The Rose

AUTHOR’S GAB, READER TALK.

A LETTER TO YOU, THE READER, SO THAT YOU CAN FINALLY FIGURE OUT WHAT I’M THINKING.

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THIS MONTH: Can you write about this, too? I think I can.

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“The word, like a heavy stone, / Fell on my still living breast. / I was ready. I didn’t moan. / I will try to do my best.”

— Anna Akhmatova, excerpt taken from Requium

Dear Reader,

For my 28th birthday, two friends, knowing how much I loved to write, got me two writing prompt books: “Write the poem” and “Complete the story”. I honestly can’t say I’ve ever used them (guilty me), but they are there, brimming with endless possibilities. It’s an exciting thing. Maybe one of these days I will stop staring dumfounded at a prompt and actually come up with an idea. The trouble is, my mind has its own writing ideas, usually. Nonetheless, it stretches me to ask: “Can I write about this, too? Yes, I think I can.” And then, I try to do it.

As most of you know, I’m a journalist, so I spend a lot of time getting absorbed in news. It’s gotten to be a habit where I listen to New York Times’ “The Daily” podcast, which gives me a quick run-down on important events for the day, much similar to their briefing. In a recent episode, they shared an expert from a new New York Times podcast, called “Sugar Calling”, hosted by Cheryl Strayed. Strayad calls up her old friend and mentor, George Saunders, a writer of short stories published in the New Yorker, an author of several books and a professor at Syracuse University.

They talk about the current situation with coronavirus pandemic, about how the nation is locked down dealing with the crisis, how it’s a weird sensation we’re all going through right now, like nothing anyone has dealt with before. But, what I love about this conversation, and what I have thought about after listening to it, is the letter Saunders writes to his graduate students. As a writer, it’s something that hits home for me, because it reminds us of the age-old, often-forgotten question: “Can you write about this, too? I think I can.”

Here is the letter:

“Dear S.U. writers,

Jeez. What a hard and depressing and scary time. So much suffering and anxiety everywhere.

I saw this bee happily buzzing around a flower yesterday and felt like, “Moron, if you only knew.”

But it also occurs to me that this is when the world needs our eyes and ears and minds. This has never happened before here. At least not since 1918. We are, and especially you are, the generation that is going to have to help us make sense of this and recover afterwards.

What new forms might you invent to fictionalize an event like this, where all of the drama is happening in private, essentially? Are you keeping records of the emails and texts you’re getting, the thoughts you’re having, the way your hearts and minds are reacting to this strange new way of living? It’s all important. 50 years from now, people the age you are now won’t believe this ever happened. Or will do the sort of eye roll we all do when someone tells us about something crazy that happened in 1960.

What will convince that future kid is what you are able to write about this. And what you’re able to write about it will depend on how much sharp attention you’re paying now and what records you keep. Also, I think, with how open you can keep your heart. I’m trying to practice feeling something like, “Ah, so this is happening now.” Or “Hmm, so this, too, is part of life on earth. Did not know that, universe. Thanks so much, stinker.” And then I real quick try to pretend I didn’t just call the universe a stinker.

I did a piece once where I went to live incognito in a homeless camp in Fresno for a week. Very intense. But the best thing I heard in there was from this older guy from Guatemala who was always saying, “Everything is always keep changing.” Truer words were never spoken. It’s only when we expect solidity, non-change, that we get taken by surprise. And we always expect solidity, no matter how well we know better.

Well, this is all sounding a little preachy, and let me confess that I’m not taking my own advice. At all. It’s all happening so fast. Paula has what we are hoping is just a bad cold, and I’m doing a lot of inept caregiving. Our dogs can feel that something weird is going on. (“No walk? Again?“) But I guess what I’m trying to say is that the world is like a sleeping tiger. And we tend to live our lives there on its back. We’re much smaller than the tiger, obviously. We’re like Barbies and Kens on the back of a tiger. Now and then that tiger wakes up, and that is terrifying. Sometimes it wakes up and someone we love dies. Or someone breaks our heart. Or there’s a pandemic. But this is far from the first time that tiger has come awake. He/she has been doing it since the beginning of time and will never stop doing it. And always, there have been writers to observe it, and later, make some sort of sense of it — or at least bear witness to it. It’s good for the world for a writer to bear witness, and it’s good for the writer too. Especially if she can bear witness with love and humor, and despite it all, some fondness for the world, just as it’s manifesting, warts and all.

All of this to say, there’s still work to be done, and now more than ever.

There’s a beautiful story about the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova. Her husband was shot and her son arrested during the Stalinist purges. One day, she was standing outside the prison with hundreds of other women in similar situations. It’s Russian cold, and they have to go there every day, wait for hours in this big, open yard. Then get the answer that today and every day, there will be no news.

But every day, they keep coming back. A woman recognizing her as the famous poet says, “Poet, can you write this?” Anna Akhmatova thinks about it for a second and goes, “Yes.”

I wish you all the best during this crazy period. Someday soon, things will be back to some sort of normal, and it will be easier to be happy again. I believe this, and I hope it for each one of you. I look forward to seeing you all again and working with you. And even in time, with sufficient P.P.E., give you a handshake or a hug.

Please feel free to email anytime for any reason. George.”

(Citation: This is an excerpt from the transcript of The Daily episode, “A Bit of Relief: ‘Sugar Calling’”: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/03/podcasts/the-daily/sugar-calling-cheryl-strayed-george-saunders-coronavirus.html?showTranscript=1.)

For those who are not aware, Akhmatova, whose real name was Anna Andreyevna Gorenko (1889–1966), was one of the great Russian poets of the 20th century. She also wrote prose, including memoirs, autobiographical pieces and a literary scholarship on Russian writers and translated Italian, French, Armenian, and Korean poetry. Requium (written 1935 to 1940), one of her more famous works, is a tragic elegy about Stalinist terror. And yet, in the middle of all that horror, she says she can write about it.

Why? Someone had to. Someone could. And, that someone was her. She did not discount her own suffering, simply recognized the story and told the tale. That, friends, is writing.

The point is that it’s possible to write about anything. As a writer, you have both limitless potential to write about anything and a responsibility to write about everything. But, it’s also possible to go through life, get caught up in one’s situation and forget all the possibilities. And, that’s why we have things like writing prompts because we forget that we can write about time, the cat, trees and our busy day. We don’t just have to keep writing about that one topic we picked (see January’s Ad Lib for what happens when we just write about one topic, such as love). Or, we are simply missing the important topic we need to write about right under our noses. Most of the time, we just fail to ask ourselves the obvious question, “Can I write about this, too?” And, the answer is and should always be, like Akhmatova, “Yes, I think I can.”

It’s important to note that you will not be able to write about absolutely everything, nor can you. It’s not physically or humanly possible. So, write as much as you can, because you can! I think that is a worthy goal.

When I heard this podcast, I realized I was missing an important topic to write about right in front of my nose: coronavirus. These days, it seems like everything has caught COVID-19, not just the people who actually have it. But, aside from the news cycle I was working in, I had yet to personally write about how coronavirus was affecting my life. Or, I had yet to even write about coronavirus. What a perfect prompt! Yes, I could write about this, too!

So, this month, I want to pose a writing prompt to you to both give you a little practice and help you write about this topic, which is right in front of your nose, too. Write a poem or short story, 500-1000 words if writing a short story, about coronavirus (COVID-19). Talk about how the pandemic is affecting your life, what your personal experience is. Or, write a letter to your “students” addressing the coronavirus pandemic, like George Saunders did for his students. Then, email me the prompt at jessmax1hope@comcast.net and I will publish it as a page on The Rose with this Ad Lib as the master, giving you credit for your poem, story or letter. It will help tell the story of this time, because someone has to tell it. And, that someone, like Akhmatova, is you. No excuses, friends! I know you’re all it home in your pajamas because of the pandemic. You can surely find a little time in between Zoom calls to do this. 😉

Each topic you write about stretches your brain a little more, like a new writing prompt in my books my friends got me for my birthday. And, if you really wrap your brain around that topic, you can indeed write about it. Anything you do for the first time will be hard, but that is learning. That is writing.

Think about that. ~

Sincerely, Your Author,

Jessica A. McLean

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For more information on Anna Akhmatova, visit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Akhmatova or https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/anna-akhmatova. For the full text of Requium, see: https://www.poetryloverspage.com/poets/akhmatova/requiem.html. Or, to listen to The Daily podcast, go to: https://www.nytimes.com/column/the-daily.

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Recent Happenings:

• Recent Ad-Lib Activity:
  • April 2020’s Ad-Lib is here!
  • Here lies my foolish thinking. A writer is dedicated, not lazy. Making a resolution to pick up monthly Ad Libs again!
    • Recently, I have not been keeping up with Ad-Libbing. I graduated five years ago from Oakland University with a degree in Journalism and I got a job at a local paper, The Oakland Press. I’m doing more writing, editing, designing and publishing than I could ever dream of. But, this cascade of graduating, finding a job and working hard at a job has captivated much of my time and mental faculties, leaving little time for personal reflection. I decided there just wasn’t time for Ad-Libbing, but I would keep publishing poetry, which is what I have done. I may not be able to publish Ad-Libs monthly as before, but I hope that when I get the chance suffices.
      • TBA: I’m working on finishing my series on form. It’s a gigantic project, so I will probably split it in two. Stay tuned.
• Recently Published:
  • Poems Added:
    • “Coming to America”, a sestina about the story of what happened to make my mother’s family decide to immigrate to the United States. I’m very proud to say that, after 5 years or more of wanting to write one, this is my the first sestina I have ever written. As such, I consider it a major literary feat for me.
      • Important: Due to the story’s sensitive nature, this poem is password protected. If you would like the password, please reach out to me via email at jessmax1hope@comcast.net.
    • “Nativity”, a sonnet about the Christmas story
• Editing, editing, and more editing.
• Waiting 🙂

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