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? I keep a poetry journal with first drafts of much of my work. This poem appeared there first.
I often write poems about my family members on their birthdays. These poems are usually just for me and my journal. They’re a way to think about the people I love, especially the ones who are no longer living, like my parents. They’re very private and sometimes quite sentimental. It was in this frame of mind that I began this poem on my mother’s birthday in 2019.
This poem unfolded as something different, though. It encompassed so much more than my relationship with and memories of my mother. It reached backward and forward and wouldn’t leave me alone. And I happened to be writing it while my granddaughter was hanging out in the early morning, getting her bearings after arriving at our house on a no-school day still in her pajamas. I felt that my mother would have loved this kid so much.
Around that time, I was also practicing the haibun form with my friend Constance Brewer (BELOW) and this poem felt like it could easily work in that format. The first draft was free verse – as most of my first drafts are – and it was quite loose. I kept revising it until I had a solid, tight prose-poem and the haiku section simply fell right into place. This happened over the course of perhaps a few weeks or so. I wrote and revised with my gut as much as with my editor’s eye. Then my friend read it and gave me some feedback and I worked through that. I’m not quite sure how long it took me to get to the final form.
Where were you when you started to actually write the poem? And please describe the place in great detail. I began writing this at our kitchen counter, which looks towards a south-facing window. (BELOW) From the counter, through the window, I can mostly see trees and sky. It’s a good spot to daydream. While I was sitting there, my granddaughter was snuggled up behind me on her favorite big comfy chair, book in hand, and she was happy to be quiet. This all happened before breakfast.
What month and year did you start writing this poem? I started this poem on October 16, 2019. And I only know this because I date the pages in my poetry journal! (BELOW)
Were there any lines in any of your rough drafts of this poem that were not in the final version? And can you share them with us? Sure there were lines I left out. And the poem is better for that. Among the missing lines is this little section: I write at the kitchen counter / memories stirred by 8-year-old girls, / Camille and my past self, / curled like cats, / books in hand. These lines were eventually eliminated because they didn’t move the piece forward in the way I wanted.
What do you want readers of this poem to take from this poem? A sense of place, of home as sanctuary, history, warmth. But once I put a poem out there, it’s the reader’s turn to take what they want from it, so perhaps there’s more that I haven’t really considered.
Which part of the poem was the most emotional of you to write and why? I’m not sure there is one specific part that was more emotional than the rest. The whole thing is a stew of emotion: missing my mom and my childhood sanctuary, being a mom and a grandmother myself now, watching my kids try to establish their own homes in this world.
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Has this poem been published? And if so where? Yes, this poem first appeared in Anti-Heroin Chic in December of 2020. It also appears in my chapbook, How We Learned to Shut Our Own Mouths (Gyroscope Press, 2021). The chapbook is available through Amazon.
Anything you would like to add? I appreciate the opportunity to talk about poetry. Thank you so much! I’d also like to invite anyone who’s interested to stop by my forthcoming website, One Minnesota Crone, which I’m launching in January 2022. The site name is a nod to the enormous creative energy that women over 50 share with the world and it’s my intention to celebrate what crones offer. A list of my current publications will also be available there.
Kathleen Cassen Mickelson co-founded the contemporary poetry journal, Gyroscope Review, where she served as co-editor for five years. Her work has appeared in journals in the US, UK, and Canada. Mickelson also created the writing-oriented blog, One Minnesota Writer, which is ending its run at the end of 2021. The next adventure, One Minnesota Crone, a blog celebrating creativity in women over 50, will appear in January 2022.
