how the ants know it’s coming before the rest of us realize, how they announce its arrival in a parade across my kitchen counter, their appreciation of the small morsels of sugar I’ve misplaced, the renegade crumbs
how the mosquitos are consistent in the hum-hum-sting of their assault at the backs of my arms, my legs, my scalp and at the sweet tender skin of my ankles, how assertively their bites manifest as persistently-itchy welts long after the union of proboscis and skin
I love the sharp pungent aroma of bug spray its perfumed plumes of offense that linger on clothing and linens, its placebo effect that lulls one into thinking a stroll in the grass or evening walk is not the suicidal effort it inevitably becomes how calamine, all these years later, still has little effect
I love how the sun is brighter and hotter now, how it sizzles in the sky and scares off cloud cover, how sun begets sweat that trickles down my neck and back and armpits and the crooks of my knees so that everything is damp and humid and sticky including my sheets at night, and the pillows, too no matter how often I wake and flip them to the cool side, no matter the window unit chugging along the fan blowing luke-warm air and irony
how humidity hangs in the air, keeps everything summer moist swells up my fingers, makes mock raisins of my toes in their constricting summer sandals that bind and dig-in, leave criss-cross marks like tattoos that say Summer Was Here
I love the incessant noise of lawn mowers the ARRRRRR ARRRRR ARRRRR beat of blades the tease as they fade around the corner but return for another stanza often accompanied by the RRRRRRA-ZZZ-ZZZ RRRRRRA-ZZZ-ZZZ of the weed whacker
Oh…all of those summer noises! the startling shock of motorcycle manhood as it revs its engine just as it passes my open window, the cigarette boat in the harbor insisting no it is bigger and better than any motorbike the backing-up beep of the landscape van, the beat box boom box bass of radios blasting music nobody likes, the violent scream of the chain saw against even more trees, the fireworks erupting to celebrate their own percussive noises in an ongoing summer competition of what the fuck can be louder than this?
I love the busy-ness of summer: the ants and mosquitos mere poster children for the weeds, the outside chores, and the inside chores, the long and sprawling list of Things to Do and Places to Be and just how many carnivals, fairs, markets, and outdoor sweaty buggy get togethers can one fit into a two-day weekend that requires hours of slogging through touristy traffic crawling along at 20 sweaty, noisy miles an hour
Perhaps, though, what I love most about summer is that tortuous steamy day in August, as heat forms in waves off the macadam and gossip spreads of eggs frying and Lucifer rising, when the air conditioner coughs its last breaths of what passes at that point for “Cool” when you look, then, to the heavens to beseech god up above to make it stop and you see what appears to be trees aflame… and know, intuitively, that soon it will end graciously and gloriously end.
Since 2020, MANIFEST (zine) has presented writing, art, photography, and creative bits of whatnot in a series of zines ranging in topics from creativity, grief, change, the environment, social issues, and finding refuge in turbulent times.
It’s an eclectic combination of lit mag, artist book, and poetry chapbook, that also includesa curated Spotify playlist. Beautifully printed, it’s layered with colors, textures, meanings (and music), the result is a thought-full, tactile journey with nooks and crannies for you to discover.
But since 2020, the costs for printing and postage have increased dramatically. And while there is a steady and loyal list of subscribers, it’s getting harder and harder to print and mail out issues on a regular, quarterly basis.
That’s why I’m hoping to raise $1,000 for production to take us through 2026, including the Spring 2025 issue, PERCEPTION, which has been ready to go to press since March.
As a thank-you for each donation of $25, I will mail you (or a recipient of your choosing) one of the following:
One copy of any of my books: LOOK UP! Musings on the Nature of Mindfulness, Evidence of Flossing: What We Leave Behind, Waiting Out the Storm, Water Under the Bridge: A Sort-of Love Story, or Sleeping with Ghosts.
I am back on terra firma, sound rushing through my feet and up in a cacophony of thought, worry, consternation that somehow fades on the coast, transitions into whitecaps and whale song, a quiet not to be found among these common conflicts at home, the roar of traffic, the flight plan overhead, the bells and buzzes of business.
How is the sound of the ocean and all its occupants some two miles deep meager competition to the loudness of this day today? The ever present noise of them and us and this…even here in my beloved woods.
I awoke this morning feeling rudderless alone and adrift so I partnered myself with sheets and pillows in a meager attempt to stop the sway to right myself between swells of defeat and despair but finding no equilibrium I moored myself to the day and got on with it albeit without commitment or fortitude floated aimless past noon and afternoon grateful for the sun’s setting the welcome drift of deep deep dreams.
It’s hard to believe it’s been seven years since my dear, sweet friend Mary Anne Siok died. I think about her a lot, especially these days when her kind of sparkle and joy would be a light in the darkness.
She’d be pissed about the current state of the world. Ferocious in her protests. Screaming from the front lines…and dancing. She’d be dancing…and so would I.
I haven’t re-posted this — her eulogy — for a few years, so I thought this would be a good time. And a good reminder, because I still don’t say YES nearly enough as I should, and the years are racing by…
Mary Anne and I met in a freshman English class at UMass in 1984. We were just joking a few weeks ago about how it’s been 30 years since we graduated. I said “How the hell did that happen?” and she said “Because we’re old.”
But the MA I knew – the one we all knew – was never old. Very often her texts would go on and on about what she was doing and where. (Even her cousin Katherine couldn’t keep up!) The weekend before she died? On Friday, after a full day of work and a train commute home to Rhode Island, she went out for sushi with Billy. On Saturday, she and I spent an entire day walking around the mall, shopping, talking, toasting her birthday with bloody marys. On Sunday, she was with friends at Foxwoods to see the Hollywood Vampires, and then on Monday she celebrated a gorgeous spring day with a drive along the coast and lobster rolls.
THAT, in a big long-weekend nutshell was our Mary Anne.
MA was my best friend, my secret keeper, my sister, my person…and the most fabulous yin to my yang.
Me ever so cautious and worried, the introvert full of specific plans to her come what may, live life to its fullest, hell yeah we’re doing that extrovert with an absolute love of life.
She was inspiring.
So much so that in recent years, I’ve taken to asking myself WWMAD? As in: What Would Mary Anne Do?
What would Mary Anne do? Mary Anne would say Yes.
YES to the next concert, the Red Sox or Patriots game, the fireworks, the dive bar, the music festival, the movie night, the road trip, the matching tattoos, and one more Hallmark Christmas movie.
YES to the beach. Always.
YES to anything in black, the sales rack, the sparkly earrings, the extra glass of wine. And YES to Dunkin Donuts. Of course.
YES to dancing … anywhere, drinks at the Hard Rock Cafe, going to the symphony, enjoying a home cooked meal, taking a spinning class … or yoga, cheering on her boyfriend’s band.
YES to shopping at the outlets, seeing an art exhibit, wandering a museum, getting tickets to a play, or a long full day at the Big E.
Jump off a 3-foot ledge into the ocean while a crowd cheers? Yes.
Help you check off something on your bucket list? Yes.
YES to coming to your BBQ, your daughter’s dance recital, your campaign event, your nephew’s first birthday, your sons’ soccer game, your girls’ weekend, your wedding, your holiday dinner. Probably all on the same day … usually with a gift … always with that big, sweet, joyful smile.
A smile that said YES, I’ll move in with you. YES I’ll meet you at the winery. YES I’ll be at the party. YES let’s go shopping.
YES, we have to do this again soon.
Not everyone can do that — be so wide open to life and love and friends and experiences. No holds barred. Fearless. Hell yeah, we’re doing that!
And so, in honor of the blessing that was our wonderful, bold and brazen, brave and beautiful Mary Anne Siok, I challenge you — all of you — to say YES a lot more often.
And I thought we could practice right now…ready?
In memory of Mary Anne Siok, May 31, 2018. Click here to read her full obituary.
It is often effortless this charge a light somewhere a word a phrase a road highlighted on an internal GPS how to get from here [ thought ] to there [ something written ] with little but an invisible arrow a compelling a compulsion an understanding that it’s fleeting unforgiving fickle if not me and mine then someone else somewhere else will get it catch it in whatever way they have learned to catch mitt, net, rain barrel
I prefer mine organic open a door a window my arms let the words come right in no ceremony or formality no place settings and certainly no roughhousing (live and let live, I always say)
you wanna be a good poem or a bad poem, one anointed with laurels or just doddering in the margins? come on out with all your slick juices scream and wail and take that first breath, baby!
and then there it is whatever it is good, bad, mediocre
I don’t mind them any of them, really they’re warm-ups stretches practice runs compost
take a deep breath
because the good ones? Mmm, yeah, the good ones, they glow! preternaturally hum and buzz and vibrate a little so you have to keep reading them over and over pinching a dream is this real?
You just birthed an angel, mama — a wild wondrous angel — watch her fly!
Hindsight is 20/20 except when what you’d been seeing then, back then, was larger than life, grander than anything you could imagine and so enormously out of proportion that… now, hindsight is microscopic requiring broken circles of glass — that you try not to bite down on too hard or else you might bleed even more than you already have — to see what was right in front of your eyes all along how minuscule you had to make yourself to fit into that space that small mindedness that box with clearly defined edges (and no imagination) but these are things you don’t see through rose colored glasses their purpose only to color inside the lines with one conforming color the vision of what you were programmed to think you wanted that small sweet girl and her dolls playing make believe building castles out of miss-matched pieces instead of telescopes with which to see the much bigger picture.
This morning, on a friend’s Facebook page, I read a heartfelt plea for a newsfeed devoid of a Donald Trump’s face. And while I, too, would love an opt-out button for that, it makes me wonder: is that her Algorithm? is she clicking on posts that generate more of that same face? That happens to me, a lot.
Our Algorithms, if you think about it, are mirrors of our thoughts — are they not? How we think, what we’re thinking about, often what we thought about yesterday or the day before. The omnipresent Big Brother feeds us more of the same until we are beyond sated, until we’re over-stimulated and over-whelmed, jacked up on fake dopamine, or banging on Read More Read More Read More like a sugared-up teenager at a carnival whack-a-mole.
And while I know (I know) it’s important that we keep informed about current events, that we pay attention to what’s happening in our world — I’m also concerned that we’re collectively helping to create what’s happening by focusing on what’s happening.
It’s called Manifesting. You can read about the positive effects of manifesting in popular books like The Secret (Rhonda Byrne) and Law of Attraction (Esther Hicks and Jerry Hicks).
And before you say hocus-pocus. Remember that prayer is also a form of manifesting.
“According to many spiritual teachings…consciousness creates our reality. What we desire is what we receive. If we are uncertain, we receive the energy of uncertainty. If we respond to crises with worry and negative, thinking, we increase the likelihood of a painful outcome.” — Yehuda Berg, The Power of Kabbalah
Yes, we are living in scary times. Yes, we need to pay attention to what’s going on. But in our attempts to pay attention to what we don’t want, are we losing sight of the things we DO want?
How can we ever hope to create a safe, peaceful, equitable world if our thoughts (and hearts) are always focused on threats, war, and inequalities?
We can all talk about what we don’t want — easily and profusely. Think about it, how many conversations have you had in the past six months about Donald Trump and his insane antics? About the circus that is our government, the atrocities happening to our immigrants, in Gaza, in Ukraine? About what’s happening to America, democracy, and our way of life?
Now, how many times have you talked about what makes a great leader? about the people on the ground doing good work on behalf of those who are suffering? about what you want the world to look like in the future? how many times have you laughed, planted something, created, danced?
All week long, activist and author Jessica Craven’s Chop Wood, Carry Water emails focus on what’s going on, the scary things happening in our government, and actions steps to take. But once a week, she posts Extra! Extra!, a glorious accounting of all of the good things that have happened lately.
I’ll be honest, by the time Extra! Extra! arrives on Sundays, I am usually stacking another shipment of canned beans in my basement and making sure my stun gun is fully charged. So to read all of the positive things that are happening, all of the forward steps we’re taking, all of the good news despite my Algorithm? My Hope tank fills right back up!
We all need a full Hope tank. So, here are 10 Ways to Fill Yours…
1. Go outside and breathe. 2. Listen to your favorite music and dance (or sing) (or both). 3. Go for a walk in the woods. 4. Have a playdate with a friend. 5. Get creative: make art, write something, bake, garden. 6. Watch a favorite movie. 7. Go to the library and find a book to read. 8. Take a day off social media/media/technology/work. 9. Keep a Gratitude Journal. 10. Change your Algorithm by reading good news; start here.
Let’s all MANIFEST the kind of world we want to be living in together!
Radar shows the storm purple and red and gold but all I see for miles are shades of Cape Cod gray pale where the sky should be a graphite-thin horizon line its boats like ghosts and a graduated green-gray ocean punctuated by the occasional wild white cap making its way to shore even the trees are gray this morning their late spring effort almost forgot inside this passing storm whose endings promise blue.
Bring me here, darling, the day I die. Let’s hope the seals bob curiously at our folly and the black cap gulls make us laugh along with them.
Let’s manifest giant waves — the kind little boys scream into — and a full moon that plays hide and seek with the setting sun behind billowed clouds and tall green grasses.
We can celebrate whale spouts and whale tails and the fine thin lines of birds come back — that life goes on and a moment of joy can last forever, here, a laugh, a dance, and love worn smooth with time.
We’ll hope for a cold spring day you and me alone on the dunes and that one final breathtaking breeze to push me forward into oblivion.
Her Algorithm has teeth fangs, really like the kind you see in nightmares, and its fur is black and sharp like a worn carpet tread in worry and fear, with small fibers that pierce the skin and stick like burrs.
Her Algorithm has firm, strong legs and claws that dig in and hold fast to a path she didn’t even realize she was walking down, until she’s so far deep and running at such a clip all she can see is the hot steamy breath of her Algorithm, the gates of hell like a flaming blur.
and there’s nothing a cute purring kitten or craft project can do but watch from the sidebar and wait their turn until the Algorithm catches sight of something more interesting and follows its scent down a rabbit hole of obscure poetry, trendy dance moves, and weird fashion from a 1970s JCPenney catalog that turns her Algorithm a shaggy, avocado green.
Heart-shaped rocks underfoot all around on the grassy path and sand dune from here to the shore and at the water’s edge
(dare I say even in the palm of the Garçon at the pâtisserie whose smile needed no translation)
Hearts!
There was a time I would have come home with enough heart-shaped rocks to border a banister, fill a bowl and basket, lined them up to show the Garçon in the morning with coffee and croissants
but I am content now to find moon stones instead translucent round and easy love in the stars, the sky, the universe enough
In a persistent effort to weave a web the spider imperceptible casts her silver filaments from the uppermost spire of a wintered beach plum one thin budded branch from which a hundred casts arc and fall arc and fall her small labors shimmering in afternoon light prayers of possibility glittering
There is a slice of ocean outside my window and in it the world from a view just above a confluence of birdsong and whalesong the mechanics of the day juxtaposed to sweet, sweet silence.
There’s this photo in which he stares at the camera and I remember we’d already begun by then; made plans, talked for hours, fallen in love, even by the look on his face; I remember that day, our chairs pushed together, sharing our lunches, scribbling notes to each other like school kids; but we were hardly that, hardly so fresh to all of it; I wish my camera had focused more, had adjusted its exposure to show the shadows, the rough edges and hidden details, to find the nuances in the full picture I see so clearly, now.
This is Reverend Scott on the valve in the belly of Poseidon. Quint in the jaws of his worst nightmare. Jack and Rose at the Titanic’s stern. Eowyn and the Nazgûl. Harry and Voldemort. Bruce Willis on the asteroid careening through space.
This is the battle scene. The climactic moment. The death scene.
This is before the denouement. Before the resolution. Before the credits roll.
This is the moment that needs you. That demands faith. That requires courage. And sacrifices.
So hang on tight, baby, because it’s going to be a bumpy ride…
Grizzly Bear and Goldilocks (that’s not my name, she says) are discussing the merits of cinnamon applesauce and whether or not I would eat her, instead, barbequed with ranch dressing but before I can answer in my gruffy harumphing voice we’re off to gather sticks for our make-believe fire pit and the s’mores we’ll eat later because right now she’s making breakfast pancakes with maple syrup? bacon and strawberries I love bacon! which we eat while she laughs that the syrupmakes my fur sticky so she cleans it off my hands thank you then we pretend-read a book before going to bed and I snore as loud as I can until she wakes me up ten seconds later to sit by the fire (just one more round, she asks) so I can’t possibly leave and why would I ever want to? there are s’mores, after all, and a backyard afternoon that is just right.
I have seen her one hundred times since she died in crowds and corners when I least expect and last night in a dream again looking fabulous and forgiving all my tears waited until I was done so we could step into the space of time allotted that glorious dreamspace where everything is as it was and we do as we used to do for hours unending until I wake no longer feeling quite as alone.
If these walls could talk these shelves and set-aside spaces you might think I love her and I do one hundred times I do and have for so long I no longer remember first glance, first conversation first spark of friendship but this and this and this tell our story — part of it most of it the sum of it — easy to turn pages in this space and remember the miles we traveled, the endless stories, the memories gathered in pockets to take home for safe keeping.
The morning thick with sound spring sound a humid hovering of birdsong and flowersong buds on trees whispering and soft soil separated by anxious green almost ready for the ministry of bees and butterflies soon to be tending and tittering a symphony of what is this moment and what will be at any moment soon.
Sleep has been merciful these past three months, arriving early from exhaustion staying late in fellowship with the dreams that wax nostalgic for simpler nightmares and harmless ghosts.
But this morning, I’m awake at 3, my familiar and I like old friends sharing space beneath the spring moon, waning in its sixth phase, while one lone peeper keeps time as sharp as the second hand on a clock.
We have not been together in this way — the moon and morning and me — since the monsters took over, since their cacophony of destruction, the sinister palpitation of days, and all of us wondering what or who will be next.
This morning is a gift of quiet comfort, the marsh frog a beacon which seems to say Here! Here! Here! over and over and over, it reminds that even in the age of monsters, once can find solace in the soft, dark edges, calm in the promise of cycles and phases, of spring and worlds ever spinning.
sit up straight the napkin goes on your lap elbows off the table tines down tines up left hand, right hand, tip the spoon away don’t slurp don’t shovel don’t talk with your mouth full
To the Starlings who have moved into the Privet Hedge on Short Beach Road,
Welcome.
Please stay as long as you like.
Help yourself to the bugs and slugs in the front garden. Enjoy the spread of sweet clover and violets in the lawn, but watch for the mower who arrives every two weeks on Friday.
There’s always shade under the boxwoods, if you need, and rain water in small pools along the mossy brick path.
In the back, you’ll find a bird feeder loosely tended, but often full of seeds, and an endless dance of bees among the honeysuckle by the old dogwood.
We have resident squirrels, a family of five jays, and a chipmunk who resides just south of the bird bath which we keep filled all summer long.
The pond out back offers the companion of frogs and turtles, crows and owls, a flock of your brothers and sisters, and at least one hawk for balance.
Pay no mind to the cat. She never goes outside, but does love her spot on the screen porch. Feel free to watch her watching you, that could go on for hours!
Now mind you, I do have one request.
What I ask only in return is this: please do not cross the wide wild way, west of the hedge. It’s fast and merciless. If you, out of instinct, fly that way ever, please stay high and alert.
It occurred to me this morning, while I held tight to old dreams, that someone, somewhere was also waking to this day, but opening eyes to a present they recognized: the familiar sun though curtains and the routine of Sunday laid out in front of them with no need to pretend otherwise; the photos on the shelf of old friends smiling, the bucket list taped to the refrigerator door, the piggy bank promise of new adventures somewhere and someday still shimmer in the early light of their morning, there; should I tell them? remind them to hold fast live in the moment for god’s sake everything is fleeting, tomorrow might already be a memory.
Thoreau, she tells me, was tended to by women. Meals and laundry — a side of the story I’d missed, hadn’t even thought to think about; his cabin in the woods? his solitude and simplicity? my dream! my escape! my alternate ending! and who considers practicalities when we’re having a transcendental crisis? I am disheartened and disappointed and then…delighted! The solitude of the woods? The simplicity of sojourn? And a community of women to soothe and support? Life Goals times one hundred!
It’s the robin’s trill that most often calls him to mind deep from the arbor of spring azalea and its cotton candy blooms, the privet hedge shoulder high then two stories up in an instant of memory, a wooden screen door slam bees and clover and Pappy lifting me to the sky whiskey on a breeze, the rough chafe of whiskers, “chirp chirp” he says as a kiss against my cheek then sets me on the ground to tangle in the blossoms one more time before we leave for home.
There’s a ghost standing on Mountain Park Road I spy her from the highway as I scream past at seventy She might have waved but had no need to I saw her knew her remembered all of the layers of time, there on the overpass at Mountain Park Road and I wondered briefly if she knew me here now this apparition this shadow of who she used to be in a blur of recognition a moment frozen in time the all of us in overlap here, there, then, now on Mountain Park Road
This morning I stayed in bed squeezed my eyes shut and begged for more more sleep more dreams more anything than what waits: that 21st century disappointment and the cold blank stare of what comes next
It was already hard enough to live with the stark comparison of hopes and dreams versus real world, the daily effort of just keep swimming just keep swimming
Now there is just this THIS every day THIS good lord THIS
Once, I told a therapist that I was considering a long slow drift in ice floe silence, and she sat aghast asked if she should be concerned so I dialed it back and laughed like I was joking
Concerned is such a funny word — To Whom It May Concern we have concerns but it is of little concern
Yesterday, at a protest, I danced with strangers and felt free in a way I haven’t since my best friend died seven years ago and I thought: she is better for it dead before THIS all of this with no concerns no need for persistence or resistance or a clever exit strategy disguised in a poem.
All along the highway a brutal massacre agony and destruction jagged edges claw the sky not even the grace of a clean cut no time to spare for the scream of chain saws the equal labor-to-labor dignity of tree felling the man-versus-nature earth shaking victory (the silent apologies) we are now machine-efficient cost-effective and ruthless with stands of trees laid bare twisted to their breaking point ripped and torn delimbed, stripped, shredded sun burning shaded places raw spaces for the taking
Somewhere in the ebb (of the work day) and flow (of the springtime woods) a page turned and laid itself gently across the path like a vignette filter on this enchanting afternoon and there beneath my feet…
A single spotted wintergreen rises up from the ground…Spotted wintergreens are the flowers that grow from longing.
The sun has warmed the alcove of cedar, so I sit for a while to consider the flowers, the swan, the osprey, the character who calls to me from across the pond who? who?
He turns and stops, his head tilted towards the ground. He stands there for several seconds, staring at the spotted wintergreen…
Am I dreaming? Then he carefully pushes his hands into the soil next to it and a cardinal flower punches through the surface…Cardinal flowers grow from frustration.
Perhaps dreaming or remembering? Surely there is magic about, even the Owl agrees watching now from above, as I sigh and adjust and…
Kneel beside the cardinal flower and touch the Earth, a purple cone flower rises to greet me.…the perfect flower for apologies.
We add to our conversation, wildflowers taking over the dirt…and so much spotted wintergreen, longing everywhere…
We see each other. I think we always have.
How long did I sleep? I don’t recall. Time stood still there by the pond beneath the trees that whispered and sang and soothed us — the Owl and I — for a moment or hours or maybe perhaps a lifetime.
A new flower punctuates the end of our conversation – a single iris to say he loves me.
A shadow crosses my path and I am at once only that over which the heron has flown — of no other consequence — with only a regiment of lilies to bear witness how small am I to his eye? I wonder as I step across a stream apologizing to the startled swans and bowing to the osprey watching warily; there’s a blush in the tree tops and across my humbled face the all of us in awe of this magnificent spring day.
the Mystic says to reenvision my life story to purge the inessential elements and exorcise old ghosts this, just days before the Healer reminds me that old stories are just old stories are just old stories
old stories that say “we don’t have room for you” right now, anymore, again “for reasons of space and other limitations that have nothing to do with your merits” nothing to do with you right now, anymore, again “but thank you for your interest”
so when a friend says she is taking the YES steps all I can see is the surgically precise removal of my bloodied ego, its clots and cartilage forming bitter words on a page that I’ll turn into kindling soon, remind myself that forgiveness and an open heart (healing and self-love) sometimes mean putting down those old stories and walking away leaving them to fend for themselves deep in the dark woods of the past
their smoldering incense wrapping around my wicked incantations while I dance in the freedom of letting go…YES!
“Launched by the Academy of American Poets in April 1996, National Poetry Month is a special occasion that celebrates poets’ integral role in our culture and that poetry matters. Over the years, it has become the largest literary celebration in the world, with tens of millions of readers, students, K–12 teachers, librarians, booksellers, literary events curators, publishers, families, and — of course — poets, marking poetry’s important place in our lives.”
My favorite way to celebrate is to join with the thousands of poets participating in NaPoWriMo — NATIONAL POETRY WRITING MONTH —in which we write a poem a day for the month of April.
While NaPoWriMo is celebrating 22 years this year, I’m happy to say this will be my 11th year attempting to write 30 poems in 30 days! Here we go!
twice today we passed each other and twice today that friction of energy and chemistry and memory tugged at the the solid yellow line like the force between silver magnets so we each turned bullet-time freeze frame slow motion twice today a sideswipe glance the closest we’ve been in years
It’s been three months since the last issue of Creatively Speaking and Wow! OK, how ’bout them Eagles?
It’s been a pretty intense few months, and if you’re anything like me, it’s been hard to look away, right? And maybe you’re feeling a little over-stimulated, a little off-focus. Some of us are leaning into the dark side more often and feeling anxious, irritable, or depressed.
There’s a reason for this, and it might not be exactly what you think. The current chaotic state of affairs is asking us to be more alert, to pay more attention to what’s happening in the world. That alone is enough to kick in our fight-or-flight response. Then add in a layer of technology — constantly checking headlines, reading to stay informed, scrolling social media, keeping engaged with each other on our devices — and we’re literally flooding our system with both adrenaline and dopamine.
We are JACKED UP — can you feel it?
For me, it’s taking the shape of being a little attention-deficity, not super creative, tired, and a bit obsessed with Tony’s Chocolonely milk chocolate bars.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately. Particularly as it applies to dopamine, because the original inspiration for this newsletter was a video called Choose Real Dopamine:
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter, or chemical messenger, that regulates pleasure, motivation, and reward in the brain. It’s sometimes called the feel-good hormone, and it gets released when we do things we need to survive, like eat, drink, compete, and reproduce.
Our brains are hard-wired to seek out behaviors that release dopamine into our reward system, and with the right amount in our bodies, we can feel happy, motivated, alert, and focused. But when our dopamine levels are off-balance, our bodies start to struggle.
Ivette Lampl, M.S., LPC-S, LMFT-S write more about this in “The Effect of Cell Phones on Dopamine in the Brain”:
“The brain is wired to function like this: put in effort – achieve reward. Cook up a tasty snack? Enjoy the yummy treat. Hike up a steep hill? Take in the scenic view from the top. Effort – Reward….
Technology has allowed us to eliminate the effort part of the Effort – Reward cycle. No need to cook a meal – just have it delivered! No need to drive around town looking for the perfect dress for an upcoming event. Just open your favorite shopping app and several options can be at your front door by morning.
Now add in a layer of dopamine hits that we get from our minute-by-minute interactions with our devices. Likes, comments, notifications, messages – all of these are tiny doses of dopamine that we ingest all day long. When the brain senses that there is an abundance of pleasure without the effort/challenge to offset it, it decides that there is too much dopamine and it needs to produce less. And without the brain’s production of dopamine, we begin to seek out more dopamine from external sources, and this cycle continues.
Think of it like this. Let’s say you’ve gone on a long walk on a hot day, and you treat yourself to a scoop of ice cream. Amazing! The brain receives a dose of dopamine and all is well. Now let’s say you really enjoyed that ice cream, so the next day you help yourself to a large scoop while watching TV. No problem. But the next day, you crave ice cream so you eat it directly from the carton. By the end of the week, you’re eating a pint every day…[and] The ice cream is no longer pleasurable….”
You know as well as I do that it’s hard to put the phone down, to ignore the dings and buzzes from our various devices, to turn off notifications or gasp! turn off the phone itself. And it’s hard to recognize when our reward system is no longer enjoying our efforts.
Apparently, this attachment to our devices is something we’re all curious about. Do an internet search for “ways to reduce phone usage” and you’ll find pages and pages of results! Here are some of the top suggestions:
• turn off notifications • put the phone on silent • turn on airplane mode • put your device in another room • set time limits for when you use the device. • consider doing a digital detox • create a Dopamine Menu for alternative activities • go outside and look up
Mine includes things like taking a walk in the woods, gathering things to donate to the thrift shop, watching a favorite old movie, meeting a friend for lunch, and working on my writing.
Now, you may ask what all of this has to do with Creatively Speaking, right? Well, I don’t know about you, but I find that there is a direct correlation between how much time I spend on my devices and how much time I allow for my creative work. When I’ve turned off my phone or given myself a digital detox day, I sleep better, get more things accomplished, and have an expanse of open space in my brain to contemplate things like a new poem, my next book, and other creative considerations.
Our technology is not going anywhere, so it’s on us to find a good balance between on and off, between all-consuming and moderation.
Wishing you balance, real dopamine, and a rewarding amount of ice cream.
Happy Spring!
Love, Jen ❤️
Creative Inspo
I was inspired by a DIY video to make this cell phone cubby for my phone. It hangs on the wall in my kitchen — ironically where the old corded landline used to hang. Before dinner, I put the phone on Airplane Mode and hide it away and out of reach. It’s not foolproof — I check it a few times before I go to bed — but it does keep me from going down the scrolling rabbit hole. Since I’ve been using the cubby, I notice I am more relaxed at the end of the day, I spend more time writing, reading, and making art, and I definitely get a better night’s sleep!
Practiced throughout history – in every culture and on every continent – poetry speaks to our common humanity and our shared values, transforming the simplest of poems into a powerful catalyst for dialogue and peace.
Held every year on March 21, World Poetry Day celebrates one of humanity’s most treasured forms of cultural and linguistic expression and identity.
UNESCO first adopted March 21 as World Poetry Day during its 30th General Conference in Paris in 1999, with the aim of supporting linguistic diversity through poetic expression and increasing the opportunity for endangered languages to be heard. World Poetry Day is the occasion to honor poets, revive oral traditions of poetry recitals, promote the reading, writing and teaching of poetry, foster the convergence between poetry and other arts such as theatre, dance, music and painting, and raise the visibility of poetry in the media. As poetry continues to bring people together across continents, all are invited to join in.
UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, is a specialized agency dedicated to strengthening our shared humanity through the promotion of education, science, culture, and communication. For more information, see www.unesco.org.
The man protecting Pi sits in the last cell down a dark hall, bent in consternation over a paint palette, its colored stripes a child’s keyboard xylophone petals coded to remember the whole of it all
next to him in a cell so close they hear each other’s considerations like dreams, a teacher traces fine connected filigrees on the wall and hums a song he almost remembers about stars and sheep and something called an alphabet he thinks, but is not sure words are not his charge
words belong to the woman down the hall who lives in a room of books stacked floor to ceiling their faded covers and cracked spines are her dominion into which she gets lost for days or weeks, leaves them all — the scientist, the teacher, the healer, the artist, the poet — waiting to hear how it ends, wondering if it all comes full circle.
The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things: of shoes and ships and sealing-wax, of cabbages and kings, and why the sea is boiling hot, and whether pigs have wings.
Random Acts of Writing began as a WordPress blog 15 years ago today! Since then, it has meandered through themes and genres as adventurously as Alice wanders through Wonderland.
The “Walrus and the Carpenter” quote above (from Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There) is not too far off really. I talk about a lot of things here on this blog. After all, it says so right in the title: Random.
On the pages of our current blog, and in the archive site RandomActs10, you’ll find creative efforts like poetry, essay, photography, flash fiction, and mixed-media collage. Topics range from nature and the environment, to travel and food, and creativity and spirituality.
I talk a lot about books — because I love books, and I also write them. Every now and then I wander into current events, but mostly I try to find connections between this and that, that and this, you and me.
I have been blessed to have readers like you — some of whom have been following along from the very beginning. I hope you’ll all continue on the adventure!
After November, I took to re-binging one of my favorite television shows, and we just got to the season when COVID hits. It was actually filmed during COVID, which makes the episodes somehow more poignant.
As I’m watching the season unfold, I’m remembering those days when we really didn’t know what was going to happen, when people were suffering at ridiculous rates, when there was seemingly no end — or hope — in sight.
I’m remembering how we hunkered down. How we embraced simple things like making bread and trying new recipes. How we found comfort in each other — even from six feet away. How we came together and sang from balconies.
I’m also remembering our feckless, reckless President — back then — so incompetent and uncaring at his job that it felt like we were on board a rudderless ship heading for the rocks.
It’s hard not to feel that way now, because here we are, back in a collective crisis, worried for our friends and family, worried for ourselves and our livelihoods. Furious about the lack of leadership, again, from that awful awful man and his minions.
In the episode I watched last night, a young doctor was sitting outside the hospital in despair. She’d lost patients, run out of supplies, had been working non-stop, and worried that she might soon simply lose her mind.
But her friend finds her, allows her space to talk, shows her compassion, gives her comfort. They lean into each other for a while, and the despair eases.
It made me realize that the suffering we’re experiencing now is very much like the suffering we just experienced in the pandemic. Like then, there is so much that doesn’t make sense, so much to be afraid of, so many unknowns.
And, like then, we will get through this. We’ll be kind with each other. We’ll allow space to talk and to cry and to rage. We’ll be a little more compassionate, a little more gentle with other — and with ourselves. We’ll help each other cope, and we’ll dance it out when we just can’t cope anymore. We’ll take care of each other and lean into each other.
I was going to tell you the story of a flag. One of those disgusting political flags. Those in-your-face, middle-finger-to-the-constitution flags you see around town, you know?
I even drove back around the block to take a picture of it, because what I thought I would be writing about here is how the flag is falling. How one wind storm twisted its staff and half-toppled its cement base. How its flaccid affect can be seen from a quarter mile in either direction. How wide that made me smile.
But then I went for a walk. On this glorious, blustery Winnie-the-Pooh kind of day. I was enchanted by the blue sky and the crisp cold air. I was pushed along by the wind, and even laughed out loud a few times.
It was like the wind blew all of that angsty stuff right out of me. Replaced it with Joy!
And as if to underscore the moment, there was wide and wild wind that roared through the forest, and I watched as these hundreds-of-years old pine trees swayed in the wind. SANG in the wind.
Their roots were deep enough. Their community was supportive enough. And they were strong enough.
They didn’t twist or bend or fall. They resisted. And they sang!
I whisper, in hushed tones, that she is safe, stroke her soft furred body as she lies in my lap, promise the wolves won’t get her, hope she was sleeping when they came last night and ripped fur and flesh from our friend the rabbit who visited the yard all winter, but I know she heard the screams, I can see it in her eyes when I make my false promises I make a lot of them these days — to this cat who needs to be close more often now and to myself that everything will be OK.
I’m reading a book voraciously this morning, swallowing down pages like I did the Chinese take-out last week, like I do most things these day…it’s Sunday and it’s supposed to be Sacred Sunday — a day of slowness and quiet and rest, a day without the distractions of technology and that loud, noisy world…but the silence these days is hungry, it needs something to fill it up before the monsters come, before their loud clanging of concerns vibrates my mind at a deafening frequency. They’ve already invaded my spine, their long, worried tentacles crippling any attempts to move forward, their slimy bodies slithering into thoughts at night, racing thoughts and me running faster than I can in the wake of days — the technician lists off the degenerative changes, the demineralization, osteophytes, and narrowing spaces, but neglects to mention the impact fracture caused by my inability to see past my own feet. I’ve never been one to skip to the last page of a book, I swear, I’ve always trusted in the ability of its pages to take me where I need to go, to help me manage the outcome with whatever dose of resilience was needed…but this? this story? I am already so braced for the ending there are days I can’t move.
On a lighter note, if you have not read Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt, please do. It’s a lovely read.
“You Are Here” is the reassuring little icon on a trail map that gives you your bearings, lets you know, in the grand scheme of things Where. You. Are. It’s often the first thing you see when you start out on an adventure somewhere. These days, with things so frighteningly askew, it’s good to have a sense of where you are in that grand scheme. And there is nothing better to make you feel a little more grounded, a little more connected to the bigger picture, than a walk in the woods!
Join me for a walk at one of my favorite places to unwind, regroup, and find inspiration.
INGREDIENTS: collage, color scans, digital art, ephemera, essays, original photographs, poetry, quotes, vintage artwork. With thanks to GIS Specialist Nicole Castro, Erwin Raisz, Ted Andrews, Hans Christian Anderson; Joseph Smith, William Curtis and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Jamie Sams and David Carson, Henry David Thoreau.
Full Color 11×17 folded map with way too many inserts and a curated video playlist. Cost: $8.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
Report from the Senate Floor, written by US Senator Chris Murphy (D – CT).
“Last night in the Senate, something really important happened. Republicans forced us to debate their billionaire bailout budget framework. We started voting at 6 PM because they knew doing it in the dark of night would minimize media coverage. And they do not want the American people to see how blatant their handover of our government to the billionaire class is.
So I want to explain what happened last night and what we did to fight back. The apex of Republicans’ plan to turn over our government to their wealthy cronies is a giant tax cut for billionaires and corporations. And they plan to pay for it with cuts to programs that working people rely on. Popular and necessary programs like Medicaid, Medicare, and SNAP, are all being targeted. In order to pass the tax cut, Republicans have to go through a series of procedural steps. Last night, they took the first step which requires them to pass an outline of their plan, but with it, any senator can offer as many amendments as we want. So my Democratic colleagues and I did just that.
Now, we knew that Republicans would largely unanimously oppose them, but we had two objectives here. One, Republicans were forced to put their opinion on record — many for the first time — on the most corrupt parts of Trump and Musk’s agenda. Two, as I’ve been saying, I am going to make every process and procedure as slow and painful as possible for as long as my colleagues choose to ignore the constitutional crisis happening before our eyes.
So what did we propose? We proposed no tax cuts for anyone who makes a billion dollars a year. We made them vote on whether or not Elon Musk and DOGE should have limitless access to Americans’ personal data. We made them vote on whether to protect IVF and require insurers to cover it. Every single amendment Democrats proposed was shot down. On almost every single amendment, Republicans universally opposed it. Every Republican voted against our proposal to prevent more tax cuts for billionaires. The corruption and theft is happening in the open here.
The whole game for Republicans is taking your money and giving it to the wealthiest corporations and billionaires — even if it means kicking your parents out of a nursing home or turning off Medicaid for the poorest children. They know what they are doing is deeply unpopular. They are offering a tax cut to the most wealthy that is 850 times larger than what they are offering working people. Oh and by the way, any tax cuts for working people are going to be washed out by higher costs for basic necessities, like health care and food. It’s a fundamental injustice.
Thanks to your pressure and support, many of my Democratic colleagues have joined my effort to do everything we can to make sure they cannot destroy democracy and steal your money in the dark of the night. We are being loud about what is happening. I’m going to continue to grind the gears of Congress down as much as possible to make it that much harder and slower to get away with this corruption. That’s why the votes lasted until nearly 5 AM.
This is a five-alarm fire. I don’t think we have two years to plan and fight back. I think we have months. It’s still in our power to stop the destruction of our democracy with mass mobilization and effective opposition from elected officials. So we can’t miss any opportunity to take advantage of opportunities to put Republicans on the record and shine a light on what is happening.
And you have a role to play in this as well. I need you to amplify what’s happening, support the leaders who are fighting for you to make sure they can continue speaking truth to power against Musk and Trump’s billionaire cronies, and show up at rallies and town halls. Use every tool at your disposal to send a message loud and clear about how you expect my colleagues to lead and fight in this moment.
Every best wish, US Senator Chris Murphy (D – CT)”
These days, I wake up with a thin veil of hope. Before the All of it sets in. Again. Then I breathe and stretch. Light incense. Beseech saints and gods. And settle into the morning routine of cat feeding and coffee making — this is the Grounding.
When I am fortified enough, I glance at the headlines and subject lines. Read Jessica Craven’s latest Chop Wood, Carry Water to talk me off the ledge. Remind myself about Chaos Theory, and This Too Shall Pass. Recite the Serenity Prayer: serenity, courage, wisdom. Breathe.
I relay inspiring quotes about Resistance and Creativity and Hope on social media. Call and email my Senators and Representatives. Take small actions of Revolution before I settle into my day, which, for now, is same and sane and familiar.
Familiar enough that at some point, I shake off the Big World things and muck about in my own for a while. The usual: the house repairs, the bills, the client rubbing me the wrong way, that one thing that one person said that irritated the piss out of me, my mother’s caregiving, the impending knee surgery, on and on…
And on…while the world fucking burns outside my window. Literally. Figuratively. Absolutely.
Every time I find myself marinating about my Small World things, I hear Julia Roberts/Liz Gilbert in the opening monologue of the movie Eat, Pray, Love:
“l have a friend, Deborah, a psychologist, who was asked if she could offer psychological counseling to Cambodian refugees — boat people, who had recently arrived in the city. Deborah was daunted by the task. These Cambodians had suffered genocide, starvation, relatives murdered before their eyes, years in refugee camps, harrowing boat trips to the West. How could she relate to their suffering? How could she help these people? So guess what all these people wanted to talk about with my friend Deborah, the psychologist. lt was all, “l met this guy in the refugee camp. I thought he really loved me, but when we got separated, he took up with my cousin. Now he says he loves me, and keeps calling me. They’re married now. What should l do?” This is how we are.”
This is how we are, in part, because we are susceptible to what is called “Crisis Fatigue” — that feeling of overwhelm, lack of control, or the urgency of the next crisis.
And goodness knows, we’re like a Russian doll of crises these days! Everywhere you look, it’s crisis stacked upon crisis upon crisis.
So where is the fulcrum? How do we find a balance between staying informed and hiding under covers? Between revolutioning and resting?
Remember, this is a marathon, not a sprint. You need to make time to drink water, slow down a little, pace yourself.
In her article “When tragedy becomes banal: Why news consumers experience crisis fatigue,” Rebecca Rozelle-Stone , Professor of Philosophy, University of North Dakota asks, “How might we recover a capacity for meaningful attention and responses amid incessant, disjointed and overwhelming news?” and suggests, beyond reining in digital device usage, that we consider:
“Limiting the daily intake of news can help people become more attentive to particular issues of concern without feeling overwhelmed. Cultural theorist Yves Citton, in his book The Ecology of Attention, urges readers to “extract” themselves “from the hold of the alertness media regime.” According to him, the current media creates a state of “permanent alertness” through “crisis discourses, images of catastrophes, political scandals, and violent news items.” At the same time, reading long-form articles and essays can actually be a practice that helps with cultivating attentiveness.”
She also recommends a focus on “more solutions-based stories that capture the possibility of change. Avenues for action can be offered to readers to counteract paralysis in the face of tragedy. Amanda Ripley, a former Time magazine journalist, notes that “stories that offer hope, agency, and dignity feel like breaking news right now, because we are so overwhelmed with the opposite.”
So do that.
But remember…it’s OK to take a day off — from work, from social media, from headlines, from the Resistance.
It’s OK to eat ice cream or take a nap or laugh out loud. It’s OK to make plans, to look forward to things.
Do the things that keep you sane and keep you grounded. Revolution requires Resilience.
In Eat, Pray, Love, the medicine man Ketut suggests to Julia Roberts/Liz Gilbert:
Keep grounded so it’s like you have four legs. That way, you can stay in this world. Also, no looking at world through your head. Look through your heart instead. That way, you will know God.
As part of its ongoing Fireside Chats program, the Blackstone Memorial Library welcomes Branford author Jen Payne for a poetry reading on Saturday, March 8, 1:00 – 3:00 p.m.
In honor of International Women’s Day, Jen will be reading from her new book, Sleeping with Ghosts, focusing on some of the women she’s written about — mentors and muses and friends. After the reading, Jen will be joined by Laura Noe for a conversation about how our relationships with women influence and inspire us. Laura, a local author as well, holds a master’s degree in Women’s and Gender Studies, and is currently teaching the Psychology of Women at SCSU. Attendees are welcome to bring a short (100 words or so) introduction about one important woman in your life to share with the group.
Copies of Sleeping with Ghosts will be available for sale during the event. Refreshments will be served.
This event is free and open to the public. No registration is required. The Blackstone Memorial Library is located at 758 Main Street, Branford. For more information, visit http://www.blackstonelibrary.org.
Jen Payne is a poet, author, photographer, and artist. She is inspired by those life moments that move us most — love and loss, joy and disappointment, milestones and turning points. Her writing serves as witness to these in the form of poetry, creative non-fiction, flash fiction and essay. When she is not exploring our connections with one another, she enjoys contemplating our relationships with nature, creativity, spirituality and our inner lives. Ultimately, she believes it is the alchemy of those things that helps us find balance in this frenetic, spinning world.
Her work has appeared in numerous publications including Sunspot Literary Journal, The Perch, and the 2024 Connecticut Literary Anthology. She has written five books: Look Up!, Evidence of Flossing, Waiting Out the Storm, Water Under the Bridge, and Sleeping with Ghosts, all of which are available to borrow from the Blackstone Library. They can also be purchased online at 3chairspublishing.com.
Today, I talk with Kaecey McCormick at Some Thoughts: Everything Creativity, who writes: “I’m thrilled to bring author Jen Payne to the blog today in an interview to discuss life, writing, and her new book, Sleeping with Ghosts. Earlier this month, I hosted a Community Poetry & Prose Night with the theme “The Ghosts We Carry,” and Jen’s book is a wonderful example of how we can be “haunted” by so much and how these “ghosts” show up in our writing.
Kaecey: Jen, welcome! I’m thrilled to chat about your new book, SleepingwithGhosts. The way you blend genres in this collection is fascinating. Sleeping with Ghosts is described as a ‘time-traveling memoir’ into the heart and mind of a poet. What inspired you to choose this format, and what challenges did you face in crafting such a unique narrative?
Jen: Hi Kaecey. Thanks for being part of the Sleeping with Ghosts blog tour!
Like you, I’m not only a writer and poet, I’m also a blogger. I’ve been writing and creating at Random Acts of Writing (randomactsofwriting.net) since 2010. That name, it turns out, was spot-on! My creative work shifts from poetry and flash nonfiction, to essay and photo essay.
As readers will find in Sleeping with Ghosts, I also write a lot of memoir pieces.
The poems in the book have been written over the past 10-15 years, but they cover a time span of 40! From that perspective, time traveling becomes a natural consequence! (It helps that I’m also a closet Trekkie and a bit of a sci-fi nerd.)
I find I have an acute memory for what I call “defining moments” — those places in time when something shifts or changes, times that you bookmark to remember. I am easily able to slip back into those moments and recall the feelings, the conversations, my surroundings. And then I write!
As happened in my previous books of poetry, Evidence of Flossing and Waiting Out the Storm, the poems in Sleeping with Ghosts gathered themselves quite naturally. As soon as I set the intention to create this book, the poems and chapters, and their organization was very clear. The biggest challenge, I suppose, was making sure that the ghosts each got their own say, and that their stories were told to completion.
Kaecey: I can imagine that covering a time span of 40 years meant some “ghostly” challenges! You did a wonderful job making sure each voice was heard. Much of your writing in this collection reflects on past relationships or experiences. I’m wondering, was there a defining memory or experience that sparked the creation of Sleeping with Ghosts? How did it start and how did the concept evolve from that initial inspiration?
Jen: Indirectly, yes.
I’ve been a writer all my life: journalist, copy editor, freelance writer, marketing wordsmith. I started my own graphic design and marketing business, Words by Jen, when I was 27, and spent a great deal of time writing for other people.
But the year I turned 40, I reconnected with someone I had been deeply, crazy in love with. We hadn’t spoken in 15 years, and our reconnection felt monumental and…karmic.
When it didn’t work out (again), everything broke wide open for me. I had to find a way to write from that place, from that broken-hearted, emotional, vulnerable place. That’s really when I began writing the good stuff!
(Actually, you can read about the whole experience in my book Water Under the Bridge: A Sort-of Love Story.)
Kaecey: It’s amazing how those difficult experiences can spark our creativity. And speaking of difficult, your work often explores themes of memory, creativity, and loss. How do you navigate writing about such personal experiences while still making them resonate universally? What advice do you have for poets and other writers who are tackling big themes like grief?
Jen: I think I write about my own experiences because I have to — it’s how I process things, how I connect with the world. Not to be cliche, but writing is my love language.
I’m a bit of an introvert, so writing and storytelling are my way of sharing, of having a conversation, of participating.
I’m not sure I intentionally try to make my work resonate universally, so much as the stories are universal. We all experience these moments —right? The broken heart, the unrequited love, the death of a friend, the relationship we need to leave.
But not everyone has the courage to talk about their experiences. It’s hard work talking about disappointment, broken hearts, loss, and grief.
What inspired me most to write from the heart, to be brave about it, was Brené Brown’s book Rising Strong. In it, she writes, “When we deny our stories, they define us. When we own our stories, we get to write the ending.”
So my advice to writers tackling the big life themes would be a) read Brené’sbook, and then b) be brave and write!
Kaecey: Love that. I’m a Brené Brown fan! So yes! And I appreciate what you just said about our stories as universal human experiences. You’ve also written about our connection to the natural world, and in previous interviews, you mentioned the “alchemy” of emotions, nature, and creativity. I’m hoping you can elaborate on how this idea informs your writing, whether that’s in the language and imagery itself or as part of your process, particularly in this new book, Sleeping with Ghosts?
Jen: There is a certain kind of magic that happens when we can step out of our day-to-day and let new information come in. For me, that very often happens when I walk in the woods or on the beach. For others, the magic happens in meditation or after physical activity.
We’re all so busy these days. And when we’re not busy with actual work — job, house, family, life — we’re regularly seduced by technology and our scrolling, binging culture. Creativity requires us to get away from all of that. How can we hear our Muses when everything else is demanding our attention?
I think it’s important for writers and artists to find those things that let them reconnect with their creative voice. One poet I know recently went on a week-long silent mediation, and when I marveled at that to his wife, she said “That’s him. I prefer moving meditation, like tai chi or yoga.”
For me, being in nature is a critical component of my writing. Whether it’s a regular walk at my favorite nature preserve or a week-long writing retreat by the water — I need that time away to process through the stories and the things I want to say.
And yes, very often there is an overlap of my connection with nature and the imagery and language in my writing, including Sleeping with Ghosts. Of course!
My book Waiting Out the Storm was a very personal tribute to a dear friend who died suddenly. I found the most comfort being in nature, and witnessing how life and death and rebirth play out all around us. Nature was my solace.
That’s what I mean by alchemy — we are part of a much larger universe than our day-to-day. If we can be open to that, give ourselves time and space to come back to our awareness of that, it can infuse our writing and our sense of self in pretty amazing ways!
Kaecey: Beautifully put, Jen. And so helpful for other writers to read about that part of the process. Speaking of process, I feel like, as writers, we’re often surprised by something in our work or in the process itself. Maybe you start a poem about the lipstick case you lost and end up writing about the death of your cat. Maybe you want to write about the sunlight and you end up writing about your toddler’s whining. (Or maybe that’s just me!) In looking back at your journey with Sleeping with Ghosts, what has been the most surprising or rewarding aspect of creating this collection and sharing it with others?
Jen: This is a great question. Our writing can come as a surprise sometimes, can’t it?
One of the most surprising things about Sleeping with Ghosts for me has been how these poems assume their own personality, and almost innately tell the story of each particular ghost…despite the fact that they were written at different times over the past 15 years.
The ghost in I Am a Rock/I Am an Island is unrequited loved no matter when I write about it — in the moment or 10 years later. The ghost in Seeing Red is angry all the time — then and even now.
The other surprising thing — and probably my favorite part about writing this book — is that the ghosts found ways to speak to me. They often showed up to remind me about a moment or a conversation that should be included. Sometimes they needed a final say — and they would chime in while I was on a walk or they’d show up in a dream. “Sleeping in Truro” was one ghost’s final say-so, and “Dear Jenny” was a ghost who appeared just months before the book went to press. When I asked the ghosts to give me a final poem for the book, they sent my Dad who asked, “Did you love?”
I did, I have…and now I get to share that with my readers!
Kaecey: “Did you love?” What a beautiful question and how wonderful to be able to answer in the way that you did! Jen, thank you so much for being here with me today. It’s be a joy to talk to you about writing, life, and your inspiration!
Jen: Kaecey, thank you for these thoughtful questions and the chance to dig a little deeper into the inspiration and ghosts in Sleeping with Ghosts! I appreciate it!
“As a child I had free rein in libraries, selecting whatever books on whatever shelves interested me. It’s what inspired me to write books and publish books. And it’s part of what inspired Books for Good.” — Jen Payne, Three Chairs Publishing
Books for Good is a non-profit project from Three Chairs Publishing. Our mission is to purchase and distribute good-but-banned books to Little Free Libraries, community centers, and other locations (in Connecticut) in an effort to make them forever-available to interested readers of all ages, no matter the culture or political climate.
HOW CAN YOU HELP
Donate new or well-loved books to us from the list below.
Donate Amazon or Barnes & Noble gift cards that we can use to make purchases. (We do not accept cash donations at this time.)
Send us book recommendations.
Volunteer to help distributed books.
Please email us for more information or to lend a hand. Thank you!
I started my business, Words by Jen, in 1993. It was a part-time effort at first, offering writing and “desktop publishing” services to a small-but-growing list of local businesses, artists, and non-profits. By 1996, I had moved my office from the second bedroom of an apartment to commercial office space and was ready to leave my job at a local print shop to dedicate my time to my own work.
Back then — pre-Google and social media— one of the best ways to market a business was to have a listing in the phone book. Phone books, for those of you who might not know, were kept in every household and included all of the landline phone numbers in your town. There was a white pages section for home phone numbers and a yellow pages section for business phone numbers and advertising.
In the fall of 1995, I placed a yellow page ad in a phone book that would be in every home within 20 miles of my office.
The very first phone call I received was from a woman named Dale Carlson. Dale was a well-known New York City author who had moved to a shoreline town here in Connecticut and started her own, small publishing company, Bick Publishing House.
We met over coffee at a local breakfast spot, and had a very long conversation about how we might work together. She was as curious about me and Words by Jen as I was about the strong force of a woman sitting across the table from me.
Dale was 60 years old when we met, with an impressive resume of writing and publishing experience. She’d written more than two dozen books at the time, had been published by Atheneum Books, Doubleday, and Simon & Schuster, and was the winner of both an ALA Notable Book Award and the Christopher Award.
She had traveled all over the world, practiced yoga and meditation, was an advocate for folks with mental illness and addiction, read voraciously, and had recently become a licensed wildlife rehabilitator.
I, on the other hand, was barely 30 and just starting out in my career…and my life. I must have seemed so young and naïve to her. Still, something clicked for both of us and we agreed to draw up a contract for “book design and marketing services.”
From that first meeting, Dale and I went on to create more than 30 books, from her first series of wildlife rehabilitation manuals in the late 1990s to her final book OUT OF ORDER: Young Adult Manual of Mental Illness and Recovery. We started on that journey together before independent publishing was a thing, before print-on-demand and Amazon and self-publishing. Dale had taken us out to the leading edge of this new industry, and it was an amazing ride!
She knew, for example, Jan Nathan — the founder of Publishers Marketing Association (PMA) which became the Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA). Her books were edited by Ann Maurer, who had a long history of editing for well-known publishers, and our team included Jean Karl from Atheneum and award-winning artists like cover designer Greg Sammons and illustrator Carol Nicklaus.
During our time together, I gathered a set of design and publishing tools that still serve me well today, including a well-worn copy of The Chicago Manual of Style that Dale gave me all those years ago. From her, I learned about book industry standards for design,how to edit and organize content professionally, what makes for a good cover design and effective back cover content, how to position a book properly for booksellers and libraries, and so much more.
Ask me what inspired me to write books and how I came to start my own publishing company — Three Chairs Publishing — and I will tell you about the 25+ years that Dale and I worked together: the long hours of editing around her kitchen table, selecting art and cover designs, developing a house style, and promoting her books.
The skills I learned from her then I apply now to my own books, and to the growing list of self-published authors I get to work with as Words by Jen. All total, I have had the privilege of shepherding well over 150 books out into the world, from Dale’s books and my own, to a long list of poetry, art, history, fiction, and non-fiction titles.
And to think it all started with that yellow page ad, all so many years ago!
Photo: Jen and her mentor, Dale Carlson, at the launch of Jen’s first book, Look Up! Musings on the Nature of Mindfulness, in 2014. Sleeping with Ghosts is her fifth book under the imprint of Three Chairs Publishing.
“It is also true that people in this country are not as mean…but yet when they see this kind of hatred and meanness normalized, they look around and wonder, well maybe that’s what my country is. Maybe actually my neighbors have signed up for this kind of inhumane treatment of human beings. And so this has got to be a multisystemic effort. And one of the things that we need to do is to show people that that is not who we are and it is OK for you to decide perhaps to align yourselves with folks who might not share your specific political values just because you don’t want this country to be defined by division and hatred, and the way that you give people confidence to do that is not just through politics, it’s by doing good works and showing folks that is actually who we are and this is who you should be as well…the rallies and the actions are important but just modeling the kind of behavior that actually is in the heart of human beings…it’s part of what a good resistance movement is.
FEBRUARY 13 Valentine’s Book Signing & Spontaneous Poetry Reading Thursday, February 13, 4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. at Guilford Art Center (411 Church Street, Guilford)
The Shop at Guilford Art Center is hosting a Valentine’s Day Shopping Event, all day on Thursday, February 13. Come see the treasury of beautiful objects made by hand with lots of love…it’s the perfect place to find gifts for the loves in your life. As a special treat, I’ll be signing copies of my book Sleeping with Ghosts, handing out homemade cookies, and doing spontaneous poetry readings from 4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. Please stop by!
FEBRUARY 15 Center Cemetery Book Launch with Jane Bouley Saturday, February 15, 12:30 – 3:30 p.m. at the Blackstone Memorial Library (758 Main Street, Branford)
Join local author and Branford Town Historian Jane Bouley for an Open House and Book Launch highlighting her most recent work Center Cemetery: Church Yard Section. The two-volume work includes the record and photographs of 470 gravestones in the oldest section of Branford Center Cemetery on Montowese Street. Jane will show photographs, describe the book, and answer questions. Refreshments will be served.
This is the third book that Words by Jen has helped Jane publish, and I am honored to have been invited to be part of this event to answer questions about book publishing. Please stop by to say hello!
MARCH 8 Fireside Chat & Poetry Reading with Jen Payne Honoring International Women’s Day Saturday, March 8, 1:00 – 3:00 p.m. at the Blackstone Memorial Library (758 Main Street, Branford)
Please join me for a special poetry reading to honor International Women’s Day. I’ll be reading from my new book, Sleeping with Ghosts, focusing on some of the astounding women I’ve known — mentors and muses and dear friends. Together, we’ll talk about how our relationships with women influence and inspire us. If you’d like, please bring a short (100 words or so) introduction about one important woman in your life to share with the group.
APRIL 27 Book Signing & Spontaneous Poetry Reading at Breakwater Books Sunday, April 27, 1:00 – 3:00 p.m. at Breakwater Books (81 Whitfield Street, Guilford)
I’ll see you on the CT Book Trail at Breakwater Books in Guilford, where I’ll be signing copies of my book Sleeping with Ghosts, handing out some sweet treats, and doing spontaneous poetry readings from 1:00 – 3:00 p.m. Plus, get your CT Book Trail Passport stamped for a chance to win over $4,000 in prizes as part of the 2-day CT Book Trail Passport Challenge!
Time alone during a retreat on the shore of Cape Cod, MA.
If the world were a sound, it would be flipping through all of the channels on a radio really fast. Announcers and DJs, commercials and music genres overlapping in the same way our 21st-century tasks seem to layer upon themselves.
We’re always busy, there’s always something else to be managed, and the To Do list is never-ending — one crossed-off item seemingly births two or three more. Work, family, and home responsibilities line up like a song queue on a commercial-free weekend — endless.
If you’re a creative type, like I am, though, you need to turn down the volume sometimes. All of that noise — all of those weighty expectations —stifle our ideas and muffle our creative voice.
And while a Vacation can be helpful sometimes, that’s a different genre of time off, usually involving a barrage of activities, schedules, attractions, must-dos, and must-sees. What’s more beneficial to your creative spirit is a Retreat.
What’s the difference?
I like to think of Retreat as all about the R words, like: Relax, Rest, Regroup, Restore, Reflect, Reset, Roam, Read, Recharge, Replenish. Get the idea?
It’s time without any expectations or To Do lists, and time “off the grid,” if you can stand it.
According to an article by executive coach Rebecca Zucker in the Harvard Business Review, taking time off has reverberating positive effects on your sleep, memory, concentration, mood, and stress level.
Time off, she explains, “can allow you to tune out much of this external noise and tune back into your true self. You can start to separate the striver part of you, let go of your ego, and reacquaint yourself with the essence of who you really are…feel a sense of peace…and do things that bring you joy.”
How’s that for motivation?
For the last 12 years, I’ve taken a week-long Retreat on the shores of Cape Cod. I spend my time reading books, walking by the water, and taking long afternoon naps. I eat simple meals, spend time in nature, write some poetry, and remember how to breathe deeply again. I try to make it a quiet experience — time for rest and reflection, not a tourist jaunt or food tour.
Of course, not everyone has the time or resources to take off by themselves for a whole week. Sometimes I don’t either. Sometimes, an overnight at a hotel with a good book and a picnic basket of food is time enough. A Sunday drive down the highway with the radio on and the windows open can clear my head as much as a long walk by the ocean. And always, a morning hike in the quiet woods reminds me that somewhere beneath all the layers of noise, my creative voice is waiting for her opportunity to sing!
What’s your ideal Retreat? Can you think of two or three ways — grand and small — that you can tune back into your creative spirit?
“64 Days to Live Nonviolence” SEASON FOR NONVIOLENCE
The Season for Nonviolence marks the 64 days between the anniversaries of the deaths of Mohandas Gandhi on January 30 and Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4. Cesar Chavez‘s birthday also falls within the Season on March 31. The Season for Nonviolence was co-founded by Arun and Sunanda Gandhi and the Leadership Council of The Association for Global New Thought (AGNT) in 1998.
To help you learn to practice nonviolence one step at a time, one choice at a time, one day at a time, the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence created a booklet called “64 Days to Live Nonviolence.”
They explain:
Through our daily nonviolent choices and action, our noble and courageous spirits rise to move the world in the direction of peace. Wherever you are in your journey, we hope this booklet will support your growth and encourage you, reminding you that you are part of a worldwide community working for nonviolence and peace.
Will you join me for “64 Days to Live Nonviolence”? I’ll be posting on Random Acts of Writing’s Facebook page starting tomorrow, if you’d like to share your thoughts or you can:
An intimate exploration of love, memory, and meaning. Take a journey into the heart and mind of a poet, where memories wander, hearts break, and ghosts appear in dreams. The ghosts — lovers, soulmates, muses — reveal themselves chapter by chapter, in this charming and wistfully reflective, time traveling memoir.
Available from Breakwater Books, Guilford Art Center, Bookshop.org, Amazon, and 3chairspublishing.com
For the poet is a light and winged and holy thing, and there is no invention in him until he has been inspired and is out of his senses, and the mind is no longer in him… — Plato
Ghosts, Muses, Inspiration, Universe, God. Call it what you will — there is another layer of this world that we live in, and if you can quiet your mind, sometimes, you can hear it and be inspired by it!
As I was finishing up the manuscript for Sleeping with Ghosts, my editor and I both agreed something was missing. While I loved the final poem “Missing Banksy,” its alluded message about impermanence wasn’t quite strong enough to hold up the end of the book. But what would? I had no idea!
When I get stuck like that and can’t find answers — about my writing or about life in general — I like to walk in the woods. It’s where I can settle my mind, slow down the busy-ness, and sometimes…sometimes…hear ghosts.
On this particular walk, I started out at the trailhead by asking the Universe to help me find a final poem, a final message for the book. Often, I can entice Inspiration with a request like that, and this time, it responded in the voice of my Dad.
It’s not the first time my Dad’s ghost has spoken to me. He told me to PAY ATTENTION on I-95 once and saved me from a pretty awful accident; he often shows up unexpectedly as a hawk with a call of I AM HERE; and he responded to my poem query with a series of questions that became the poem “The Final Ghost.”
But connecting with our ghosts can be challenging! There is so much noise in the world today — we’re busier than ever, more distracted by things, more seduced by technologies. There are so many things demanding our attention, how can we possibly hear Ghosts, listen to Muses, or tune into our Inspiration?
One of my all-time favorite movies is Contact with Jodi Foster. The scene I think about often is when she is in the portal pod that’s been reconfigured with an anchored chair and seat belt — things to keep her rooted in place as she travels across space through wormholes. But as she starts her journey, the chair and seat belt cause more harm than good. She may be OK to Go, but they keep her too firmly in place. It’s only when she releases what holds her down that she projects openly forward.
In the same way, listening to your Ghosts requires that you release what’s holding you back.
For Jodi Foster’s character Ellie Arroway, what was holding her back was physically obvious. For me, I know that my biggest obstacle is technology and how it eats up my time and siphons my attention span.
So, what gets in the way of listening to your Ghosts?
Just this weekend, I talked with a woman who told me in a whispered voice how she stopped listening to her Ghosts because it seemed a little scary. And I have a friend who is a phenomenal painter, but she often ignores her Inspiration because it feels too powerful, almost possibly un-godlike.
But the idea of listening to Ghosts or Inspiration or Muses reaches far back into human history.
Did you know that “the word inspiration ultimately derives from the Greek for ‘God-breathed’ or ‘divinely breathed into.’ In Greek myth, inspiration is a gift of the muses, the nine daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne (Memory).”
Similarly, “the Oxford English Dictionary defines inspiration as “a breathing in or infusion of some idea, purpose, etc. into the mind; the suggestion, awakening, or creation of some feeling or impulse, especially of an exalted kind.”
In his article “How to Find Inspiration, the Psychology and Philosophy of Inspiration,” writer and philosopher Neel Burton offers seven 7 simple strategies to encourage inspiration:
1. Wake up when your body tells you to. 2. Complete your dreams. 3. Eliminate distractions, especially the tedious ones. 4. Don’t try to rush or force things. 5. Be curious. 6. Break the routine. 7. Make a start.
Because I know too much you look like her, so instead of blaring my horn I stop and smile and let you pull out into the crowded lot in front of me
You’re sweet and apologetic in gestures, so I smile even more and nod because I know too much, and I owe you — or her — a thousand kindnesses in place of apologies that have long since gathered dust in the corner of both our stories
Because I know too much about your suspicions and my jealousies, your patience and mine, I think this gesture now in this parking lot with this stranger might be atonement, might be appreciation — or love — a precious light in the shadows of our shared secret
There is a stain on my town and it’s hard to ignore.
To get here, you take Exit 54 for Branford, Connecticut / Cedar Street and head south to our charming downtown center. There you’ll find the stately Blackstone Memorial Library and our Main Street flanked by small businesses, an art gallery, and award-winning restaurants. White steepled churches circle the classic New England Town Green, where tables are set out for conversations and ice cream from across the street, and fairs and concerts are regular events. The wide expanse of grass is crisscrossed by brick sidewalks that lead to Town Hall and war monuments honoring soldiers who died to uphold the principles of our country.
But in order to get from Exit 54 to this snapshot of Americana, you have to drive by a monument of a different nature. Its years-long, hate-spewing tribute to Donald Trump includes numerous flags and signs that change as the wind blows — effigies of enemies, the maga slogan du jour, the in-your-face, aggressive rhetoric unfurled for all to see.
I’d call it Hate Speech or Domestic Terrorism.The courts call it “freedom of speech,” but it’s vile. And it’s embarrassing, quite frankly.
Now let me tell you about that stain.
The stain is on me. Because my response to this effigy whenever I drive past it is as full of hate as it is. I regularly give it the middle finger, use foul language, froth up with anger and a visceral desire to cause damage to something or someone.
You know what I mean.
Over the past nine years, we’ve all had that moment when our animal instinct raises the hairs on our backs and makes us want to pounce — verbally, physically, or otherwise.
I have been thinking about that A LOT this week, inspired by my attendance at the 40th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast and the presentation by guest speaker Dr. Jeffrey C. Stewart who spoke about nonviolence.
King was a well-known proponent of nonviolence. Here are some of his thoughts on the matter:
“We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself. We will try to persuade with our words, but if our words fail, we will try to persuade with our acts.”
“Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy’s point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves. For from his view we may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own condition, and if we are mature, we may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of the brothers who are called the opposition.”
“Nonviolence is absolute commitment to the way of love. Love is not emotional bash; it is not empty sentimentalism. It is the active outpouring of one’s whole being into the being of another.”
“I am convinced that even violent temperaments can be channeled through nonviolent discipline, if they can act constructively and express through an effective channel their very legitimate anger.”
Ah — there! How do WE learn to “act constructively and express through an effective channel” our “very legitimate anger”?
I think a lot of us are asking ourselves that lately. How can I express my anger about what is happening around me, but act constructively to make change?
I am not well-versed on the concept of nonviolence. I know Henry David Thoreau wrote about it in Civil Disobedience. I’ve read some of Krishnamurti’s writings on the topic, and I’ve heard of Mahatma Gandhi, Pope Francis, and Cesar Chavez. In the online exhibition “Women Champion Peace & Justice through Nonviolence,” you can learn about Lydia Maria Child, Dorothy Day, Dorothy Thompson, and other women leaders of nonviolent action.
According to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Research & Education Institute, King’s idea of nonviolence had six key principles:
First, one can resist evil without resorting to violence. Second, nonviolence seeks to win the “friendship and understanding” of the opponent, not to humiliate him. Third, evil itself, not the people committing evil acts, should be opposed. Fourth, those committed to nonviolence must be willing to suffer without retaliation as suffering itself can be redemptive. Fifth, nonviolent resistance avoids “external physical violence” and “internal violence of spirit” as well: “The nonviolent resister not only refuses to shoot his opponent but he also refuses to hate him.” The resister should be motivated by love in the sense of the Greek word agape, which means “understanding,” or “redeeming good will for all men.” The sixth principle is that the nonviolent resister must have a “deep faith in the future,” stemming from the conviction that “The universe is on the side of justice.”
If nonviolence is a way to lose this “internal violence of spirit” and find my way back to a “deep faith in the future,” …count me in!
Count me in because, to be honest, it has only been my considerations of nonviolence this week that started to make me feel like our story here isn’t finished, that despite all of the loud noise and chaos since the election, we can find a way to the other side of this…together.
❤️ With Love, Jen Payne
“64 Days to Live Nonviolence” SEASON FOR NONVIOLENCE
The Season for Nonviolence marks the 64 days between the anniversaries of the deaths of Mohandas Gandhi on January 30 and Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4. Cesar Chavez‘s birthday also falls within the Season on March 31. The Season for Nonviolence was co-founded by Arun and Sunanda Gandhi and the Leadership Council of The Association for Global New Thought (AGNT) in 1998.
To help you learn to practice nonviolence one step at a time, one choice at a time, one day at a time, the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence created a booklet called “64 Days to Live Nonviolence”
They explain:
Through our daily nonviolent choices and action, our noble and courageous spirits rise to move the world in the direction of peace. Wherever you are in your journey, we hope this booklet will support your growth and encourage you, reminding you that you are part of a worldwide community working for nonviolence and peace.
“They tried to bury us, but they didn’t know we were seeds.”
Yesterday, I had the privilege of attending the 40th annual MLK Breakfast, presented by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Heritage Foundation. It was a beautiful community event that included readings, music, and a presentation by Pulitzer Prize winning author Dr. Jeffrey C. Stewart who spoke about the history and importance of non-violence.
I went at the invitation of my friend Laura Noe, who has her finger on the pulse of activism in truly inspiring ways. She reads voraciously, volunteers liberally throughout town, and knows how to make good connections for others. She’s currently working towards her second Master’s Degree, in Public Health (her first was in Gender Studies), and she’s teaching two courses at Southern Connecticut State University this semester, Psychology of Women and Adolescent Development.
For several years, Laura has recommended I read the book Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, about the reciprocal relationships between humans and the land, with a focus on the role of plants and botany in both Native American and Western European traditions.
So yesterday afternoon, while the world around us marched to a seemingly different beat, I picked up my beautiful hardcover copy of Braiding Sweetgrass and began to read.
I suspect this was a divinely inspired moment — something somewhere knew it was exactly what I was supposed to be reading yesterday, the odd ironic day in 2025 when we simultaneously honored a great leader like Martin Luther King Jr. and inaugurated a demon and his minions.
I wanted to share with you this gorgeous passage from the new Introduction in the 2020 edition…it delivers, I think, beautiful blades of hope.
I began writing Braiding Sweetgrass in what seems, from this moment in the midst of a global pandemic and the upheavals it has generated, a more innocent time, when climate catastrophe was a hot glow on the horizon. We could smell smoke but our home was not yet engulfed in flames. There was guarded optimism for leadership on climate change and justice for land and people, human and otherwise.
A lot has happened since in climate urgency, with the political pain of vile Windigos come to office and all the wounds they have inflicted. I don’t need to say more. This evidence might suggest that the medicine of plant stories has not worked very well to heal our relationships with land and each other. The powerful purveyors of destruction are still in power, the skies darkening. But as always, I take my guidance from the forests, who teach us something about change. The forces of creation and destruction are so tightly linked that sometimes we can’t tell where one begins and the other leaves off. A long-lived overstory can dominate the forest for generations, setting the ecological conditions for its own thriving while suppressing others by exploiting all the resources with a self-serving dominance. But, all the while it sets the stage for what happens next and something always happens that is more powerful than that overstory: a fire, a windstorm, a disease. Eventually, the old forest is disrupted and replaced by the understory, by the buried seedbank that has been readying itself for this moment of transformation and renewal. A whole new ecosystem rises to replace that which no longer works in a changed world. Braiding Sweetgrass, I hope, is part of that understory, seeded by many thinkers and doers, filling the seedbank with diverse species, so that when the canopy falls, as it surely will, a new world is already rising. “New” and ancient, with its origins in the Indigenous worldview of right relation between land and people. What the “overstory” of colonialism tried to suppress is surging. It is the prophesied time of the Seventh Fire, a sacred time when the collective remembering transforms the world. A dark time and a time filled with light. We remember the oft-used words of resistance, “They tried to bury us, but they didn’t know we were seeds.”
Kimmerer, Robin Wall. Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants. United States: Milkweed Editions, 2020.
I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’ Gleams that untravell’d world whose margin fades For ever and forever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use! As tho’ to breathe were life! Life piled on life Were all too little, and of one to me Little remains: but every hour is saved From that eternal silence, something more, A bringer of new things…
We all have ghosts — those lingering memories that resurface when a song comes on, when a certain scent fills the air, or when we wander in our dreams. Those are the kinds of ghosts that appear in Sleeping with Ghosts — the memories of moments and people who have wandered into my own life, the lovers and soulmates and muses to whom the book is dedicated.
As I was gathering the poems for this book, I kept hearing the phrase “I am a part of all that I have met.” It’s a line from Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s poem “Ulysses,” in which the protagonist reflects on his life and sees the fabric that is woven between him and his experiences. That is the essence of Sleeping with Ghosts, we are all connected — by memory, by story, by experience. To emphasize that, readers will find common phrases, themes, and symbols repeated throughout the chapters and stories in the book — a weaving of love, hope, and loss. (Humor, too.)
In total, there are 14 chapters in the book, including seven primary ghosts about whom I’ve written most frequently. These are the stories that captured my attention (and my heart) and left a shadow of memory long enough for me to step into now and then, to revisit and repurpose them into poems. The seven ghosts include a first love, the last love, secret encounters, and those defining moments that come from living life with an open heart.
There are two chapters dedicated to my muses — the people who have inspired my life in a variety of ways, including life-long friends and cherished mentors — and a chapter that narrates the Ephemera of life’s encounters.
My favorite section of the book is called Dreamwork. It’s a collection of 12 poems presented like an inquiry or analysis with dated entries that note the particular ghosts as they reappear in dream form. These dream-ghosts are the wistful spirits of What If or Might Have Been, Ulysses’ “untravell’d world whose margin fades.” I truly believe that dreams offer all of us an opportunity to reconnect with our memories, heal old wounds, and reinterpret moments in new and helpful ways.
I hope this book, as a whole, offers readers a chance to see things in new ways. That in the shadowy corners of their own memories, they might conjure up the “something more, A bringer of new things…” for themselves.
Remember, we all have ghosts. Give them a direct line to your Muse, and you never know what will happen!
“Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction. So when Jesus says “Love your enemies,” he is setting forth a profound and ultimately inescapable admonition. Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies — or else? The chain reaction of evil — hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars — must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.”
The physical therapist shows me exercises, but I tell her I am Stretched Too Thin ENOUGH ALREADY! So she digs into the mechanics of my Bracing for the Worst and attempts to allay the places where I am Holding on for Dear Life — god bless their white-knuckle grip and control efforts — INCOMING! My shoulders, for example, find comfort near my ears these days perhaps to hear which of the Invading Forces will surge today, while my back has decided it — and it alone — will hold me upright and steady so as not to fall headfirst into the Thick of It All; apparently my glutes are sitting this one out, and lord knows my knees won’t hold us up — they’ve just about given up or out, having carried the burden of this ALL OF THIS for way too long; even the feet are fed up FUCK YOU! says my big toe, the Last Line of Defense; the only Saving Grace these days is way up at the top where words and ideas and creative Escape Routes are lighting up the sky!
There’s a man in a red hat walking across the pond on this chilly January day in 2025. I consider stopping to explain the precariousness of his position, except that I am familiar with this man. And I know my concern will be met with cold and bitter defense. He might walk farther out on the ice to prove his point. Indeed, he might even walk right to the thinnest spot and give a little jump. So I laugh out loud, remind myself that nothing can save him now — neither his capacity nor his god — and I head for the safety of home where I wouldn’t dare jump these days. Safe is all but an illusion now, and I haven’t the arrogance to pretend otherwise.
Wolf Moon’s final moments illuminate the scar on the maple where last year, the storm tore a limb and crashed it to the ground, so in its place this morning a glowing pale shadow like an owl or specter, a No-Face in meditation over the yard; house eves cast a great horned shadow against the frosted grass and somewhere near somewhere unseen something stalks in quiet enough to hear its hunter’s walk, follow its course in the deepest dark of fallen leaves; the fog is thick with wood smoke and salt brine and catches in it a car’s whine screech scream like a banshee now as it rounds the bend closest to the house; an omen that soon the long tall branches will silhouette like weathered hands into the paling sky and the day-monsters will again grab tight to the day.
My mother, who is easily insulted, often remembers the time a therapist called her a storyteller. Mom recounts the comment as one might an injustice, and she twists and elongates the word “storyteller” to make it sound as painful as it felt for her.
What’s the old saying? The truth hurts.
That’s the funny thing about my mother’s story — she IS a storyteller. Long before neurodivergent was a word, my mother was making her way through life with the only tools she had, and one of those was storytelling. Often and on repeat. It’s how she relates to the world and people around her.
I have a friend whose mother was also a storyteller. She had a degree in drama, was in numerous theatrical productions, taught children how to act and perform, and went on to start a successful annual storytelling festival. She also found connection in telling stories.
The act of storytelling is as diverse as these two examples and includes four primary forms: oral, visual, written, and digital. Within each of those forms, there are a myriad of vehicles: books and magazines, visual arts, stage, radio, film, television, video, internet.
Consider all of the ways storytelling comes into your own life! It’s part of the fabric of who we are. Think about it! What would we be without our fairytales, folktales, fables, religions, and mythologies? We are built on story!
And quite literally. This is what social scientist Brené Brown, says about storytelling in her book Rising Strong: How the Ability to Reset Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead.
“We are wired for story. In a culture of scarcity and perfectionism, there’s a surprisingly simple reason we want to own, integrate, and share our stories….We do this because we feel the most alive when we’re connecting with others and being brave with our stories — it’s in our biology. The idea of storytelling has become ubiquitous. It’s a platform for everything from creative movements to marketing strategies. But the idea that we’re “wired for story” is more than a catchy phrase. Neuroeconomist Paul Zack has found that hearing a story — a narrative with a beginning, middle, and end — causes our brains to release cortisol and oxytocin. These chemicals trigger the uniquely human ability to connect, empathize, and make meaning. Story is literally in our DNA.”
Like my mother, I’m also a storyteller. I frequently use analogy and story not only to talk about my own experiences, but to say, “I understand yours, too. Let’s talk about it.” It was Brené Brown who gave me the courage to tell those stories on paper, and who inspired several of my books, including my new collection of poems, Sleeping with Ghosts.
That book, Rising Strong, still sits on my coffee table — dogeared and well-worn — as a reminder to be brave, to show up, and to keep telling my stories. The book ends with her “Manifesto of the Brave and Brokenhearted,” which I’ll share with you here as inspiration for you to tell your own stories because what you have to say — no matter how you say it — is important!
Photo by Kool Shooters/Pexels.Brown, Brené. Rising Strong: How the Ability to Reset Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead. United States: Random House Publishing Group, 2017.
“You Are Here” is the reassuring little icon on a trail map that gives you your bearings, lets you know, in the grand scheme of things Where. You. Are. It’s often the first thing you see when you start out on an adventure somewhere. These days, with things so frighteningly askew, it’s good to have a sense of where you are in that grand scheme. And there is nothing better to make you feel a little more grounded, a little more connected to the bigger picture, than a walk in the woods!
Join me for a walk at one of my favorite places to unwind, regroup, and find inspiration.
INGREDIENTS: collage, color scans, digital art, ephemera, essays, original photographs, poetry, quotes, vintage artwork. With thanks to GIS Specialist Nicole Castro, Erwin Raisz, Ted Andrews, Hans Christian Anderson; Joseph Smith, William Curtis and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Jamie Sams and David Carson, Henry David Thoreau.
Full Color 11×17 folded map with way too many inserts and a curated video playlist. Cost: $8.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
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