"The Taste of River Water" by Cate Kennedy

In my poetry class, we often come back to the question of what we think a poem should or could do. There are lots of answers, but one of my favourites is that a poem can show you something that you thought you knew about in a different and/or surprising way. To me, this is what Cate's poems do. While some might say they are too "prosey" or dwell too much on the ordinary, this is what gives her images such power. She sets the scene and then stuns the reader with imagery that you can see and feel and, at times, smell and touch.

Many of her poems, in fact, feel like narratives. When did we last read good narrative poetry? Some of Les Murray's do this, but many other Australian poets focus more on lyrical imagery and small moments in a landscape. Behind Cate's poems sit whole histories and what we see are not just glimpses but the bones of the stories within. She allows the reader to fill in the gaps, which is also what I think good poems do.

Not all of the poems are like narratives. Any collection benefits from variety, but I think what also underpins this one is a real sense of place. Some of you would be familiar with her poem, "8x10 colour enlargements $16.50" which tells of a farmer's wife, a talented amateur photographer, who enters a competition. The reader is invited into the poem: "Let me lay it out for you". We are in the local town hall with the poet, observing, commenting on the winning photo: "a massive sunset shot, the colours juiced with Photoshop" and the farmer's wife who said so little about the injustice that the poet felt compelled to show us what happened.

The collection is book-ended by two poems about writing poetry, an interesting touch given that I've heard Cate talk about her short stories and how often she tries to begin and end a story with images that mirror or connect in some way. As I said, I think this is where the strength of the poems lies, in the way an image will reach out from the page and hit you, make you pay closer attention to what is being created for you. For example, in "Windburn" after a day at the beach:

this rim of salt on my forearm
like unnoticed, evaporated tears,
as if I've spent today silent, unconsolable,
weeping into the crook of my elbow

My favourite poem in the collection is "Temporality". We don't need to know exactly what building this is, just that it's one with a secret history that the average museum visitor might well miss unless they looked more closely and used their imagination. This history is of ordinary working men, and the details tell us much more than you expect:

This four-inch nail banged in beside them to hold invoices
that they always meant to replace with a decent hook or clip;
see how it's holding fast
long after they have gone,
see how they were wrong
about what was temporary.

I could go on about this book of poetry all day, but I won't. However, I will recommend it very highly as one you should add to your bookshelf.
By the way, The Taste of River Water recently won the Victorian Premier's Award for Poetry.

Whose Fault Is It If I Don't Understand?

Two writer friends raised the same issue today, and both were talking about poetry. What do we do when we read a poem that we don't understand? Is it our fault, or the poet's? This question often comes up when talking about the poem published in our Saturday newspaper here in Melbourne, The Age. Most readers and writers of poetry that I know just shake their heads each week. What am I supposed to get from this poem? they ask. I don't understand it, no matter how many times I read it. Am I dumb?

I'm teaching poetry again this year, after a long break, and I think it's a good issue to raise. Sometimes in workshopping I've had a student who insisted that if the others didn't understand the poem, that's just too bad. No changes, no compromises. But at the point at which you put a poem out to the world, or even just one reader, isn't what you are hoping for is communication? Surely as soon as you want or ask for a reader, you are trying to show or tell them something.

In class, we've been reading some of Ted Kooser's book, The Poetry Home Repair Manual, and discussing the points he makes. One is: If a poem doesn't make sense to anyone but its author, nobody but its author will care a whit about it. He also says: I favor poems that keep the obstacles between you and that person [your reader] to a minimum. I agree, and I think some poets are deliberately obscure, and deliberately use language that creates obstacles. Does this mean they don't care about their readers?

Kooser suggests that some poets write difficult poems because they think that's the way to be a poet, and that in some circles, writing poems that are accessible is sneered at. But he agrees that many people give up on poetry because they think it's too much like hard work, in the same way that readers stop reading literary fiction because, at the end of a long working day, they don't want to be challenged, they want to escape. A difficult poem will require you to think, to ponder, and to puzzle (and sometimes to look words up). A deliberately obscure poem, however, won't even let you close enough to read it with a basic level of comprehension.

The reason poetry teachers use Kooser's and Billy Collins' poems so often in the classroom is because they are wonderful examples of how to write something that's both accessible on a first reading and also offers deeper levels if you want to dive in. Ultimately, once a poem is out there, whoever reads it will take from it what they want. They will interpret it in their own way, from their own experiences, and create their own meanings.

As a poet, I want to open the door for the reader, not slam it shut in their face. I hope that my verse novels will cause a child to welcome poetry in the future rather than grimace whenever it's mentioned! (I've seen that awful expression many times!) But I also, as a writer, want to challenge myself. I don't want to write poems that are easy for me. I want to experiment and explore, swoop and dive into language and imagery. But still, ultimately, to remember the person on the other side of the door.

Diving Into Poetry

This week, I've dived head-first into poetry. I'm not sure why this happens, but it kind of creeps up on me. First I read some poems (these were ones I wanted to use in my mythology class), then I wrote a couple, then I wrote more for my new verse novel, then my book order arrived, which included four books of poetry. Somehow, when my fingers did the ordering online, they clicked on books of poems and verse novels. Now I'm fully indulging! And remembering all the things I love about poetry, what each poem creates as I read it, and how often something in a poem will spark an idea and off I go to write.

Of course, the book I grabbed first was Ballistics. This is Billy Collins' new collection, and as the very first poem is about Paris, I had to stop and re-read it. Having heard recordings of him reading quite a few times, now whenever I read one of his poems, it's as if I can hear his voice. Weird, but good.

Next book in my pile was one I read about in a review magazine and actually misunderstood what it was. The book is The Cuckoo's Haiku: And Other Birding Poemsby Michael Rosen. I thought it was a book about writing haiku (despite the subtitle) but it's a great collection of haiku about birds. And not only that, the watercolour illustrations of birds by Stan Fellows are beautiful. If you're a haiku fan, I can recommend it.

I've also ordered three verse novels, again from reading about them in other people's reviews or blogs. I've read novels by Ron Koertge before, and was surprised to see a verse novel by him (hidden poet inside us all?) - Shakespeare Bats Cleanupis about a 14-year-old boy who gets mono (a disease) and is quarantined at home for a few weeks. He can't go to school, and he can't play baseball, his favourite sport. He's reduced to writing poems to entertain himself! What I like about this story is the way form poems sneak in - the narrator is under no illusion that his poems are world-class, but he still manages to use the forms and say what he wants. There are shades of "Love That Dog" in here - the idea of a kid who isn't keen on poetry and ends up writing it and drawing more from the experience than he thought possible.

After many years, Sharon Creech has written a follow-up to "Love That Dog". It's called, of course, Hate That Cat. I haven't read this one yet, but am looking forward to it. More poetry, please, more!

Flying Home From Perth

I think I am becoming an inveterate plane sleeper. It amazes me when people say, "Oh I can't sleep on planes." And I think, Why not? It's like sleeping in the car when you're a kid. I'm almost to the point where I sit down, buckle up my seat belt, we take off and zzzz...... Something about the hum and the quiet (unless there's a screaming kid). Although I can't say the seats do much for the comfort level. This amazing sunset photo was taken after I woke up!

When I look back now on the Poetry Festival (seems like ages ago although it wasn't, but I've been to Sydney since then), this is what stands out for me:

* the keynote address by Fay Zwicky, not least of all because she had just been to see Gran Turino with Clint Eastwood and referred to it many times in relation to her life as a poet. I loved the movie and totally understood what she was saying, although no doubt some others might not have. She was very inspiring.

* the keen interest that everyone had in listening and contributing, and in writing and reading poetry.

* the opening party of the Perth Writers' Festival, in the grounds of the University of WA - and me getting lost looking for the bus back to the hotel and discovering a spooky sunken garden.

* the opening of the poetry festival by an Aboriginal person named Sean (sorry, Sean, I should have asked someone who you were!) - it was the most eloquent, stirring welcome to country I have ever heard, and from now on, anyone who just does the "lip service" thing will just be annoying! He brought tears to my eyes and raised goosebumps.

* the rain - I got soaked to the point of dripping onto the carpet on my walk back to the hotel one day, and it was wonderful. I'd almost forgotten what rain felt like.

I'll report on the Northern Sydney School Librarians' Conference shortly - it was terrific!

Writing in Perth

Back from the Apropos Poetry Festival in Perth, and feeling zapped. The time zone difference is fairly small - two hours - but enough to disrupt sleep patterns, and then suddenly you're home again and still sleep-tardy. I got really sick of waking up at 4am and then at 6am, and not being able to get back to slumberland again. On two mornings, I went to the hotel gym instead, thinking it might help. Wrong. I would have done better using the "pillow talk" form next to my bed and asking for a better pillow from the multitude of choices available (this was a 5 star hotel).

The poetry festival was rich and varied, and gave me much to think about. By the time I came home, I'd written at least ten poems. I attended sessions on publication, new trends, performance, the influence of country/place, community arts, poetry in schools and whether you can pursue poetry as a profession or not. Plus I ran two workshops myself, and spoke on the schools panel.

It was a great pity that only four teachers came to the schools panel discussion. The fact that they made the effort was wonderful, and it would have been even better if another 20-30 teachers had attended. Because the ones who were there ended up feeling a bit like they were manning the barricades! Not intentionally, of course, but those of us who do school visits and workshops are very aware of the woeful situation of poetry in schools, and the discussion tended towards the gloomy. With good cause, but that didn't make the teachers feel any better, I guess.

I ended up compiling a long list of great suggestions for encouraging poetry in the classroom, most of which were contributed by those teachers who came along. A big thank you! I added some more of my own the next day, because I really couldn't stop thinking about it. I still can't.

Why is poetry given such pathetic lip service in so many schools? For every school doing wonderful things, there are 50 where the teachers avoid it. A report I was given from the UK pointed out that if teachers don't like poetry, don't read it, don't know how to teach it, of course they won't include it in their English studies. Our panel members talked about being poetry evangelists, of starting a poetry virus. I still think a lot of it has to do with resources and good training. You get anyone excited and interested in something, they'll be happy to pass it on and create equal enthusiasm.

I often meet poets who talk about being brought up in a household or attending a school where reciting and reading poetry was an everyday occurrence. That wasn't the case for me. I came to poetry late, but I just figure I have lots of great reading still ahead of me. But all the same, if 98% of our kids, especially those in state schools, are not being introduced to the joys and thrills of poetry, who will be reading or writing it in twenty years time? Only the kids who went to private schools where poetry was given room to grow? What was your experience at school? What is your kids' experience right now?

Poets Poeting

I'm about to fly off to Perth to take part in the Apropos Poetry Festival, which is a lead-in event to the Perth Writers' Festival. I'm really looking forward to it, not least because it seems like an awfully long time since I've been able to focus on some poeting, i.e. writing, reading, talking, thinking and dreaming poetry. The program looks interesting, and tackles some of the current "issues" such as whether you can or should make a living out of poetry, poetry in schools, and simply studying how to write better poems.

I'm teaching two workshops - one on writing poetry for kids, and the other on "what poetry can do for you". This latter class sounds a bit vague perhaps, but I see a lot of writing for kids that goes for the basics, getting the story moving fast, the plot pacy and the characters snappy. I'm going to try to encourage participants to look at how to write fiction more poetically, how to take a first draft and apply some great language skills as part of revision. Writers of all genres and forms might find it useful. If you live in or near Perth, come along and join in!

I will no doubt have to admit to those who live in WA that I haven't been to Perth since 1976. And even then, it was a stopover on my way to South Africa. My friend and I stayed in a hotel for one night, and it happened to be the night the hotel caught on fire (somebody's air conditioning unit blew up). I have never been known for my elegant clothing, least of all where nightwear is concerned, and for some reason I'd bought what I considered to be a "sensible" nightie. As I filed down the stairs and out of the hotel, a kindly fireman told me "Gee, you'll be able to write about this at school tomorrow." Hmph!

On Thursday afternoon, I'll be taking part in a panel discussion on Poetry in Education - what are we doing about poetry in schools? Anything? I've been doing some research this week and the answer seems to be Not Much. But I've heard about some great projects happening in WA so hopefully I'll report back on this next week. I can't wait to fill my head with new ideas and inspirations, and fill some pages with writing.