Right: Hero Over Covid Credit and Copyright by Christal Ann Rice Cooper
1
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?
2.
Where were you when you started to actually write the poem? And please describe the place in great detail.
3.
What month and year did you start writing this poem?
[Answers to questions 1-3 are combined below.]
This poem began as I was biking home from work one afternoon in July 2020, in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. To comply with safety guidelines, citizens were still considerately practicing social distancing outdoors then. As I neared the intersection of Kenwood Boulevard and Maryland Avenue, I noticed a pedestrian alter his path so that he and I would continue to be at least six feet apart. “We give each other space,” I thought to myself, smiling because my civilized neighbors were willing to protect one another by keeping their distance.
One line simply followed another as I pedaled and meditated: “We like to keep our distance.” My thoughts turned toward what personality types are comfortable keeping a distance, and stanza two emerged. I wanted a happy outcome for the “damaged introverts”; that took shape in stanzas three and four.
The poem’s lines were recorded soon after I got home, at my kitchen desk with a view of the back garden (Above). I wrote the lines on a yellow legal pad (Below) in cursive, double-spacing to leave room for revisions. I aimed for perfect rhymes, with a scheme of ABBA.
Credit and Copyright by Kathryn Ann Hill
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? I altered three lines of my initial handwritten draft before the poem was finished.
In stanza two, the two middle lines rhymed imperfectly; I had written:
this wariness is nature
and also learned behavior
I changed the second of those two lines to “developed by our nurture,” for a closer, more satisfying rhyme between “nature” and “nurture.”
The second place of revision was between stanzas three and four; here is my first version:
From COVID we have learned
we’re all in this together:
Let those of us who weather
the crisis find we’ve earned
some friendships that endure
beyond the dire pandemic.
Let love become endemic.
Let trust become our cure.
The word “earned” rhymed with ‘learned,” but I disliked the meaning: I do not believe we earn good things; I believe blessings like friendship come to us as a gracious gift. So the two final stanzas became:
From COVID we have learned
we’re all in this together:
Let those of us who weather
the crisis find we’ve turned
toward friendships that endure
beyond the dire pandemic.
Let love become endemic.
Let trust become our cure.
What do you want readers of this poem to take from this poem? I want readers of this poem to receive hope. Trauma does not only damage humans; sometimes trauma brings welcome change: a strengthened personality, deeper and more satisfying relationships, increased love and trust.
Copyright by Kathryn Ann Hill
Which part of the poem was the most emotional of you to write and why? This poem was emotional for me for a couple reasons. First, because I had in mind a person very dear to me who might be called a damaged introvert. I was pleased to be able to project a happy outcome for this person and for others.
Second, I was happy with the poem for technical reasons. I have written and published hundred of metrical poems. In most of them, I rhyme every other line. In this one, each line rhymes with its mate while delivering an understanding of human behavior in a hopeful way.
I admire poems in which form conveys meaning. The ABBA pattern might be understood to represent the coming together only to separate, the thought presented in stanza one.
And I am a fan of enjambment judiciously used. I think the enjambment between the third and fourth stanzas works well.
Has this poem been published before? And if so where? The poem was first published on 25 July 2020, at pendemic.
All Backstory of the Poem LIVE LINKS can be found at the very end of the below feature:
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2021/02/will-justice-drakes-intercession-is-251.html
The images in this specific piece are granted copyright: Public Domain, GNU Free Documentation Licenses, Fair Use Under The United States Copyright Law.
The other images are granted copyright permission by the copyright holder, which is identified beneath each photo.
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