Going stir-crazy here on a beautiful spring-like day in Cleveland. I hope those of you in the area were able to get out and enjoy this weather, because you know what they say: in 10 minutes it will change, and the pressure headache I'm getting now is proof that's true.
Well, miracle of miracles, that other poetry collection I mentioned in my previous post has been completed! It's nowhere near ready to print yet, but it's written, and I love it more than anything I've ever done! The title is Seventy Times Seven and I've created a new page for it here on the site. It is 77 poems long and is set up like a narrative, so it's a lengthy piece. Antoinette Hancock, the lovely artist who did the covers of The Esoteric and Crush Violets, will be creating the artwork for this book. I'm super excited to share this with all of you.
I'm also super excited that this project is pretty much done! It's been over 10 years in the making, and it was quite a lot to carry around inside me all that time. It chronicles a period that many of you will recognize as the "Hyacinthe dropped off the face of the earth" era, and it is a relief for me to get this out of my system. I wrote it in a style a bit more like Anne Sexton than usual, and I think it works well. It's a journey from hope to horror and back again.
Now that I've birthed that child, I can go back to nurturing the other inside me: book two of the Jon Hunter Mysteries! I've extended the trip I'm taking in March (see the 'Events' page for more details) so that I can spend time writing. I love the energy of NYC, and I'd like to capture that as I write this new installment. This year is going to be very exciting!
Ah...That Time of Year
12/12/10 07:54 PM
I love the soft blanket snow makes when it covers the ground, how it smothers all the sound outside. I'm not sure how winter looks by you guys, but here in Cleveland the sky tends to be a strange grey-orange, and everything feels ominous. Like you're in a Neil Gaiman novel with the good guy (who doesn't quite seem so good) sensing the bad guy (who is exquisitely and properly good at not being good).
I have too much work to do tonight to be getting all dreamy and poetic about the precipitation, but it just can't be helped. This is the stuff that makes me want to curl up and write. My husband, bless his heart, brought me coffee, which makes a fabulous dinner as far as I'm concerned. Holiday cards are spread around me, buried under 2 of our 5 cats, in the half-stages of being completed to send to the post. The Cocteau Twins are fluttering through my laptop as I type, to be followed by Lycia, which truly makes the perfect soundtrack to this season.
Was there a point to this? Yes. It's to say that book 2 of the Jon Hunter Mystery series, Flowers in the Dustbin, is being written...with the hope that by this time next year it will be proper reading material.
Stay safe, wherever you are, and know that you are all in my thoughts as my pen goes to paper.
I have too much work to do tonight to be getting all dreamy and poetic about the precipitation, but it just can't be helped. This is the stuff that makes me want to curl up and write. My husband, bless his heart, brought me coffee, which makes a fabulous dinner as far as I'm concerned. Holiday cards are spread around me, buried under 2 of our 5 cats, in the half-stages of being completed to send to the post. The Cocteau Twins are fluttering through my laptop as I type, to be followed by Lycia, which truly makes the perfect soundtrack to this season.
Was there a point to this? Yes. It's to say that book 2 of the Jon Hunter Mystery series, Flowers in the Dustbin, is being written...with the hope that by this time next year it will be proper reading material.
Stay safe, wherever you are, and know that you are all in my thoughts as my pen goes to paper.
