Approaches to Nature Poetry

 

Approaches to Nature Poetry

My mind is a snow globe, shaken, thoughts tumbling, suspended and seeking a way to settle into a familiar scene.  Learning does that to me.

I attended a Maritime Writers’ Workshop on “Approaches to Nature Poetry,”  an event sponsored by University of New Brunswick, College of Extended Learning, and facilitated by Ian Letourneau.   Well qualified, he is the author of Terminal Moraine (Thistledown Press 2008), and Defining Range (Gaspereau Press 2006).  He is poetry editor of The Fiddlehead, associate poetry editor with Goose Lane editions, and frequent contributor to CBC as the local book columnist.  His book reviews have appeared in magazines across the country, including The Malahat Review and Books in Canada.

For the workshop, each participant submitted their own poetry, some of which we critiqued together.   We explored samples of animal world poetry by  John Clare, Ted Hughes, Clea Roberts, Les Murray and Jo Shapcott.  We studied landscape poetry through the work of Alden Nowlan, Harry Thurston, Milton Acorn; environmentally conscious poetry from Les Murray and Erin Robinsong.  We shared reading lists, ideas, laughter, examined what makes a poem work and why, looked at how nature poetry has evolved and continues to evolve, we asked questions, found answers (often more than one) and reviewed diverse approaches to nature poetry.

What did I learn?

1. Where I am.   I know basics.  There is much more to learn.  There will always be more to learn. 

2.  Nature poetry must be unsentimental.  Sentimentality, clichés, expected phrases or images draw attention away from nature itself.

3.  Nature poetry should be accurate in detail and language, speak the truth, and use images in the same metaphorical field as the subject of the poem.

4.  Acknowledge anthropomorphism.  Evoke it thoughtfully.  Don McKay author of Vis-à-Vis, Field Notes on Poetry and Wilderness suggests reading field guides as one preparation to writing.  Don explains that writing poetry about nature struggles with the desire to put the experience in words, knowing that it is too easy to quantify nature with human perception, in anthropomorphic terms.  It is more respectful and more accurate to see and experience the event, to translate it from nature’s point of view, without human judgement.

5.  Culture and nature are not two separate concepts.  Even the tiniest seeds are political issues now.   "Everything is political," says Ian.  Culture and nature are intertwined, and as Alden Nowlan remarked, the climate can kill us.

6.  Metaphor and precise description are essential poetic skills.

7.  Poetry is not always serious; neither should I be.

8.  Write regularly.  Be receptive to what comes.  Even on the bad days, there will be beginnings, images, possibilities for another day's writing.

9.  After hard work, play.

10.  Poetry is everywhere.

11.  It takes time to absorb learning, for the brain to settle into new paths.  Sit in the sun, make notes, drink wine and breathe summer.

12.  Write and write and read and read.

Thank you to UNB College of Extended Learning and to Laurie Glenn Norris for organizing these Maritime Writers’ Workshops.  Thank you to UNB CEL for a scholarship to attend Ian’s workshop.   And huge thanks to Ian LeTourneau for patient feedback on my poetry. 

I am grateful for advice given by Ian and by the other writers at the event, for honest feedback, helpful suggestions, reading lists and encouragement.

When my head settles its flurry of thoughts and learning, I’ll continue to write; write nature poetry with an expanded understanding.

 Note:  Learning list item #2 through #6 inclusive are from Ian LeTourneau's notes and /or explanations.

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Spring Writers' Retreat 2013 with Ian LeTourneau

 

 

 

Spring Writers’ Retreat 2013 with Ian LeTourneau

 

I don’t know what I don’t know about writing poetry.  That’s annoying.  That’s also the way it is. 

Receiving feedback on my poems teaches me how to improve them.  However, one of my challenges in learning anything is this: I am a visual, tactile learner.  Hearing comments is helpful, but seeing them written is better.  Better still is sitting with someone who can tell me how to improve what I’ve written and show me how to change the poem around; show me on paper. Then I “get it.”  I see, I learn.  I can capture the concept in my mind and retain it.

 

The SpringWriters’ Retreat offered by University of New Brunswick provided the opportunities I needed.  In addition to time learning from and socializing with other writers, I submitted ten pages of my writing to share and to be critiqued.  Each of us did.  I read my poems aloud and then made note of the comments on my work, from Ian LeTourneau, the instructor, and from the other writers.  Any feedback given was positive and constructive.  No personal attacks or personality issues were permitted.  After everyone had commented, I had a chance to ask questions or make my own remarks.  We spent all day Saturday rotating turns reading our work and listening and critiquing.

An added bonus for me was receiving written feedback from three writers.  I took these pages home where I could study their suggestions.  These three didn’t make comments and leave it there, they wrote notes explaining to me why something worked well or didn’t work.  Those explanations were gold.

On Sunday, I met one-on-one with Ian LeTourneau to ask questions and to receive advice.  He explained in thoughtful detail a concept I had misunderstood.  He suggested a book for further study.  His feedback was encouraging, yet realistic and truthful.  I left with new lights on in my mind and optimism about my writing journey.

Prior to the retreat, I had received the copies of the other writers’ work.  For two days, I poured over their words, making notes on what worked and why, what wasn’t clear, what made me green with envy, and most challenging, what didn’t work and why.  To my surprise, I learned more from the discipline of having to write why something didn’t work in their submissions, than from making the easier comments on what did and why.

It’s been over a week since I attended the Spring Writers’ Retreat.  I’m still processing what I learned.  I’m grateful to have been in the company of writers for three days, for their casual conversations about their own writing, for their questions and their critiques. 

It was a fine way to learn what I don’t know about my own poetry writing.  

I'd go again in a minute.

 

 

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Thank you, Ian LeTourneau

Thank you, Ian LeTourneau

“A poem freshens the world.”  
So wrote the US Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser.

To learn more about how a poem freshens the world and the craft of poetry, I participated in “The Basics of Poetry Writing: How to Transform Ideas into Poems” with instructor Ian LeTourneau.  The daylong workshop was part of the 37^th Annual Maritime Writers’ Workshops sponsored by University of New Brunswick.

The focus was to strengthen skills in the craft of poetry, using metaphor, imagery and the poetic line.  The goal was not to create a masterpiece in one day, but to study and learn more about the basic tools for poetry writing, using explanation, writing exercises, examinations of sample poetry and sharing of our own pieces.  This was indeed what we did.

We seven students and Ian talked; the dialogue shed light on questions about technique and this in turn opened doors and pushed us beyond familiar territories.  We began with warm-up exercises on imagery:

*working like a _________________________________

*cold as _______________________________________

*as unpredictable as_____________________________

*as red as_____________________________________

And as we shared (all of us shared, including Ian), it was helpful to hear how others’ minds worked; it generated creativity.  It helped to learn that the instructor, a published poet, went through the same processes, he was teaching us to use.  Each workshop participant was at the same time dealing with the same technique, and was focusing on the same assignment, so we became interested in and learned from the work of each other.

We examined “My Shoes” by Charles Simic, “X-ray” by Dave Hickey and “Ode to a Stinging Jelly-fish (Portuguese Man-O-War)” by Roger Nash.  We admitted to feeling jealous of their abilities, all the while admiring their poems.

We created enlarged images from our initial warm-up exercises.  Here is mine:

Birth and Death

Dark eyes are red.

She’s just given birth,

a son,

for a husband who

runs around,

and she is raw,

red as fresh road-kill

bleeding out.

We set up our own metaphors, created lists of similarities, noted associations and connections, searched for fresh ways to make our poetry bits and nubs leap to life.  Ian encouraged us to make our images stretch, to do more work, to connect with emotions, to enrich details, to freshen the world.  The lists exploded and we picked a concrete image to begin.

I worked on a metaphor between hand-churning old-fashioned ice-cream and the beginnings and subsequent survival of a couple’s relationship.  It’s a work in progress so I won’t share it here but it has potential and I was content with accomplishing a good start.

The workshop participants shared exercises, beginnings of poems, great lines and shitty lines.  We laughed and we learned.  We talked about titles and how to make them work for our poems.  We talked about line breaks and ways to milk meaning, and yet more meaning from spaces, and ways to still or rush a clause to illuminate with surprises. 

Ian shared this from “Paradise Lost” by John Milton:

Of what he was, what is, and what must be

Worse.

We understood the line break and spacing suggested another meaning.

Our minds stretched through writing exercises, using restrictions.  One assignment was to use the same five words in each stanza of a two stanza poem; the words were plain, light, glass, river, shadow.  Mine follows.

(Untitled)

The river is glass-still

reflects light and shadow,

root to root, stem to stem,

plain and perfect

at full tide.

The tide shifts,

stabs the glass,

ripples spread,

shadows wrinkle,

shake the light.

The river plain begins

to shimmer and dance.

Not good poetry certainly, but you have the idea.

At the end of the day, we shared poems we had brought with us; not an easy thing to do, like giving birth and hearing someone say, “Gosh, that’s an ugly baby.”  It was helpful to listen to the responses and suggestions, to know the others were sharing their thoughts about what worked and what needed tweaking or a complete overhaul.  It was another way to learn.  And my day was all about learning.

The workshop emphasized that writing a poem was a passionate relationship between craft and seriousness of endeavour.  It took place in a crucible, where the wild unfettered mind met the responsible, purposeful self and laboured with fervor and desire, with ability and honest work and created a fresh way in which to perceive our world.

The workshop day was well spent.  My time, my money and my energy were well spent.  I was grateful for the opportunity to work with Ian LeTourneau and to learn from the others.

I hope to learn more next year, hope to attend the full week and follow courses on other genres of writing, on editing, on pitching a story and on publishing.  I hope to get acquainted with other poets and writers and continue to learn new ways to freshen the world through my own writing.

For now… thank you, Laurie Glenn Norris for organizing with the University of New Brunswick, for the Maritime Writers’ Workshops and especially, thank you, Ian LeTourneau, for the gift of yourself.

I’ll see you next year.

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