Author: Jnana Hodson

In downsizing to a remote fishing village in Downeast Maine, this eclectic writer feels everything's coming together.

OH, YES

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

 As I said at the time … Eighth Month 24, 1997 

Dear M of the Warm Heart and Extraordinary Signature …

Thanks for giving those five poems a first home. I look forward to seeing what you’re doing with your ‘zine, being already intrigued by your sense of graphic design. (A lobster in the crest? Great touch, especially considering how many French-speaking kids in Maritime Canada used to go to school with lobster in their lunchboxes while their richer English classmates had roast beef. How times change.)

You have no way of knowing how much your letter meant to me. (So I guess I’ll have to try explaining, right?)

Here I was dragging home from another hellish Saturday at the newspaper office — the 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. drill — well into a mounting depression that has been building for the last several weeks. (In part from watching an ex-girlfriend slip into alcoholism and eating disorders, and also in part from going to contradances where we’ve been way short of women partners, as well as in part from the pleasures of adult orthodontics, and even in part from car trouble, blah-blah. You get the picture.) So there, amid the junk mail and a bill or two: your letter. Poetry acceptances are always nice, especially when an editor selects more than one. An entire batch, of course, is a winning scratch ticket. But a letter? Not just a form acceptance? I’m touched.

You pack a lot into a single page. Things that trigger emotional reactions within me, too. For starters, you write so well — with seeming ease, grace, intimacy, color and a varied vocabulary, joy, and encouragement. You leave me arguing with myself: Is she really 18? (Na, can’t be … way too insightful to be a kid.) (Yes, she is: Listen to the dreams. Listen to the inner connections. You don’t get that from university study.) (Nah, it could be a very studied imitation — somebody who would like to be 18, like your friend who decided 17 was the perfect age and then spent the next half century remaining 17.) (Yes, see how she leaps with playful touches — the “love and liquor” or “little blade of grass in the garden of literature.”)

So, M, which is it? How is it you apparently have so much going — plus the resourcefulness and skill to launch your own magazine? Tell me, do … I’m intrigued. (And why, by the way, were you home on a Friday night instead of out on the town. Especially a big town, like Chi’town?) Ah, life! Ah, mystery!

“Professional” writer? My dear, all writing is work — and sometimes, when we’re really blessed, it becomes intense prayer, no matter how that particular piece turns out. Writing is a process, with two muses, as Wendell Barry insists: one says you can do it, you really have to give it a try, before the other reminds us, it’s harder than you thought! For most journalists, it’s a trade, as in plumbing or meat-cutting. Since no poet today pays the rent or mortgage from royalties alone, my definition of a “professional poet” is anyone who gets pieces published while being employed to teach “creative writing.” That makes the rest of us “amateur poets” — amateur, as in one who loves. Of course, as an editor now, you are “professional” to whatever degree you want to accept — especially since you’re in position to endorse some of those creative-writing teachers through publication. (Feel the power yet?)

Literary masterpieces? Don’t worry about that, not for a long time, if ever. The important thing for you now — as well as those other “mostly manic, angst-ridden teenagers,” who, you acknowledge, “produce some fine work too” — is to ride the energy, recording as much of it as you can while everything is extraordinary, intense, and fresh. This — your “shit load of poems (from) the last several years” — is the Mother Lode you’ll be drawing on for the rest of your writing career. Lucky you! Thirty years from now, you’ll shriek: “A diamond in the muck! A turn of genius where I had seen nothing remarkable!” Trust me. And in the meantime, throw nothing away. I wish I had begun keeping a journal six years earlier I did. One detail can spring an entire movie from oblivion.

A theory: By the time most writers develop the craft to accomplish what they intend technically, they’ve lost the opening that compelled them in the first place. The result is dry, technical work.

Put another way: A critic on PBS remarked that no other visual artist has produced as much bad art as Picasso did, yet we need the nine bad pieces if we are to appreciate the genius of the tenth one. Ted Berrigan, in one of his taped teaching sessions, says much of the same in warning writers to be wary of the limitations success can put on their outpouring.

About my poems in your hands: Yes, these five are delicate, subtle, even dreamlike. Lately, I’ve been reflecting a lot on how the conflicts within any relationship often form as much of the fabric of connecting as the basic erotic/romantic attraction does. Of course, either partner can really know only his or her half of the interaction, at best, so there are always these gaps and misunderstandings and expectations and — well, the kind of lacy texture I think you perceive. I’m trying to let the images themselves convey this energy, without limiting it by any editorial comment. Does this make sense to you? (By the way, a hambo — one of the images — is a wonderful pivoting dance for a couple: somewhat like a waltz or a polka, except that the woman really does seem to fly about five feet rather than five inches above the floor.)

So how ‘bout sending a big batch (copies, of course) of your writing my way? Not that I’m bored, mind you, but as I’ve said, intrigued. The whole point of writing is to share it. Enclosed check, too, is for past issues, future issues, a subscription if you have one.

Wish you were here to read to me. It’s a lovely, dry, cool New England Sunday afternoon. A great day to head to the beach or the mountains. Or even off to Boston, for whatever. Thanks for making up for being so mean to everyone that day by being nice to me. Your penance worked!

Cheerios and grins …

CORNFLOWER EYE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

The sky of America’s interior West is a dry eternity – an intense blue I see reflected in the cornflower bloom, or certain other blossoms, such as flax.

Curiously, the flower itself has no direct relationship to the cornstalk or ear. Its naming presents a mystery, to the modern ear, at least.

Now that I dwell under the commonly milky skies of New Hampshire, I find the blooming cornflower celebrates that vibrant blueness in my memory, and locales suddenly overlap in my mind, making me grateful to once again acknowledge that fullness and contrast. By extension, the cornflower blue sky extends to open spaces reaching westward from the Great Plains, with another set of experiences within me.

Gaze, then, into such deep color, undiluted, and its inexplicable essence.

NOTHING NOSTALGIC ABOUT IT

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

One thing I strive to avoid in my Hippie Trails series of novels in a sense of nostalgia. Admittedly, the music, especially, can bring back groovy feelings. (The close reader will notice how little of it I touch on directly, but rather I try to look at other facets of the experience.) And, yes, it is easy to get wistful with some of the memories – Woodstock, for example, while conveniently overlooking all of the physical discomfort, or for some of the lost social life and friendships – but there are good reasons we can’t and don’t go back. Our youth, obviously, has turned to aging, and our freedom turned to responsibilities, many of them ones we’ve chosen.

We need to emphasize that much was not happy. There was desperation, in fact.

The period and the movement were far from perfect, but we also had glimpses – epiphanies, for some – and their influence is far from completed.

If we wholesale deny the dreams and prophetic directions we experienced in that youthful outburst, we cut ourselves off from our higher nature – and both we and our largely society are impoverished as a consequence.

As I look at the array of problems facing America and the world today, I sense that the more serious currents under the surface of the hippie outbreak may finally provide some much needed direction, if we can be honest with ourselves and our history.

That’s definitely not nostalgia, no matter the anthems and hymns in the music of the era.

~*~

To learn more about my novels, go to my page at Smashwords.com.

CHOOSING FRIENDS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 7 Comments

Theological issues play very little into why a family chooses one church over another. So the surveys tell us. Instead of its beliefs, a church is chosen for its youth program, its overall vitality, music, the kinds of expectations it will or won’t place on members, and so on.

Puts Friends in a pretty strange position, doesn’t it? What committee do you want to serve on?

On the other hand, our existence as a “do-it-yourself” congregation requires us, personally and as a group, to draw out individuals and families and engage in their daily lives. One of our strengths is that Quaker meeting allows room for spiritual growth over the years, within a wide range of activity, while maintaining an intimate connection. Our small size, in an era of mega-churches, presents us with advantages, especially in knowing one another authentically. Besides, worship is quite distinct from entertainment.

Now, how do we roll out this welcome mat? Maybe I would remind folks that our place of worship is a house, first and foremost. Come on in and get comfortable. And then be fed. Be sure, of course, to lend a hand with the dishes.

SHOT FIRED AND ALL THAT

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

From a note dated 11 June 2005: Old North Bridge

Dixieland band on a pontoon party boat on the swollen Concord River
passing two Revolutionary War era uniformed re-enactors
on a hot, sweltering day.

(My younger one pointed out to them how their uniforms were wrong.)

Incongruous merriment.
How freely, all the same.

THIS OLD HOUSE DISILLUSIONMENT

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

One of the downsides of owning an old house is an awareness of just how expensive any repair is. (And it’s always more than you’ve planned.) Add to that just how many repairs are needed. (Remember, most of them are for things you don’t even see.) And that’s before we get to any upgrades.

The awareness has also afflicted many of my dream-house observations, especially when I’m nearing the ocean. Where I would have admired a stone retaining wall under construction or a long pier from a private boathouse or deck to the mooring, what I now see is dollar signs. Often, more than I would have made in a year. It’s crushing.

It can make you wonder what people do for that kind of income. Or what kind of wealth they were born into. Or how long it will last.

One thing I know is that fishermen used to live in some of these coastal communities. But not anymore. Not by a long shot. Some of them live closer to me.

 

A TURN IN THE GARDEN

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

As the hot, humid weather kicks in, we shift gears. Our weeding turns lazy, and our plants will just have to fight it out for survival. If we’re diligent, we’ll water, though the utility bill frightens.

Maybe it’s all part of the relationship.

~*~
Of Devis and Other Spirits

A garden without a woman is lamentable

unfolding from Eve
and the Singer of the Song of Songs

 all this color and excitement

my Woman wears no cosmetics
she’s organic
but oh so much better for me
than health food

my Lady leads me in unanticipated ways
she’s so unlike the ones before her
she works with wise fingers without hesitating
to get dirt under her nails

still, as the younger one said,
“you’re a mean mommy:
you’re as mean as the thorns in a buckle bush”

In constructing her garden

sod, roots woven tight, close together
the way I thought we would

overlooking the fact we both flower
quite conspicuously

our stems woody or thorny
even through winter

 poem copyright 2014 by Jnana Hodson

CHANGING STYLE, CHANGING TASTE, CHANGING DIRECTION

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

Driving any of my back routes to the beach, I pass impressive houses that have views of the water. Often, they’re old estates reflecting established money. Some are infused with history. Some are large, with four or more chimneys. Others are cozy cottages with four-season porches.

For much of my life, I would have dreamed of owning such a place.

Lately, though, there’s been a sea-change in my perspective. Part of it is no doubt my arrival at a point in life called retirement, although for me it’s been more a matter of culminating focus on the Real Work, as the poet Gary Snyder calls it. Another part of it has to do with stripping away all of the competing visions of where I thought my life might have been heading. The two dovetail, actually.

When I was starting out, I held often contradictory goals. As one date once admitted, she couldn’t decide whether I’d been in a corner office in a Manhattan tower or in an artist’s garret 10 years hence, and she wasn’t far off the mark, even before the ashram intervened.

Of course, the corner office and the house overlooking the water both assume a sizable income, and that was never in the offing for a journalist unless I somehow became publisher at a young age. Unlikely from the outset, but all the more so once the hippie movement kicked in.

Even so, as a writer, there was always the dream of the blockbuster novel that became a hot movie, but my work kept veering more and more toward the experimental while the publishing industry kept constricting. You get the picture.

You could add to that the possibility of a wealthy girlfriend or the talented one whose career took off big time, but both of those went up in smoke. Or whatever.

Come to think of it, the dream wasn’t just about houses. You could figure in the shiny cars, too, or a sailboat or global travel.

The vision, as it turned out, included an entire lifestyle. An exteneded family with a handful of my own kids, at the least, running around. Many friends and business acquaintances, along with political connections, all coming to stay in the guestroom or guesthouse. A fully stocked library with an impressive collection. An art collection, too.

What it didn’t include was the life I’ve wound up living. Much smaller scale. As a writer, what I really require is blocks of uninterrupted time and solitude. Let’s be honest. A studio can be not much larger than a closet, for that matter.

As for the big place? It would need household staff, for one thing. And a long list of handymen.

What I have instead is an old house and its barn in a small city, along with a common car with 250k on the speedometer. It’s more than enough to handle, even before adding the family.

On top of it all, I also have a shelf of books with my name as author.

TIDAL SURPRISE FROM BEHIND

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

Ogunquit has one of Maine’s loveliest sandy beaches (to distinguish it from some pebble sites we frequent, especially). It’s more than a mile long facing the Atlantic, with house-free dunes behind it.

One corner, near the parking lot, is bordered by the Ogunquit River, which is fun to float in, as long as you avoid the whirlpool.

That end also has a lovely large apron of sand at low tide, and unsuspecting visitors often carry their towels, folding chairs, bags and coolers right out to the edge of the water, establish camp, and head off into the surf. While they’re at play, though, the tide turns quickly, submerging much of the apron within minutes, generally approaching the camp from behind. You should see their faces as they suddenly recognize the catastrophe at hand and desperately try to retrieve their floating debris from the quicksilver waters. Their chairs, coolers, towels and blankets, even shoes are all heading out to sea.

Soon, most of the beach on that end is under water. Remember, the level changes more than a foot every hour … and sometimes it’s closer to two.

The veterans, in contrast, set themselves up much higher, against the rocky base of the parking lot itself.

Follow their example if you go. Or watch out.