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Morton Marcus: This is KUSP community sponsored radio for the Monterey Bay and Salinas Valley. Stay tuned for a special presentation of The Poetry Show, representatives from the Celebration of the Muse Readings, which are occurring

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all through this fall in Santa Cruz. Good afternoon once again, this is Morton Marcus and we're here with The Poetry Show and today something that we did a number of times last year and unfortunately have not gotten around to until more than half

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the readings are done. And that is feature a program, which will introduce the meaning behind, the reasons behind several of the participants in the celebration of the Muse readings here in Santa Cruz County, the oldest continuing reading series

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in Santa Cruz County and I'm sure in the Monterey Bay area as well. And I would first like to welcome the two organizers of the reading, Amber Coverdale Sumrall and Patrice Vecchione. Welcome, ladies.

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Patrice Vecchione: Thanks, Morton. Morton Marcus: I want to see if you're coming up here loud and clear. Why don't you refresh us, either one of you, on how the readings began and where they are now, because it is a

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different place than where it was, how many years ago? Six years ago? Patrice Vecchione: Five years ago, this is the sixth series because the first year we did a spring and fall series and then

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after that, we've done just an annual fall series. When the series began, it was actually the idea of Wilma Marcus, and it was to benefit the National Festival of Women's Theatre. And Gael Roziere and myself are the two people who began it. I

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wanted poetry to be a part of the Theatre Festival, and we thought this would be the best way; we also wanted to do some volunteer work and I had no idea at the time that it would take off like it has. The first series were well attended, the

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writing- we just called writers up and asked them. We had I think, with the first one was four evenings, and now we're up to six evenings in the fall. Morton Marcus: They are every other week, are not?

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Patrice Vecchione: Every other week. Morton Marcus: And they're on Tuesday nights? Every Tuesday- every Tuesday. Unfortunately, because of the timing of this show, we were

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unable to have a show yesterday, which was the fourth reading in the series. Patrice Vecchione: Correct. Morton Marcus: And there are two more left, and when are they?

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Patrice Vecchione: November 11th. Morton Marcus: Mhm Patrice Vecchione: And reading that night are Maude Meehan, Gael Roziere, Ellen Treen, and Jan Sturtevant.

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Morton Marcus: And Jan is here tonight- today, this afternoon, this morning. Patrice Vecchione: It's night already, really. And then a reading on the 25th of November with Marjorie Simon.

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Morton Marcus: Who is also here, she is a famous oatmeal eater. Patrice Vecchione: Lucille Clifton, Eliza Nava, and Dianna Deering Morton Marcus: Wow, each one of the readings, because we have

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been announcing them and advertising them here, just sound wonderful. And I've talked to one of the participants earlier in the year, who just said last night's reading was just incredible.

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Patrice Vecchione: Oh, good. Morton Marcus: So the attendance has been wonderful, I assume? Patrice Vecchione: Full house every night. Morton Marcus: That's great.

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Patrice Vecchione: Last year, we had rented the auditorium for the series and due to the price increase, we chose to not rent it this year. And I think we could have filled the auditorium. We've been completely to capacity each

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night. Morton Marcus: Great. That's terrific. Let me see. I did want to ask something, yes. How- there is a different way in which people now try out for, or in some way have their work

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brought to you to become part of this Celebration of the Muse. Amber Coverdale Sumrall: We start advertising in April and May for submissions, and this year we received 70 submissions. Out of that 22 women were picked; and we try and have new

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readers every year, and this year we have six new readers to the series. And one of- one of the things that people have said is that, gosh, you know, it's the same women that are reading over and over again, we see the same names every year. And I

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just like to say that poetry is a lot of work and the people that read are the ones that work at it and take their writing very seriously. And so that- that comes up year after year, the work- you can see the change in the work and, and how it's

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improved. Morton Marcus: I have seen a lot of new names there in the last three years. You know, I mean, I've just been surprised and delighted that there are- this turnover, but then there are

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people who are standbys, you know, and if you keep adding voices in and everything, well, what are we talking about? We're talking about very different kinds of poetry. We have five people here so I would like to have some samples of this poetry

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and I wonder, Jan Sturtevant, if you wouldn't start us off with either one short one or- no how's it-? One long or two short ones. Jan Sturtevant: I'd like to- I'd like to read the poem I consider

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my first real poem. It's called: A FERAL WOMAN A feral woman prowls narrow mountain passes, forages for food, kindling. Rubs sticks to fire, roots and green simmer,

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she drinks bitter tea. At night, limbs wrapped close to body, she dreams of home. Constantl fire, light spilling from windows onto snow. She wakes, her body tenses, eyes darting, she rises, lopes instinctively into a run.

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Morton Marcus: Let me ask you a question, and this is about the whole reading itself. Obviously the Muses here are women, and these are women who write poetry, and I will make the statement -- you can deny this -- that feminism is really not

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the core of these readings; it is that all of you are the same gender, but all of you have very different relationships with the world, and when you read the poems of people to become part of the readings, you're really concerned with excellence in

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poetry. Patrice Vecchione: That's right. It's not a feminist issue, in- except that excellence also can be a feminist issue, but the issue is quality.

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Morton Marcus: I wanted to make that clear. There are a lot of people who don't know how to take a reading that is only composed of women, you know, especially around Santa Cruz, where we have very active feminist groups.

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Patrice Vecchione: And we encourage men to come to the readings as well. The readings are not intended to be just for women, they're intended to be for our entire community. Morton Marcus: Well, in relation to that, how many males are

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there in the audience, have been let's say this year. Patrice Vecchione: Well, I say last night, I noticed about seven out of, gosh, I don't know how many people were in the audience last night? 70-80-100 people, maybe seven or eight

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men? My dad was one of them. Morton Marcus: Good! Jan Sturtevant: My husband was one. Morton Marcus: That's good. All right, you know, I was involved

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in a reading, no one heard of it, which was the Orion male readings, did you know that. And this is really an answer to the the Muse Readings and 90% of the audience was female. Which was amazing, because we really wanted to get a male audience in

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there, but now the interest was- was female. Patrice Vecchione: Well, I guess that says something about the poetry community here in Santa Cruz Morton Marcus: I guess it does. Yes. Very interestingly so,

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yeah. Jan Sturtevant: I think it's very unfortunate that more men don't attend the readings. The work is quite excellent. Morton Marcus: Yes.

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Jan Sturtevant: And needs to be heard by men and women. Morton Marcus: I agree. How about another poem, Jan. That was Jan Sturtevant talking. If you don't recognize the voices that was Patrice before, and that now Jan and before that, if

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you can remember was Amber. Jan Sturtevant: Okay SHE GIVES HER LOVER A PHOTOGRAPH One, the lover. He expects softness, the deliberate giving

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up of edges and Adams' landscape gray toning into gray, Cunningham's unmade bed, or sinuous Weston peppers, the worship of form. Two, the photograph. Soccer field at night, a black block of sky divides sharply along the flare

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of a single light. On the field ghost shapes caught in motion. The dirt trap turns away. A scratch of light strikes the night‘s horizon. Three, the action. She is running, he has not seen this, her bodies hit and fall. Dirt ground into

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broken skin, mouth spitting teeth and blood, up fast again and running she cannot speak, gives him the photograph, tells her darkness to his eyes. Morton Marcus: So, the names in the first part, Cunningham and

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Westion, and Weston obviously the photographer, and Cunningham, the dancer? Jan Sturtevant: No, she's a photographer also. Morton Marcus: And her first name was?

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Jan Sturtevant: Imogen Morton Marcus: Imogen Jan Sturtevant: And Adams is Ansel Adams, of course. Patrice Vecchione: Is that a recent poem, Jan?

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Jan Sturtevant: Yes, within the last year. Morton Marcus: Did you know that Edward Weston's favorite model has been living in this town for the last 20-30 years? Jan Sturtevant: No. Is that Charis?

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Morton Marcus: Charis Wilson. Yeah, yeah. wonderful woman. Wonderful. Okay, Amber, would you grace us with a poem or two? Amber Coverdale Sumrall: Okay. I read a poem called

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PRESSURE COOKER. Sultry wind stirs through kitchen windows, sparks fly from my fingertips. I pick up a mug, it shatters in my hand. The coffee pot cracks on low simmer. Coffee puddles on the burner,

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seeps into the apparatus below. I remember the night my mother cooked ribs. I sat at the table pretending to study lulled by the hypnotic hiss of steam escaping that suddenly changed to a shrill whistle rising and pitch like a siren. "Mother

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hurry, come quick," I yelled as the lid shot off and sour steam fogged the room. Sauerkraut globbed on cupboards, dripped from the ceiling, blistered the butterfly wallpaper. She came running down the hall in her cream satin slip, high heels

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clacking, shrieking, "Ye gods, ye gods." Her blue eyes crackling with hate. My mother wilder, more alive than I'd ever known. Morton Marcus: Very interesting last line and totally

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unexpected. Oh, yeah. Well, it's very interesting that we've got “Photographs to a Lover“ and a mythical poem about, let's say, would you say mythical? About women sort of [cross talk] and a domestic poem. So this is the kind of variety, you know, and

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range that the readings have. And this is one reason why we have the five poets here today, in case you wonder what you're listening to, you're listening to participants and the two organizers of the Celebration of the Muse Readings. The next one

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will be on November 11, and we'll talk more about where that will be, but just keep listening. Because Amber is going to read another poem now, and this is Amber Coverdale Sumrall, who is one of the two organizers of the reaning.

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Amber Coverdale Sumrall: I'd like to read a poem called THE WEIGHT OF OUR BODIES I remember the Buddhist monks and nuns, their shaved heads and delicate bodies, saffron robes glowing like sunset on the other

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side of the world. How they anointed themselves with fuel as pilots spilled liquid fire on rice fields, schools, villages. How they sat, legs folded beneath them, and with a single match became torches, a nightmare of orange and black.

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Their bodies curling inward as if in prayer then falling back in slow motion. We watch the news in horror and disbelief, kernels of rice dropping from our forks. We have been talking about Zen, Vietnam, of demonstrating in the streets.

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Words shriveled, a visible silence scorched the air. We reached across it with our hands still a long way from the knowledge that some things are much worse than death, the weight of our bodies, their plenitude of hungers holding us

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firmly to the earth. Morton Marcus: Is that a recent poem? Amber Coverdale Sumrall: It's a fairly recent poem. And I was thinking that this is what it might take again for the war in

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Nicaragua to stop, is people actually making this kind of statement so dramatically, because I know that this was something that affected so many of us. It's an image that doesn't go away.

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Morton Marcus: But you've got amazing parallels in that poem, which really make it much more than a political statement. What I'm always looking for in political or social poetry is something that will lift it, you know, from propaganda; and the

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parallels of anointing themselves and the pilots spilling their own kind of fuel, you know, it's amazing, the resonances in that. Nice. Amber Coverdale Sumrall: Thank you.

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Patrice Vecchione: I really like in that poem the description of how they- they move, how they bend inwards, toward prayer, and then back; it's a very visual poem. Morton Marcus: Yeah, very, very well. I just brought back those

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horrendous scenes that we would watch on television, usually when we were ready to have supper. Patrice Vecchione: Right, yeah Morton Marcus: It was a strange-

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Patrice Vecchione: Six o'clock news Morton Marcus: Contiguous- contiguous- strange contrast. When my- who is the song. Patrice, I know you said you wanted to read one poem Have you reconsidered?

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Patrice Vecchione: Well, I'll definitely read one. I'm suffering a headache and maybe Amber knows better. Morton Marcus: Well, all the soothing poetry- Patrice Vecchione: Here's an another subject of of the

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readings. This poem was just accepted for publication in the magazine Yellow Silk, which is a journal of erotic literature and art out of the Berkeley area. It's called: MOVING HOUSE

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The bulk of our bodies moves under the sheets in an upstairs bedroom, like a house on wheels. And the view from the windows changes each time we kiss. Your tongue between my teeth, my lips pull on your warm cheek. All the redness we make, like dark

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curtains, like blood. Our sex is burlap, than velvet in the old family house. We travel with the dishes rattling through ranch country, past the odor of cattle grazing, to the sea and plant the wooden pillars in the damp earth we cannot keep from

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sinking. Morton Marcus: You want to read another one? She's reaching, there it is folks. Patrice, while she's looking for a poem is the other organizer of the readings. That's Patrice

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Vecchione, in case you've just tuned in. Patrice Vecchione: This poem is called: COUNTING BLESSINGS I don't have enough clarity to know what I want, except for the

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minor things, which shoes and socks. One minute my belly‘s throbbing with the desire for a baby. I give birth in a dream, and the next morning my breasts ache. I want to retreat into silence for days. I want your body, to grasp you in my arms. I

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want to learn French so I can come in a foreign language, but I close the door, sleep alone in the cold room. I want, I don't want this bowling pin life of mine, this feed the cat, love my grandmother, experience jealousy, be inordinately

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grateful life. Counting my blessings, they are larger than some countries and heavier than some worlds. I am counting on the weather to be brisk enough for flannel, and if it's not, I will unbutton everything.

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Morton Marcus: Right, that was Patrice Vecchione. And now we're going to move to Marjorie Simon, we're also going to move so you're going to hear this on the air, we're going to move - oh look at how quietly they‘ve done it - we are moving the

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microphone. And Marjorie Simon, and are you reading from the "Oatmeal Eater"? Marjorie Simon: Yes, I'm going to read from the "Long Distance Oatmeal Eater," a poem, I thought since Friday's

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Halloween, it might be appropriate. Morton Marcus: Great. Marjorie Simon: And another- another shift in subject matter. This is called:

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NIGHT WOMAN ALONE CALLS TO THE SHADOWS I sit in my room. I am alone. My desk is empty. The cubby holes hold nothing. Silence stares from walls where the paint stopped listening. Before long, before deaf ears hung from the

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ceiling. I look at the rug thin from years of nighttime pacing, patterns with yesterday's soft drinks and ground-out cigarettes. Inside a coffee stain, something moves: an ant. I stare as it grows until it fills the room. Its feelers

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turn, eyes bulging find me on the bed, sinking slowly, smaller, first hand, then feet slide and disappear into my spine. I roll to the floor, near the rug's edge where I see the barbs on the ant's legs quiver. Have you ever wondered if a

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violin hears music? Morton Marcus: Happy Halloween, Marjorie. [Laughter] Marjorie Simon: Happy Halloween. Morton Marcus: Oh, how about another one?

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Marjorie Simon: All right. Morton Marcus: That actually is not a typical Marjorie Simon poem, by any means. If there is a typical Marjorie Simon? Marjorie Simon: Well, I- I guess my poems break down into the

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humorous ones and then the tragic ones. Because I started writing humorous poems because they're fun and I- I- I'm happy when people laugh. But then you hear, oh, if you don't write serious poems, you're really not a poet. So I started writing

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some serious poems. But I do enjoy reading funny ones, how about he- HE'S SO BORING He's so boring, he goes to sleep to get rid of himself. When he

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meets himself in dreams, he runs till he wakes out of breath, goes back by counting himself over fences. All day at his window, nothing. When salesmen come, he takes them by the arm, sits them down for hours. They watch their wrists,

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the sun go. When they try to rise, he punches them another punch line, you've got hear when I was four, this one you'll really love. He's so boring, his wife left a message in limp spaghetti, her only known communication before she locked

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herself in the refrigerator. Patrice Vecchione: What inspired this poem Marjorie? Marjorie Simon: Well, I was on my way down to La Paz, Mexico and at a fishing village met a man who we called motor mouth,

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he never stopped talking and he never stopped talking about himself, and he was the inspiration. Morton Marcus: That in fact, a lot of that book came out of that trip down there, didn't the huge manuscript came back?

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Marjorie Simon: Yes, I started writing every morning. Well, George Hitchcock and I go down to Mexico for the winter and we would write from about 5:30 in the morning until nine o'clock every- every day. It was nice.

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Morton Marcus: And Marjorie, that is from a book called The- what was the beginning title again Marjorie Simon: "The Long Distance Oatmeal Eater" Morton Marcus: "The Long Distance Oatmeal Eater" I wanted

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to put another word in there for some reason. And you have also been the third selection of the Poet Santa Cruz, a little Chapbook Series, haven't you. Marjorie Simon: Yes, Poet Santa Cruz Number Three.

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Morton Marcus: And I'm sure we can hear some of those, but right now we're going on to the fifth of the five poets, a very nervous Joan McMillan Joan McMillan: Nervous because I'm afraid I'm gonna drop the

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boom mic- boom mic on the floor or something. Just something really great like that. Morton Marcus: Oh, you couldn't goof up any more than I have. Joan McMillan: I would like to read a poem for my grandmother,

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it's one of my favorite poems, and its title is: MARY GILBERT, MY GRANDMOTHER, 1906 TO 1969. Even though I am without you, you are always with me, an ore that richens in my veins over time. Last night in a dream,

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light shone through your own veins, silver. I confess I hardly knew you when you died. Later, I touched your despair. Alone, you raised a daughter in the house of your East Boston in-laws, one room to yourself, one bed shared with the child

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who became my mother. Now I place you there. Quart jars of brandy cherries and peaches and syrup hidden in the closet behind the winter clothes. 10 pairs of elbow length gloves wrapped in thin blue tissue at the back of a dresser drawer.

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You left me a necklace of platinum, earrings of topaz, gifts you might have sold, but kept as secrets tucked in a shoe box. I confess I hardly knew you. But I place you near the window of that room, walls blank and tight as the face of one

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with a thousand stories who refuses to speak. It is early spring and I think you smile, lean close as you can to the cold glass, brush dust from the sill, watch the backyard drift from snow into flowers.

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Morton Marcus: Nice. We are talking with five participants in the Celebration of the Muse Readings, the oldest reading in Santa Cruz County and possibly on the Monterey Bay that is continuously going from year to year. This is the sixth year,

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right? Patrice Vecchione: Six years. Morton Marcus: And we're now listening to Joan McMillan's poetry, back to the microphone. And she will read one more poem,

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and then we are going to take our half hour break, and we will be back with more poetry by each of the poets. Joan McMillan: I'd like to read a poem for my husband Dan, who gave me directions to KUSP, about half an hour ago and I

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called him frantically and said I was lost. This is- it's true- very true, this poem is called: A MARRIAGE GARDEN When we first moved here, we thought we'd plant everything

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the soil could hold, and more. At night, we discussed it, intricate as a dream or a map. The work was parceled easy, but you plant all day for a living, don't want to come home and do more. I don't always have time. All sorts of reasons lined up, a

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hedge, so we discarded the idea of tulips shining like silk hearts, the sleek slippers of Iris, blue and blue violet, the tomatoes, carrots, and lilies. Still there's a peach tree that fruits in October despite us, and lion colored roses by a

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granite wall above the rivers poured gray glass. I sometimes sit near it stones and moss, my eyes on that younger couple as they divide the ground between them like cake, hands full of earth and water, kneeling down, digging in, half wild with the

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promise of each fertile bright life. Morton Marcus: We are listening to some Vivaldi Mandolin Concertos in celebration of the program today with the people partaking in it, and it's five of the readers, two of whom are

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the organizers of the Celebration of the Muse Readings, six readings which are taking place this fall in Santa Cruz for the sixth time. In other words, this is the sixth series of readings. And Amber Coverdale- why don't I ever get

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that right, Amber Coverdale Sumrall and Patrice Vecchione who are the organizer of the reading are here, along with Jan Sturtevant, Patrice Vec-, Joan Mcmillan, and Marjorie Simon. And there goes Vivaldi out the door. Okay. I thought we'd throw

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the- you can't hear that, but it's very clever electronic stuff, you see it got lower and lower and they seem to be receding into the distance. I just thought we would talk a little bit about why all of you, each one of you actually write

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poetry; what do you hope that your poetry will accomplish? And as you lean forward to the microphone -- no one is yet -- I will give your name. Patrice has just leaned forward. So this Patrice Vecchione:

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Patrice Vecchione: New way of signaling interest here. I write, to clarify at a real basic level, I write to clarify myself to myself, and that's the primary reason that I write. I began writing when I was 17, and I was angry at an art teacher in

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high school. And I had all this anger welling up inside of me and didn't know what to do with it, and sat outside the music building, and started writing poems, and it's gone downhill or uphill, I'm not sure whichever since. So to clarify myself to

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myself, to play with language, I adore language, and another reason that I write is to become more adept at writing, I think. Morton Marcus: Let's just say a little more about each one of you. I've already said some words about Marjorie. You teach

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poetry in schools. Patrice Vecchione: That‘s right Morton Marcus: And have been for some time. Patrice Vecchione: 11 years

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Morton Marcus: Why don't tell us about that? Patrice Vecchione: Yeah, I've been teaching poetry in the schools, kindergarten through high school primarily, since, well, this is my 11th year. And I teach to help children be able

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to articulate their thoughts and feelings into words. I teach in Santa Cruz, and Monterey, Salinas, and Hollister, through the California Poets in the Schools Program. Morton Marcus: Are you the head of the program for this area?

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Patrice Vecchione: Locally, yeah. Morton Marcus: Good. Amber. Amber Coverdale Sumrall: Well, I agree with Patrice. There are a number of different reasons why I write and I think each poem is

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reflection of a different aspect. I started writing as a healing from a severe accident, in which my liver was killed, and I was injured. And it was a way of healing from that. I had all this stuff I needed to process and that's how I began

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writing, initially it was for healing. I think some of the other reasons for writing for me are to honor the memory of someone I love, someone who's had a tremendous impact on my life. And another reason is because the- the writing has a

00:32:37.800 - 00:32:53.670

mind of its own, and sometimes something will just come that I have really no conscious part in, it's- I will find myself sitting down, it's more of an impulse than anything else, and this poem will start coming out; and so there's that trust in in

00:32:53.670 - 00:33:12.450

the emerging of something that needs to be said. And then I- I think really, it's really important for me to discover how I'm feeling at a real deep emotional place that my feelings to- it's a way of tuning in with how I'm feeling and a way of

00:33:12.450 - 00:33:24.760

distilling experience. Morton Marcus: Okay, that's very interesting. Yes, there are several different reasons for writing there. That must have been a very traumatic accident. Very, very traumatic.

00:33:24.760 - 00:33:32.270

Amber Coverdale Sumrall: Yeah, it was. Morton Marcus: But you've gone beyond therapy. I mean, just the way you're talking about, you know, discovering things you don't know about, you've gone beyond therapy and

00:33:32.270 - 00:33:43.100

[unidentified] itself. It's really a fascinating journey. Really amazing journey. And Jan is sitting there and she was nodding, and this Jan Sturtevant, so why, what do you hope to accomplish with your writing, in what you write Jan?

00:33:43.240 - 00:34:01.900

Jan Sturtevant: Well, I agree with Patrice and Amber about clarity, clarifying myself. I write to communicate with myself first, and healing is an important part of that. And I discover things about myself when I write, I find that I- I

00:34:01.900 - 00:34:18.610

have- I have accomplished some kind of internal integration that I didn't know until I put it down on paper. And I feel that my experiences are both universal and unique. And I want to communicate that to other people, especially other women.

00:34:19.600 - 00:34:35.290

And there is the- also the problem, I mean it's a delightful problem most of the time, of not having a choice. If I wake up at three o'clock in the morning with a poem starting, I have to write, and I don't feel that I have a choice.

00:34:35.800 - 00:34:42.130

Morton Marcus: Do you have a job you have to get to? Jan Sturtevant: Oh, yes. Morton Marcus: Well, what happens when you have to write a poem and have to get to your job? I'm not going to admit

00:34:42.130 - 00:34:52.450

anything over the air about myself, but I'm sure all my students know the answer to that. Jan Sturtevant: Well, fortunately, the job I have is not emotionally demanding. And that's one of the reasons I do

00:34:52.450 - 00:34:57.520

it. Morton Marcus: That‘s great. What- what is it- what? Jan Sturtevant: I‘m an insurance auditor. Morton Marcus: An insurance auditor

00:34:58.510 - 00:35:09.370

Jan Sturtevant: I play with numbers all day. Morton Marcus: Wow. Marjorie is sitting over there, and she is dubious about whether she has an answer, but I'll bet it will be highly unique.

00:35:10.000 - 00:35:19.990

Marjorie Simon: I really feel like- Morton Marcus: And you're gonna have to get closer to that- that microphone. Marjorie Simon: I really feel like Amber, Patrice and Jan have

00:35:19.990 - 00:35:40.360

all been so articulate and have expressed everything so well. I write because I have to write. When I don't write for a long time my brain starts to fry. And- and I feel like I've got to sit down, and whatever is happening, get in touch with it.

00:35:41.410 - 00:35:56.440

And I started to write poetry because I was a very heavy smoker. When I gave up smoking, I could no longer write short stories, I just couldn't sit at the typewriter for that long. Amber Coverdale Sumrall: I just like to interject here that I

00:35:56.440 - 00:36:08.590

really- I really hear what you're saying about this. I feel quite incredible, this tension in my body when a poem is wanting to come out sometimes, and I don't know what it is until it starts really coming out and it's just, I'll be

00:36:08.590 - 00:36:23.530

gritting my teeth and going around the house for two days just in a state. My nerves are just tearing at me, and then all of a sudden the poem is starting, and it's wonderful. Morton Marcus: It is a form of mental disease. Freud called it

00:36:23.530 - 00:36:42.110

the Viennese Compulsion Theory. Joan- Joan McMillan Joan McMillan: I don't know if I can even add to everything that's been said. We have so many commonalities, but I have a hunger to write. Not even just, you know, I mean, that's- I was

00:36:42.110 - 00:36:56.150

thinking, I think it's very much like hunger, only without the hunger pains. I've got to write. And I think sometimes I write to amaze myself, that when I write, it just amazes me that I can even do it, even though I've been writing since I was eight

00:36:56.150 - 00:37:06.290

years old, literally, not all the time but that's me consciously beginning to write creatively as- Morton Marcus: You write a lot of poetry, no? Joan McMillan: Lately, I've been writing a lot. Lately, I've been

00:37:06.290 - 00:37:20.360

writing about a poem every two or three weeks, which is really a lot for me because I would write maybe a poem once every two or three months before. I'm a mom of two kids, and I have so work, so the time factor's kind of a thing in how much I write.

00:37:20.360 - 00:37:32.430

I think I would write more if I had a little less outside things to do, but I don't know. I'm sure the outside things contribute to the poetry just as much. Morton Marcus: Yeah, let's ask about that. How do you think the

00:37:32.430 - 00:37:46.380

outside world that you live, I mean, all of you are women, which puts you in our society, you know, in a certain area where you do certain things. I mean, even one of the poems that Patrice read was upon wrestling with that idea of having

00:37:46.380 - 00:37:59.130

children, wanting children, but knowing how it's going to limit you and the whole thing. How do you deal with that, and how does that become part of your poetry, and here comes Patrice: Patrice Vecchione: Here comes the massive mic.

00:37:59.870 - 00:38:14.960

I think all of those outside things are fuel for the poetry. It's really stimulation. Then it- then there are times when it goes to the extreme, I didn't write for about a year and a half. I had been teaching with a local arts and education program

00:38:14.960 - 00:38:28.400

and had over-taught. Had gotten to the point where I was teaching hundreds of children a week trying to memorize hundreds of names, and working with various grade levels. And I got to the point where I didn't care about poetry, even I was too

00:38:28.400 - 00:38:44.720

exhausted; all I wanted to do was sleep. And so I did not write for a year and a half. And during that time, I wondered if I was ever going to write again. So that was an experience of the outside becoming overwhelming. I have just taken- not taught for

00:38:44.810 - 00:38:58.340

the summer, and I'm beginning to teach again this fall. And in the last two months, I have written I think 20 or 25 poems, which is to me- an incredible amount for me. I feel like I could write a book, put a book together with just what I've

00:38:58.340 - 00:39:09.770

written. So there's a balance I think between when the outside is overwhelming, and then when it's- when it's fruit. Morton Marcus: So this year and a half was the time you went to Greece, you'd not get any Greek poems?

00:39:09.890 - 00:39:22.910

Patrice Vecchione: No, actually, it was prior to the to my Greece trip, I began writing again after a year and a half of not writing. I began writing in Greece, a year ago September. And did quite a bit of writing despite that during that time,

00:39:23.090 - 00:39:37.880

my doubt of what I was doing was massive. I had not been writing in so long, I was not able to be accurately critical of my work. I was overwhelmed by the critic aspect of myself and very doubtful of the process.

00:39:38.140 - 00:39:49.550

Morton Marcus: Well, it's a very interesting point and if there are poets out there who are teachers, teaching can really do some very nasty things to you. Patrice Vecchione: And then there's the other side where my

00:39:49.550 - 00:40:03.830

teaching right now is fruit. It's inspires my writing. It's just such a delicate, delicate balance. Morton Marcus: Very interesting. Anyone jump in on this subject. Marjorie.

00:40:03.870 - 00:40:21.570

Marjorie Simon: I think that if you're a poet you're sensitive to everything around you. And the- the change in atmosphere can influence your- maybe even the subject of a poem. I don't think that you can be alive without being influenced by

00:40:21.990 - 00:40:37.710

every factor that surrounds your day, all the world events. Morton Marcus: True and obviously, all the poetry that was- has been read here so far today has very definitely illustrated that. And since we are speaking about the word

00:40:37.710 - 00:40:51.480

poetry again, let's have at least one more poem by each person, and see if we still have time for more poems after that, but this time, we'll go around the other way. And we'll start with Joan McMillan, and go on and while you're looking- Oh,

00:40:51.480 - 00:41:05.400

you're ready? Oh, great. You knew what I was doing. Joan McMillan: We're talking about the- where our lives influence our poetry. I would like to read a poem for my son, Jamie, who was stillborn three months ago. I would like to read

00:41:05.400 - 00:41:19.140

this today because this is the- the third month anniversary of his birth. It's called: ALREADY SHE KNOWS Already she knows there will be no cry at this birth, no

00:41:19.140 - 00:41:41.430

struggle for breath, no pulse from the cord. He enters the world soundless on a freshet of blood, hers and his. When she asks to see, she is shown. Nothing is hidden. He lies wrapped in transparent membrane. Each rib a bent needle shielding

00:41:41.430 - 00:42:04.020

the heart. At home, her days unfold in echoes. She finds the correct words when questioned, does not tell how palpable the hours, how they have frozen like walls of glass all around her. Already she knows she must live, must walk through a silence as

00:42:04.020 - 00:42:21.270

dangerous as glass without flinching. Morton Marcus: Joan, obviously, that is a terrible experience. I mean, you chose to do something in there that I want to ask you- you chose to put yourself obviously in the third person.

00:42:21.000 - 00:42:29.500

Joan McMillan: Yes Morton Marcus: May I ask why? Joan McMillan: It's a way of distancing a little bit from the experience. I began another poem- I have one other poem,

00:42:29.500 - 00:42:44.410

which I actually don't have here today, about the experience. So that I will have so far three poems. The first two poems I've written about the experience in the third person, this next one will be using I. So I don't seem to need that much distancing

00:42:44.440 - 00:42:54.260

now. Morton Marcus: Yeah, it's very, very interesting. I knew that would be the answer, but it is- it's fascinating. And this is where we're talking about excellence. We're talking

00:42:54.890 - 00:43:10.820

before, about, you know, the craft of poetry, and here is how a person has to, this hunger again, this need to write a poem, but it is so raw that you know you can't get it out, not certain that what you will get out will be any more than a cry.

00:43:11.480 - 00:43:24.410

And so you start to make decisions, you start to distance yourself so you can work as a craftsman as well as a human being to shape some of those human sounds into intelligibility and meaning for others. And so this is just one

00:43:24.410 - 00:43:41.350

example of that, very moving. Joan McMillan: Thank you very much Morton Marcus: Well, this is Marjorie Simon. Marjorie Simon: Really so moving, I hate to follow but-

00:43:42.820 - 00:44:05.660

This is another poem from Mexico, from Baja California LORETTO The sea comes to call, his gifts shimmer in shallow surf by my door, lost diamond, caravan of suns circling the walls with

00:44:05.690 - 00:44:25.730

each movement of my hand. The sea brings espadrilles, a blanket, remnants of sunken tins, jagged slats, a fisherman's sweater patterns with hope. I step into his ripples, call of gull [unidentified] turn, black

00:44:25.760 - 00:44:47.060

grackle on a dern, jetting at sea‘s edge. In the tide pool, I am an invisible needle darting between kelp and sponge. I, a survivor return to you, the brittle beak of a pelican, your last sand dollars.

00:44:51.020 - 00:45:02.070

Morton Marcus: It's interesting. I don't know how many other people here notice that the sea personified to Marjorie is male. Marjorie Simon: That‘s right Morton Marcus: That's an interesting and this- this is

00:45:02.070 - 00:45:15.510

Marjorie Simon: What's the name of the poem? one of the things that, you know the consciousness of women i poetry is that these traditiona images get turned around. An the muse who was always for th male poets, or in the dominance

00:45:16.200 - 00:45:30.510

has now in many poets bee turned around. One of my favori e poems, which I'd sugge t everyone out there as well s people here, is by a wonderfu poet who is not that well kn wn on the West Coast. But [lau hs] there goes the mind, so we

00:45:30.510 - 00:45:50.340

l known that I forg Morton Marcus: It's- it's the poem "To Her Muse," who is a boy, and they have a wrestling match. And the Muse is obviously lover and child. And she lives in St. Louis, she's won enormous

00:45:50.340 - 00:45:59.880

amounts of awards. “Three Valentine's for the World“, is one of her poems, it won just about every single award there was around 20 years ago. Marjorie Simon: Moira-

00:46:01.040 - 00:46:12.770

Morton Marcus: No. I mean, we can do- we can waste the rest of the program this way. You've got 18 more questions. Oh, I can see her face. Amber Coverdale Sumrall: Oh, well, while you are thinking

00:46:12.770 - 00:46:21.620

about it- Morton Marcus: While I'm thinking about it- very good. Marjorie Simon: It's very true, and I think this is one of the difference between women's poetry and men's. When I started

00:46:21.620 - 00:46:39.470

writing, I suddenly realized that all my images were masculine images. And I thought, wait a minute, just because I've read this in a poet, from a male poet, doesn't mean I have to use it. And I think that you really have to dredge down and find

00:46:40.370 - 00:46:49.880

your own imagery. Morton Marcus: And poetry I can imagine for women is really breakthrough, really breakthrough stuff. I mean, I can go and hit all the traditional male things that

00:46:49.880 - 00:47:05.120

males have done and it's sort of a crutch, you know, but women every- everything is just breaking these molds. And the name of that poet is Mona Van Duyn, a wonderful, wonderful poet. Again with great range. Patrice.

00:47:05.960 - 00:47:20.990

Patrice Vecchione: My muse has always been female ever since I began writing, and my internal editor is also very female. I personified her in a story once wearing a very tight skirt and no runs in her stockings. And I never-

00:47:21.030 - 00:47:33.480

Morton Marcus: That was mine. Patrice Vecchione: Yeah. Perfect. I never really thought about it and I never really thought about what you're saying how remaking the images remaking them, renaming them in an

00:47:33.480 - 00:47:45.930

original sense, which is female. I just kind of do it. This poem is called: WILLING We float along the Seine on a bateaux mouches like any day in

00:47:45.930 - 00:48:07.980

Paris. The wind nips at our collars, our fish tail anger slaps at the sides of the boat, deliberately flinging water, wetting the other passengers, the hems of their skirts, their bootlegs, their foreign language. I am dragged under by

00:48:07.980 - 00:48:28.770

your brash wooden voice. At the Pont Neuf I think about leaving you for the Tour Eiffel, that absurd wire tower always in the background of this city. I think of leaving you for my mother's acceptance, for my peace of mind, that coveted place I

00:48:28.770 - 00:48:51.600

rarely enter is ravaged by the flags of every country of our love. The solvent ones, the terror land, parched seasons of thirst. Yet here we float along a river in a country of promise. The boat glides willingly, no matter that our words resemble

00:48:51.630 - 00:49:00.850

sharks. Morton Marcus: And Amber, we're going to move right along here now. I'm just looking up at the clock, and it says six and a half minute to.

00:49:01.810 - 00:49:10.520

Amber Coverdale Sumrall: I'd like to read a poem from my grandparents called: TAPROOT Those first days grandma put away her recipes for persimmon

00:49:10.520 - 00:49:29.570

bread, [unidentified] cookies, rabbit stew, heated frozen food in the cramped all-electric kitchen. Grandpa paced the chill white rooms, filled the apartment with smoke from his hand carved pipe, fogging windows of thick wired glass. No

00:49:29.570 - 00:49:46.730

window ledge or balcony for clay pots of flowers, herbs from their relinquished garden. "So much less to take care of," their children told them, "relax, take it easy." When the elevator stalled, they lugged groceries up four flights of

00:49:46.730 - 00:50:07.580

stairs, collapsed in front of the miniature television. Relaxing, taking it easy. After the stroke severed grandma's reflexes, Grandpa walked every day to the hospital, cutting the crisp green stems of asters, daisies, roses, scabiosa from

00:50:07.580 - 00:50:28.490

lush yards along the way. "From our garden," she would say, her face lit with memory, fingers lost in the soft petals. He brushed her tangled hair, bathed, and fed her reverently as once he tended the earth, burying seed in the sweet, rich

00:50:28.490 - 00:50:43.410

loam, drawing hope out of the darkness with his hands. Morton Marcus: And Jan Sturtevant Jan Sturtevant: I‘m going to read a short piece of prose because many of the women read prose, and this began in my

00:50:43.410 - 00:50:59.320

journal: During a 60 minute story on Guatemala, a photograph of a woman's mutilated body, Harry Reasoner warns viewers before the image is shown. Her name is Beatrice Gomez. She lies on a

00:50:59.320 - 00:51:19.360

morgue slab, her head turned to one side as though she were napping. Her face battered, then trails of blood dried in place on her neck. One arm severed halfway between wrist and elbow, between her breasts the sundered hand. Gathered in her pelvic

00:51:19.360 - 00:51:38.260

bowl white curled ropes of her intestines, I look away, but not soon enough. Go back to my sauce thickening on the stove, the artichokes steaming in red wine vinegar, the Stilton cheese a reproach, everything white, the woman's intestines. I've seen

00:51:38.260 - 00:51:56.770

recreations of modern atrocities, killing fields in horrific color mock ups of actual events, but regardless of how real a film looks or how true its basis, it is still one step from reality, a beat of distance that protects me. There

00:51:56.770 - 00:52:20.840

is no protection from the single image of the body of Beatrice Gomez. No step back I can take, no safe retreat to my own reality. There is only the soft underside of her chin in shadow. Morton Marcus: We have been talking to five participants,

00:52:20.840 - 00:52:39.440

poets, in the sixth Celebration of the Muse readings this fall. That was Jan Sturtevant. Before that, you heard Amber Coverdale Sumrall and Patrice Vecchione, the two organizers of the readings and Marjorie Simon, and Joan McMillan. Can I ask you to

00:52:39.440 - 00:52:45.500

give us a rundown of the next readings, where they are and who will be reading in them? Amber Coverdale Sumrall: The readings- Morton Marcus: This is Amber

00:52:46.350 - 00:53:03.870

Amber Coverdale Sumrall: This is Amber, -will be November 11, 7:30pm at Louden Nelson Center, and Maude Meehan, Gael Roziere, Ellen Treen, and Jan Sturtevant will be reading. And this is a benefit for Matrix Newspaper, I think we didn't mention that.

00:53:04.080 - 00:53:18.060

Morton Marcus: Okay. And then after that? Amber Coverdale Sumrall: And after that, Patrice Vecchione: November 25 will be Lucille Clifton, Eliza Nava, Marjorie Simon, and Diana Deering. And the readings are

00:53:18.060 - 00:53:25.940

held at Louden Nelson Community Center. Amber Coverdale Sumrall: And they start at 7:30? Patrice Vecchione: 7:30. Morton Marcus: Great, well, we'll be advertising more of

00:53:25.940 - 00:53:46.940

them on the show. Thank you so much for coming in today. Next week, Joe Stroud will be talking about and playing recordings of the poetry of Michael Hannon, the San Luis Obispo poet. And this Saturday from 5 to 7pm on KUSP, Joe will substitute for

00:53:46.940 - 00:54:02.300

The Hamster of Love on the It Will Stand, early rock & roll show with his own selection of early rock & roll. So if you want to hear Joe Stroud's early rock & roll selections, do listen in then; it should be a lot of fun. I plan on listening

00:54:02.300 - 00:54:19.250

in. And as I said next week Michael Hannon, really a fine, fine lyric poet will be the subject of Joe's program. This is Morton Marcus thanking our participants again, thanking our listeners, and subscribers, and also thanking Plaza Books and

00:54:19.250 - 00:54:28.070

Stuff who made this program possible in part by- with their grant. Thank you again. We'll see you in two weeks.