table and do art projects with me is now 23 and my daughter will be starting college in the fall.

Now it's the beginning of March already. I've put the relics of the past away, and I'm grasping the mane of this year of the horse as it gallops off into undiscovered territory.

Cyrano's Plume

With Cyrano de Bergerac’s dying breath, he proclaims he’s lost all but one thing: his panache. By this he means even death can’t rob him of his style, swagger, verve, dash. At the end of the play, who cares about his big nose? His spirit and pizzazz take precedence over any so-called physical flaws.

Here’s a question to ponder while you’re sitting in traffic or waiting for your coffee to brew: Does the sweeping white plume Cyrano wears atop his hat solely serve as a symbol of his flair or does its flamboyance actually fuel his inner panache?

I wrote the haiku below about a pair of shoes (big, scuffed, used) that have been adding a little spring to my step lately.

My new shoes – maroon! –

found in the Goodwill bins. No

one else wanted them!

OK, so haiku are supposed to be about nature – raindrops and cicadas and whatnot. But hey, I’m a creative writing teacher and feel obligated to model what fun it is to take a literary rule and bend it to my own purposes.

Next month, we’ll continue bending the rules in my Saturday creative writing class.

Saturday, March 15, 2014

10-11:30am

100^th Monkey Studio, 1600 SE Ankeny St.
Cost: $20 per class

A Certain Fame

Some of my creative writing students have gone pantoum crazy, writing powerful poems with a pattern of repeating lines. As for me, I’m on a little haiku kick.

After seeing an apartment called "Casa Linda," I came up with this poem:

My name, not on a

book cover, but published on

an apartment sign.

According to our former poet laureate Robert Hass, the haiku form started out as an improvisational game that Japanese writers used to play at parties. Apparently, a group of them would make poems by adding to each other's lines and riffing like jazz musicians.

In keeping with that tradition, my Saturday creative writing students will meet next week to socialize and play around with words.

If you feel like joining us, bring a pen...or maybe your saxophone.


Saturday, February 15, 2014
10-11:30am
100^th Monkey Studio, 1600 SE Ankeny St.
Cost: $20 per class

"That's So Portland"

Before our fair city became known for its beards, microbrews and baristas, my grandmother, Myrtle L. Drahn, moved here in the 1960's. A middle-aged wife from Newberg, Oregon, she suddenly found herself single and in need of an income. She got a job at Jones Photo, rented a series of apartments in Portland and spent her free time riding the bus to Montgomery Ward (a department store) and chatting with her favorite waitresses and busboys at Roses Restaurant, which was famous for its bazillion-layer chocolate cakes and donuts the size of truck tires.

Two of the apartments she lived in when I was a kid still stand on Vista Avenue. I see them now every time our family heads to Washington Park, our picnic basket filled with a quinoa salad, some Dogfish Head Ale and maybe a plate of cookies topped with hazelnuts, which my grandmother would have known as "filberts."

Comin' Thro' the Rye

Long before Holden Caulfield ever imagined himself on a cliff catching children, Robert Burns (that sexy, self-educated Scotsman) wrote his song “Comin’ Thro’ the Rye.”

Gin a body meet a body
Comin’ thro' the rye,
Gin a body kiss a body,
Need a body cry?

Gin a body meet a body
Comin’ thro' the glen
Gin a body kiss a body,
Need the warl' ken?

Ilka lassie has her laddie,
Nane, they say, ha’e I
Yet all the lads they smile on me,
When comin' thro' the rye.

Burns was born 255 years ago on January 25. If you feel like giving it a try, enjoy the rolling rhythms of  his “Comin’ Thro’ the Rye” by reading it aloud -- or even sing it, if you know the tune. Then light a candle and kiss someone in celebration of the life of this poet who continues to urge us all to relish our own lives.

Ground Control to Major Tom

My daughter recently got into David Bowie, and I’ve had the first line of his song “Space Oddity” going through my head for the last few weeks. I find myself singing it (in my best pre-Ziggy-Stardust voice) at random times throughout the day – while I’m driving to work or cooking a carrot soup or checking my email.

I suppose that’s what happens when you hang around other people – their habits and hobbies and interests tend to rub off on you. During my sixth grade Gone With the Wind kick, I addressed my mother as “Miss Barbara” (in a Southern drawl, of course), and she returned the favor by calling me “Miss Linda” for many years to come. I started researching the life of Emily Roebling when our son, at age eight, got obsessed with the Brooklyn Bridge, which Emily's husband built, and I immersed myself in John Lennon lore during our family’s Beatlemania phase. Thanks to that obsession, I even ended up writing a short story, “The People v. Hiroko Uno,” which was published by Imitation Fruit a few years ago. (http://www.imitationfruit.com/Issue_9/people_hiroko/people_hiroko.html)

That’s one of the many things I love about teaching creative writing classes – all the participants inspire each other. We hear someone read a story that cracks everyone up, and we all know we want to try our hands at humor too. Or another writer will share an elegiac piece that’s so moving the room is silent for a moment after she’s done reading, and we feel the call to tiptoe into new territory.

Luckily for me, I reap armloads of creative inspiration through all the students I teach each week. This Saturday I get to meet with yet another small group at 100^th Monkey Studio, and you’re welcome to join us too. Besides leaving with some new material of your own, I guarantee your unique voice will serve as inspiration for someone else.

Creative Writing Saturdays

100^th Monkey Studio, 1600 SE Ankeny
Saturday, January 18, 10 – 11:30am
Cost: $20

Read On, Macduff!

Dear Friends,

My daughter spent her winter break composing college essays. One question asked her to write about a piece of art that expanded her world view. Here are some books that did that for me in 2013.

Margaret Fuller: A Life. Megan Marshall takes her meticulous research about the famous feminist icon and spins a spellbinding story of a living, breathing woman.

Nine Horses by Billy Collins. The plain-speaking former poet laureate reflects on a chess piece found in the park and a song looping through his head and somehow touches on our need for transcendence.

My Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor. A call for us all to work and love and learn and rise.

Clair de Lune by Jetta Carleton. An odd, newly discovered novel about a young depression-era teacher who yearns to live a larger life. Jetta Carleton’s words are like rare jewels catching light.

Mink River by Brian Doyle. A lyric novel peopled with a cast of colorful characters singing a mischievous, healing song.

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson. A woman keeps dying and getting a chance to live her life again. No, that’s not it. I’m too in awe of Kate Atkinson, the Empress of Dark Wit who also has the humanism of E.M. Forster, to attempt to describe her newest book in a few sentences. Let me just say that reading her work is a little like listening to Mozart or seeing one of Shakespeare’s plays or watching the sun rise over Mt. Hood. How can it be that this world of ours, which has produced internment camps and juntas, has also graced us with such art?

Wishing you all a happy new year full of your own reading adventures!