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***This is the ninety-sixth in a never-ending series
called BACKSTORY OF THE POEM where the Chris Rice Cooper Blog (CRC)
focuses on one specific poem and how the poet wrote that specific poem.
All BACKSTORY OF THE POEM links are at the end of this piece.
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permission by Mary Ellen Lough for this CRC Blog Post Only unless otherwise
noted.
Strawberries Have Been
Growing Here for Hundreds of Years
By Mary Ellen Lough
Can you
go through the step-by-step process of writing this poem from the moment the
idea was first conceived in your brain until final form? The poem began as a
feeling, an atmosphere, I would say. It was writing itself throughout the
evening which is described in the poem. I had a few phrases that were repeating
themselves in my mind, so I excused myself from the dinner party and went out
to the car and found a scrap of paper to jot some notes down. During the next
day or two, I began to work with the notes to create a draft - fleshing out
more of a narrative. Then I let it sit for a while.
I had taken a semester off
school because I had a baby, and when I went back for winter session, I brought
the poem in to be workshopped. It seemed however that the language was kind of
congested and far out and the images did not create the experience for the
reader that I has hoped it would. My readers suggested that I simplify the
narrative and just say exactly what happened. So I did. And the poem then was
like, presentable. But I also felt it was no longer moist and heavy and ripe -
the way I had wanted it to feel, because that was the primary feeling of the
last month of pregnancy and that evening, which was the poem. So the poem had
become a dry husk to me and I wasn’t sure what next. (Above Left: Mary Ellen Lough with her baby girl Elora in May 2013)
Where
were you when you started to actually write the poem? And please describe the place in great detail. I was at a friend’s
farm. I live in the mountains of southern Appalachia and my friends, Daniel and
Veronica (Below) were leasing a plot of land and Veronica was trying to make a go as an
organic farmer delivering CSA boxes. She had been living in a very tiny camper
for the first year on the land, and that summer had decided to move into the
partially enclosed barn.
This lovely table set out in
the grasses with fresh flowers and linen and homemade bread. They had cooked a
big pot of collards from the garden, and we had brought a bottle of wine. And
we wanted to walk while the sun was still out. We passed the fields where she was
growing her crops, the soil was somewhat dry and caked, and her vegetables I
remember were very tiny.
Except the strawberries. There was maybe one or two
long rows of ripe, plump strawberries that were just heavenly to eat. My
partner at the time was an herbalist with a passion for wild foods, so he was
also pointing out wild herbs and edibles on the walk which we would stop and
sample. When the feeling became all too much, I kind of held back from the
group because it was not just the baby I was feeling, but the poem ripening
inside me, and I needed space for that.
Later, by the time I made it out to the car to write down my thoughts, it
was already pretty dark and dusky and I wrote by the light of that little
interior car light in my old grey mini-van that had maybe been clean for about
four days out of seven years of ownership. (Right: Mary Ellen Lough's writing space today in her Southern Appalachia Farmhouse)
How
many drafts of this poem did you write before going to the final? (And can you
share a photograph of your rough drafts with pen markings on it? Oh gosh. Probably at
least a dozen. I wish I still had the original notes I wrote down in the van.
That would be cool. But I’m way not organized enough for that.
And so close to the
baby’s arrival and so consumed
by sun and tiredness, I
was blinded by my own arrival,
like religion before it
has spoken a word, when
sight is the blindness
of being first-born. It seemed
I had found a place my
grandparents had
found before me. I could
hear their voices surrounding
the bed where I was
born, when I was first new.
Faces turned toward me
as if I were the sun
of a new-found world: as
if that day were now,
and we were new-found
and blinded by our own arrival.
I found John standing in
the tall grass and we fell into the field,
splintered by the
brilliance of a hundred tiny suns
and the world was no
longer tired.
Which
part of the poem was the most emotional of you to write and why? It’s really the
ending. The moment I came out of the woods alone and topped the hill and the
sun was just so brilliant and it was this wide meadow at the top of the hill
with tall grass, and the sun was disappearing everything. I’ve honestly never
experienced something like it before. It had that Lion King-esque moment -
where you are presenting yourself, this new life to the gods.
Strawberries Have Been
Growing Here for Hundreds of Years
It was during the last
days of pregnancy,
we went to dinner at a
friend’s farm.
Linen, bread, collards
and wine
were on the table beside
the barn.
John said, let’s walk
before we eat
and we set off for the
path, picking
strawberries and wild
mint.
We had entered the cool
shade of woods,
and while climbing the
last hill, I found myself
feeling distant to the
world, and stumbling
over a root, I stopped
while the others went ahead.
I wanted to be alone
with an atmosphere
inside me, ripening as
if it were not just the baby
but the Kentucky farm
where I was born
pressing against my
veins - memories,
stored in a blood I now
shared,
requesting tendon,
berth, bloom.
The woods were thinning
out
like a veil between
worlds and I could sense
my grandparents near,
who had passed long before,
as if this moment were a talisman
lifting itself out of
centuries of their dreaming,
As if I were not alone, but rather
an unfolding archive of
former worlds
and a hundred preliminary suns.
Behind the hill, the sun
of now was setting
and I walked out into
the meadow
and it was blinding
and I felt myself
disappearing into it.
I could just make out
John’s silhouette
standing in the field,
like the observer which
occults the sun,
as if he were always a distance I couldn’t
reach
even if I wanted
to. Even if I found him there
and we laid down in the
tall grass together.
Mary Ellen Lough is a poet, teacher,
community organizer, and single mother living in an old farmhouse with her five
children nestled into a valley in Southern Appalachia. She hosts the Farmhouse Poetry series there,
offering eclectic classes on poetry, creative writing, depth psychology and
dreamwork.
She works for the Asheville Area Arts Council to teach poetry to veterans with trauma, as well as travels around the country teaching poetry as a path of soul recovery and wholeness, as a form of community and lifting up marginalized voices. She trained with The Institute for Poetic Medicine and has two books forthcoming in 2020.
She works for the Asheville Area Arts Council to teach poetry to veterans with trauma, as well as travels around the country teaching poetry as a path of soul recovery and wholeness, as a form of community and lifting up marginalized voices. She trained with The Institute for Poetic Medicine and has two books forthcoming in 2020.
motherskylark@gmail.com
BACKSTORY OF THE POEM
LINKS
001 December 29, 2017
Margo
Berdeshevksy’s “12-24”
002 January 08, 2018
Alexis
Rhone Fancher’s “82 Miles From the Beach, We Order The Lobster At Clear Lake
Café”
003 January 12, 2018
Barbara
Crooker’s “Orange”
004 January 22, 2018
Sonia
Saikaley’s “Modern Matsushima”
005 January 29, 2018
Ellen
Foos’s “Side Yard”
006 February 03, 2018
Susan
Sundwall’s “The Ringmaster”
007 February 09, 2018
Leslea
Newman’s “That Night”
008 February 17, 2018
Alexis
Rhone Fancher “June Fairchild Isn’t Dead”
009 February 24, 2018
Charles
Clifford Brooks III “The Gift of the Year With Granny”
010 March 03, 2018
Scott
Thomas Outlar’s “The Natural Reflection of Your Palms”
011 March 10, 2018
Anya
Francesca Jenkins’s “After Diane Beatty’s Photograph “History Abandoned”
012 March 17, 2018
Angela
Narciso Torres’s “What I Learned This Week”
013 March 24, 2018
Jan
Steckel’s “Holiday On ICE”
014 March 31, 2018
Ibrahim
Honjo’s “Colors”
015 April 14, 2018
Marilyn
Kallett’s “Ode to Disappointment”
016 April 27, 2018
Beth
Copeland’s “Reliquary”
017 May 12, 2018
Marlon
L Fick’s “The Swallows of Barcelona”
018 May 25, 2018
Juliet
Cook’s “ARTERIAL DISCOMBOBULATION”
019 June 09, 2018
Alexis
Rhone Fancher’s “Stiletto Killer. . . A Surmise”
020 June 16, 2018
Charles
Rammelkamp’s “At Last I Can Start Suffering”
021 July 05, 2018
Marla
Shaw O’Neill’s “Wind Chimes”
022 July 13, 2018
Julia Gordon-Bramer’s
“Studying Ariel”
023 July 20, 2018
Bill Yarrow’s “Jesus
Zombie”
024 July 27, 2018
Telaina Eriksen’s “Brag
2016”
025 August 01, 2018
Seth Berg’s “It is only
Yourself that Bends – so Wake up!”
026 August 07, 2018
David Herrle’s “Devil In
the Details”
027 August 13, 2018
Gloria Mindock’s “Carmen
Polo, Lady Necklaces, 2017”
028 August 21, 2018
Connie Post’s “Two
Deaths”
029 August 30, 2018
Mary Harwell Sayler’s
“Faces in a Crowd”
030 September 16, 2018
Larry Jaffe’s “The
Risking Point”
031 September 24,
2018
Mark Lee Webb’s “After
We Drove”
032 October 04, 2018
Melissa Studdard’s
“Astral”
033 October 13, 2018
Robert Craven’s “I Have
A Bass Guitar Called Vanessa”
034 October 17, 2018
David Sullivan’s “Paper Mache
Peaches of Heaven”
035 October 23, 2018
Timothy Gager’s
“Sobriety”
036 October 30, 2018
Gary Glauber’s “The
Second Breakfast”
037 November 04, 2018
Heather Forbes-McKeon’s
“Melania’s Deaf Tone Jacket”
038 November 11, 2018
Andrena Zawinski’s
“Women of the Fields”
039 November 00, 2018
Gordon Hilger’s “Poe”
040 November 16, 2018
Rita Quillen’s “My
Children Question Me About Poetry” and “Deathbed Dreams”
041 November 20, 2018
Jonathan Kevin Rice’s
“Dog Sitting”
042 November 22, 2018
Haroldo Barbosa Filho’s
“Mountain”
043 November 27, 2018
Megan Merchant’s “Grief Flowers”
044 November 30, 2018
Jonathan P Taylor’s
“This poem is too neat”
045 December 03, 2018
Ian Haight’s “Sungmyo
for our Dead Father-in-Law”
046 December 06, 2018
Nancy Dafoe’s “Poem in
the Throat”
047 December 11, 2018
Jeffrey Pearson’s “Memorial
Day”
048 December 14, 2018
Frank Paino’s “Laika”
049 December 15, 2018
Jennifer Martelli’s
“Anniversary”
O50 December 19, 2018
Joseph Ross’s “For Gilberto Ramos, 15, Who Died in
the Texas Desert, June 2014”
051 December 23, 2018
“The Persistence of
Music”
by Anatoly Molotkov
052 December 27, 2018
“Under Surveillance”
by Michael Farry
053 December 28, 2018
“Grand Finale”
by Renuka Raghavan
054 December 29, 2018
“Aftermath”
by Gene Barry
055 January 2, 2019
“&”
by Larissa Shmailo
056 January 7, 2019
“The Seamstress:
by Len Kuntz
057 January 10, 2019
"Natural History"
by Camille T Dungy
058 January 11, 2019
“BLOCKADE”
by Brian Burmeister
059 January 12, 2019
“Lost”
by Clint Margrave
060 January 14, 2019
“Menopause”
by Pat Durmon
061 January 19, 2019
“Neptune’s Choir”
by Linda Imbler
062 January 22, 2019
“Views From the
Driveway”
by Amy Barone
063 January 25, 2019
“The heron leaves her
haunts in the marsh”
by Gail Wronsky
064 January 30, 2019
“Shiprock”
by Terry Lucas
065 February 02, 2019
“Summer 1970, The
University of Virginia Opens to Women in the Fall”
by Alarie Tennille
066 February 05, 2019
“At School They Learn
Nouns”
by Patrick Bizzaro
067 February 06, 2019
“I Must Not Breathe”
by Angela Jackson-Brown
068 February 11, 2019
“Lunch on City Island,
Early June”
by Christine Potter
069 February 12, 2019
“Singing”
by Andrew McFadyen-Ketchum
070 February 14, 2019
“Daily Commute”
by Christopher P. Locke
071 February 18, 2019
“How Silent The Trees”
by Wyn Cooper
072 February 20, 2019
“A New Psalm
of Montreal”
by Sheenagh Pugh
073 February 23, 2019
“Make Me A
Butterfly”
by Amy Barbera
074 February 26, 2019
“Anthem”
by Sandy Coomer
075 March 4, 2019
“Shape of a Violin”
by Kelly Powell
076 March 5, 2019
“Inward Oracle”
by J.P. Dancing Bear
077 March 7, 2019
“I Broke
My Bust Of Jesus”
by Susan Sundwall
078 March 9, 2019
“My Mother
at 19”
by John Guzlowski
079 March 10, 2019
“Paddling”
by Chera Hammons Miller
080 March 12, 2019
“Of Water
and Echo”
by Gillian Cummings
081 082
083 March 14, 2019
“Little
Political Sense” “Crossing Kansas with
Jim
Morrison” “The Land of Sky and Blue Waters”
by Dr. Lindsey
Martin-Bowen
084 March 15, 2019
“A Tune To
Remember”
by Anna Evans
085 March 19, 2019
“At the
End of Time (Wish You Were Here)
by Jeannine Hall Gailey
086 March 20, 2019
“Garden of
Gethsemane”
by Marletta Hemphill
087 March 21, 2019
“Letters
From a War”
by Chelsea Dingman
088 March 26, 2019
“HAT”
by Bob Heman
089 March 27, 2019
“Clay for
the Potter”
by Belinda Bourgeois
#090 March 30, 2019
“The Pose”
by John Hicks
#091 April 2, 2019
“Last
Night at the Wursthaus”
by Doug Holder
#092 April 4, 2019
“Original
Sin”
by Diane Lockward
#093 April 5, 2019
“A Father
Calls to his child on liveleak”
by Stephen Byrne
#094 April 8, 2019
“XX”
by Marc Zegans
#095 April 12, 2019
“Landscape
and Still Life”
by Marjorie Maddox
#096 April 16, 2019
“Strawberries
Have Been Growing Here for Hundreds of
Years”
by Mary Ellen Lough
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/096-backstory-of-poem-strawberries-have.html
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2019/04/096-backstory-of-poem-strawberries-have.html
