Writing the truth

Recently, there was a National Poetry Day competition with the theme of 'Truth'. Annoyingly, I've just written a poem about truth, too late to send in. But truth remains a weird thing to write poems about. What's the difference between truth/authenticity/sincerity/universality...? Can something in a poem ever be absolutely true?

A few months ago I wrote a poem that I did actually manage to submit somewhere. It was for the Places of Poetry project, where anyone could pin a poem about a place on a digital map of England and Wales. Check it out here https://www.placesofpoetry.org.uk/

My poem, pinned to Seaham on the coast of County Durham, was called Sea Glass. Here it is:

Sea Glass

We ate our sandwiches on the grass

up by the Seaham coastal path

backs to the carpark, wave watching

over the cliffs as the tide splashed in.

Then, down the concrete steps,

nettles reaching for our fingertips,

across the line of sea-turned stones

to the surging water’s edge beyond.

We picked up sea glass from the sand,

frosted white, green, honey-amber,

one small speck of electric blue,

one with rusted wire running through.

We stepped, scanning the length of shore,

and carried home a treasure hoard.

This poem has bothered me a bit with questions about truth. Although the description is literally 'true' - there are concrete steps edged by stinging nettles going down to the beach at Seaham - for me, this poem doesn't communicate the reality of the experience. It is devoid of emotive language, which was perhaps my way of dealing with what had been a difficult day struggling with depression and anxiety. The trip to the beach, at my husband's suggestion, was a welcome break from the darkness I had been inflicting on the family, and turned a bleak day into a happy memory. My poem doesn't really communicate any of this. So today I tried again, drafting a poem called 'The Truth about Sea Glass'. I'm not sure if it's finished yet, and if I do get it to a refined state, I may want to submit it somewhere else, which means I can't post it here (a sad truth about submitting poems for publication). The new one doesn't really rhyme or have a set metrical form (which may make it technically worse?) But, I already like it more, though, perhaps because it seems more 'true'.

The problem of pre-emptive grief

Back when I was still working towards an academic career, my research was beginning to look at particular sub-categories of grief. My postgraduate studies of the elegy, the genre of poetry which mourns a death, were getting refined to include new definitions of grief. This included, in the language of psychiatry, disenfranchised grief. Disenfranchised grief is an umbrella term which covers things like the loss of a pet, the loss of a secret lover, the loss caused by divorce, and many other instances in which the grief suffered might in some ways be seen as ‘taboo’. Or at least, less of an obvious loss than losing a loved person to death. Actually, the example that Freud uses in his work ‘Mourning and Melancholia’, upon which most of the literary theory about elegy has traditionally been based, is that of a jilted bride, which is clearly not a grief caused by death.

An area of disenfranchised grief that I had started to write about was that of anticipatory, or pre-emptive, grief. The grieving that occurs before a tangible, final loss has taken place. The example that I had been working on was the grief connected with dementia. This became more personal to me as I watched both sets of my grandparents, together with my parents, live through this pre-emptive grief; my Grandpa suffering from Alzheimer’s for the final years of his life, and my Grandad succumbing to vascular dementia.

I have been wanting to write poems about my own parents. However, I am finding it hard to begin. One big reason, currently, is that my Dad was recently diagnosed with cancer. It has since been treated with surgery and we await results from that. It turns out that pre-emptive grief is a real phenomenon. It is further nuanced for me because my Dad’s type of cancer is likely to be fully treatable. So there is much hope for recovery. But, there’s still a kind of grief.

From a writing point of view, this is quite hard to process. Any poem written now would feel like an elegy, which I feel reluctant to write. Yet, perhaps all poems about the people we love are elegies in some way – they memorialise that person whether they are still with us or not. Perhaps there is something slightly superstitious in not wanting to mourn for someone while they are still alive and (relatively) well. But then, we often regret that the nicest things said about people are usually at their funerals. Can I re-imagine this problem of writing pre-emptive grief, and consider it as a celebration of life and hope? Might the attempt to do this actually help to generate hope, in myself and others? I hope so.

Morning Meditation

The more serious blog material is still lodged away somewhere in my brain like mental constipation.

So, here is a silly thing from a time when the two minutes that I spent brushing my teeth felt like the only time I ever got to be in a room by myself (on a good day). It's also partly a 'found' poem, as half the lines are taken from a bottle of mouthwash. Found poems are sometimes in danger of being a bit pretentious...

Morning Meditation

Apply toothpaste. Switch on.

Upper left quadrant, thirty seconds.

Macrogoglycerol Hydroxysterate, Sorbitol, Peppermint oil and Water.

Upper right, thirty seconds.

Macrogoglycerol Hydroxystearate may cause skin reactions.

Lower right, thirty seconds.

KEEP OUT OF THE REACH AND SIGHT OF CHILDREN.

Lower left, thirty seconds.

If no improvement after two weeks, please see your doctor.

Toothbrush shudders to a stop.

Somewhere a child is crying.

Toddlerchef

Here's something that got rejected from a food-themed competition last year. 

Toddlerchef

Here’s a cooking show I’d watch on TV:

the judges are aged between two and three –

grown-up food critics are far too easy.

They will eat things like bone-marrow, offal,

steak tartare, frog’s legs, snails, or steamed mussels,

mushroom ketchup, sea-weed, skin, and truffle…

The toddlers are a formidable bunch:

inscrutable, as you bring them their lunch;

fastidious about what they will munch.

Contestant one. Your meal is rejected.

We’re sorry, but we see you’ve neglected

the memo re: greens – the plate’s infected!

Contestant two. You’ve fallen down on sauce.

This meal needs deconstructing, a divorce

between the pasta and red stuff, of course.

Contestant three. Now, this is hard to say.

While we like everything you’ve made today,

you didn’t slice the same way as yesterday.

Those gallant souls who make toddler dinners

that meet with approval are true winners.

All other chefs are simply beginners.

My First ABC of Parenting

I returned to something I wrote nearly two years ago. Some things remain true. Some, thankfully, are less pertinent. Some have been replaced by exciting new worries...

My First ABC of Parenting

A is for anxiety, allergies, and anxiety about allergies.

B is for bath-and-bedtime, breastfeeding, babysitters and bribery (see also “s” for snacks).

C is for cake (allergen-free), CBeebies, Calpol and carseats.

D is for “Don’t lick the radiator/window/fence!”, “Don’t ride the baby!” Also, doctors’ waiting rooms and Disney (see also “f” for films).

E is for eating the children’s selection boxes/Easter eggs. How long can this go on for?

F is for films. And failure.

G is for Grandparents.

H is for how long does it take a two year old to put on gloves/shoes/come down the stairs when you’re late for nursery?

I is for immunisations.

J is for JOY.

K is for kisses that involve more teeth and saliva than you had ever previously experienced.

L is for love that is wilder, more overwhelming, exhausting and terrifying than you had ever imagined. Also, laughter. Also, labour.

M is for missing them when they are asleep.

N is for naptime. And nappies. Nappies. Nappies.

O is for other parents. And opinions. Other parents’ opinions. Opinions about other parents. Also, the discovery that small people also have opinions, in abundance, from a very early age.

P is for pasta. Also potty training, and parent-and-child parking spaces.

Q is for questions. One of the best things about two year olds. One of the worst things about health visitors.

R is for risk assessments. You have just become your own health and safety officer.

S is for snacks (your new magic word). Also, sitting in the car on the driveway/in a KFC carpark/during church because they fell asleep 30 seconds before you switched the engine off.

T is for TV boxsets, binge-watching of; trying not to stand on the squeaky floorboards; trying to fit two toddlers into a supermarket trolley. And terror.

U is for university fees. Do we start saving now?

V is for vomit.

W is for WHAT are you doing? WHERE do you think you’re putting that? WHY? Also, Wotsits.

X is for x-rays, because A & E is the most fun place to be with a toddler on a Friday night.

Z is for zebra, because it’s important that pre-schoolers living in the North of England can correctly identify their African wild animals.

Deferrals

[A foreword... Ironically, ha ha, I have deferred posting this for a week. The process of writing it, which was made possible mostly because of the support of some good friends, was therapeutic. So much so, that the next day my feelings were so far away from those described here that it felt a bit embarrassing and over-dramatic to publish this. However, I am determined to keep writing and posting, and trying to be honest. So here it is...]

“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.” Proverbs 13:12.

“The process of doing a PhD and becoming an early career academic operates through a model of delayed gratification. It demands that you work extremely hard (research, teach, network, publish) and implies acceptance into the academic fold, esteem, and a lecturer’s salary as your reward. Leaving the sector meant coming to terms with the reality of a broken social contract which meant none of those things would be forthcoming for me.” Catherine Oakley, “How I left academia: An honest look at the challenges and benefits of leaving UK academia with a Humanities PhD, one year on.”  see article here

After a year of blogger’s block, I am stirring myself to return to writing.  This blog, and writing in general, has been deferred for many reasons in the past year. Some practical ones, like it’s been busy selling and buying houses, overseeing building work, decorating rooms… sometimes writing time has had to make way for the general duties of life: laundry, cleaning, child-related tasks… But, other people have these things in their lives, and still write. The major reason for my silence has been what the writer of Proverbs might have called heart sickness. Others might call it depression.

The root of this is probably my life-long tendency towards deferred gratification. I have always operated on the basis of ‘if I can just get through this, then it will be better’. This, as Catherine Oakley has recently pointed out, is actually the premise that most of our education system is based on, particularly at postgraduate level, and even more specifically, within the academic career trajectory. And when the promised academic career doesn’t happen, you find that you have done all of the deferring, but got none of the gratification. Instead, you get a gaping void where your aspirations had been, and a full-blown identity crisis.

This is not the only area of my life in which I have been deferring joy. It comes naturally to me. As a child, I was the one who would save up sweets in a box under my bed, while my brother devoured his the moment he got them. The knowledge that I had something to enjoy later was almost more gratifying than actually eating them. I deferred my entry to university, not because I had any gap-year plans, but just because deferring seemed like the thing to do. And in a sense, I was proved right. I had such a miserable year before university, which included a broken engagement and working 9-5 for the council, that the first year of my degree was a blissful time. So, this tendency to defer became a defining characteristic of my adult life.

My experience of parenthood is also in danger of going down this route. When you have a new-born baby, it’s easy to think, ‘This will be great… when we finally get some sleep/when we get feeding sorted/when we establish a routine/when we get our evenings back…’ This can become a habit. Over the last four and a half years I have continually found myself waiting for the next stage (particularly when it comes to finding space and time for myself, and for writing). I begin to believe that life will be easier when the kids can walk/talk/don’t need naps/go to nursery; that if I give all of myself at this point to being a mother, wife, household manager, I will eventually earn the right to be anything other than that (a writer, a poet, a voice that reaches beyond the four walls of my home). Now that the eldest child is preparing to start school, I need to face up to the reality that there will always be reasons to defer the things that I want to do for myself. Not all of these are good reasons. And endlessly deferring my own life makes me heart-sick, taking the joy out of everything, including my family. I want this to end. I want to bring joy to my children and husband, and to relish and treasure the joy that they are to me. I need to stop deferring my dreams.

Although this might not sound as inspirational as that last sentence, I need other people to help me do this. If it takes a village to raise a child, it certainly takes community to nurture creativity. If anyone reads this, please talk to me about what I'm writing, ask me for a poem, share your writing with me, tell me what you're reading, let me know where you find joy, or when you're in need of some encouragement.

The pain of requited love?

I am daily aware of, and hugely grateful for, the immense amount of privilege that I enjoy.

One of these huge joys is that I am loved by the people that I love most.  I endeavour not to take this for granted or to treat this gift too lightly.

Many of my early attempts at writing poetry, as a younger person, were based on experiences of unrequited love, or heartbreak, or mortifying misunderstandings. I have no doubt that the writing produced was not very accomplished. I have very little desire to trawl through old word documents to attempt to find any examples. Yet, at that time, I felt extremely motivated to express my feelings in poems.

In my current phase of life, I am searching for ways to write meaningfully about the relationships that I have with the people I love. One slightly paralysing consideration is that these people will probably read what I write – not usually a problem when writing about an ex, or about someone who doesn’t even know you exist. This was one factor that delayed my writing about my Grandad’s death. My Grandma might read it, my parents, my aunt: people who knew and loved him longer and better than me. I am still holding back on either writing or sharing elegies about other relatives and friends for the same reason. This is also why I struggle to write poems about, or for, my husband. This is why I worry about writing in too much detail about giving birth to my sons, or the subsequent experience of parenting them.

If I write too specifically about loved ones, especially in a ‘warts ‘n’ all’ fashion, am I betraying their trust? If I use my children’s names, is that a data protection issue? How do I avoid the ‘miserable mum’ genre without glossing over the fact that motherhood is the hardest thing I’ve experienced?

There are many people who have managed to do this very well. Carolyn Jess-Cooke’s poems about motherhood, for example. Ciaran Carson writing about his wife’s serious illness in his recent work. Writing about more mature relationships is the next step in my poetic development.