Robyn Hood Black - children's author, poet, artist

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers! How is May already half over?  Whoosh!  The weather here in the SC mountains has been beautiful.  The bears and coyotes are making their nightly rounds, the hummingbirds are back, and a pair of cardinals have built a nest in the bush by our front steps. To snatch May's magic before we're in June, I have a poem even older than last week's poems, one by Robert Herrick (1591-1674).

I mean, who doesn't love "May" as a verb?

 

Corinna's going a Maying

By Robert Herrick

Get up, get up for shame, the Blooming Morne

Upon her wings presents the god unshorne.

         See how Aurora throwes her faire

         Fresh-quilted colours through the aire:

         Get up, sweet-Slug-a-bed, and see

         The Dew-bespangling Herbe and Tree.

Each Flower has wept, and bow'd toward the East,

Above an houre since; yet you not drest,

         Nay! not so much as out of bed?

         When all the Birds have Mattens seyd,

         And sung their thankful Hymnes: 'tis sin,

         Nay, profanation to keep in,

When as a thousand Virgins on this day,

Spring, sooner than the Lark, to fetch in May.

 

Rise; and put on your Foliage, and be seene

To come forth, like the Spring-time, fresh and greene;

         And sweet as Flora. Take no care

         For Jewels for your Gowne, or Haire:

         Feare not; the leaves will strew

         Gemms in abundance upon you:

Besides, the childhood of the Day has kept,

Against you come, some Orient Pearls unwept:

         Come, and receive them while the light

         Hangs on the Dew-locks of the night:

         And Titan on the Eastern hill

         Retires himselfe, or else stands still

Till you come forth. Wash, dresse, be briefe in praying:

Few Beads are best, when once we goe a Maying.

 

Come, my Corinna, come; and comming, marke

How each field turns a street; each street a Parke

         Made green, and trimm'd with trees: see how

         Devotion gives each House a Bough,

         Or Branch: Each Porch, each doore, ere this,

         An Arke a Tabernacle is

Made up of white-thorn neatly enterwove;

As if here were those cooler shades of love.

         Can such delights be in the street,

         And open fields, and we not see't?

         Come, we'll abroad; and let's obay

         The Proclamation made for May:

And sin no more, as we have done, by staying;

But my Corinna, come, let's goe a Maying.

 

There's not a budding Boy, or Girle, this day,

But is got up, and gone to bring in May.

         A deale of Youth, ere this, is come

         Back, and with White-thorn laden home.

         Some have dispatcht their Cakes and Creame,

         Before that we have left to dreame:

And some have wept, and woo'd, and plighted Troth,

And chose their Priest, ere we can cast off sloth:

         Many a green-gown has been given;

         Many a kisse, both odde and even:

         Many a glance too has been sent

         From out the eye, Loves Firmament:

Many a jest told of the Keyes betraying

This night, and Locks pickt, yet w'are not a Maying.

 

Come, let us goe, while we are in our prime;

And take the harmlesse follie of the time.

         We shall grow old apace, and die

         Before we know our liberty.

         Our life is short; and our dayes run

         As fast away as do's the Sunne:

And as a vapour, or a drop of raine

Once lost, can ne'r be found againe:

         So when or you or I are made

         A fable, song, or fleeting shade;

         All love, all liking, all delight

         Lies drown'd with us in endlesse night.

Then while time serves, and we are but decaying;

Come, my Corinna, come, let's goe a Maying.

 

Here's a little more about the poet. 

 

While you're already out "a Maying," be sure to take in the blooming gardens of poetic goodness rounded up by Patricia at Reverie. Thanks, Patricia! :0)

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers! For those celebrating Mother's Day, I wish you a lovely weekend.  It is a difficult holiday for many; sending warmest wishes for peace to you. 

 

Among my many 19th century books is a volume with a gilded cover called Mother, Home & Heaven. Well, in typical 1800s-fasion, its full title is GOLDEN THOUGHTS on MOTHER, HOME AND HEAVEN.  From POETIC AND PROSE LITERATURE OF ALL AGES AND ALL LANDS.  The introduction is by Rev. Theo L. Cuyler, D.D., and it was published in New York by E. B. Treat in 1879.

 

Now that you're exhausted from reading the title, I'll keep the poetic offerings short!  Abundant reading options are sorted according to the three concepts listed.  

 

The title is found in the final stanza of a poem simply called "Mother," by E. L. Cassanovia:

 

....

 

Among the names to mortals given,

There's none like mother, home and heaven;

For home's no home without her care;

And heaven, we know she will be there;

Then let us, while we love each other,

Remember and be kind to mother. 

 

Here's a poem of the same title written expressly for this book:

 

MOTHER

 

by Fanny J. Crosby

 

The light, the spell-word of the heart,

     Our guiding star in weal or woe,

Our talisman - our earthly chart - 

     The sweetest name tht earth can know.

 

We breathed it first with lisping tongue

     When cradled in her arms we lay;

Fond memories round that name are hung

     That will not, cannot pass away.

 

We breathed it then, we breathe it still,

     More dear than sister, friend, or brother;

The gentle power, the magic thrill,

     Awakened at the name of mother. 

 

 

Here's a snippet from Mrs. Sarah J. Hale:

 

O WONDROUS power!  How little understood!

Entrusted to the mother's mind alone,

To fashion genius, form the soul for good.

 

 

We'll end with the first few lines of the royal treatment given by Rev. H. H. Birkins in his essay, "Mother's Empire."

 

The queen that sits upon the throne of home, crowned and sceptered as none other ever can be, is - mother.  Her enthronement is complete, her reign unrivalled, and the moral issues of her empire are eternal. ...

 

Well, pass me that crown! ;0)

 

Special thanks & love to my own queen mother, who spent more time on the floor playing with us than sitting on a throne, and to the wonderful mothers in our family nurturing the next generation of precious littles.

 

Appreciations to Cathy Stenquist, taking the "host" reins for the first time to round us up this week!  Find more Mother's Day and other goodness over at her blog. 

Greetings and a Quick Wave!  I'm doing some re-organizing and cleaning (and recuperating from April - ha!), so taking a bloggie pass this week.  Please welcome May with all the poetic goodness at Reverie, where Patricia has our Roundup this week.  Thanks, Patricia! :0)

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers!

 

It's the last Poetry Friday of Poetry Month already.  But you've still got several days to peruse all the NPM projects in the Kidlitosphere rounded up by Jama here, and you can follow today's line of the Kidlit Progressive Poem here.

 

I've enjoyed making "Poetry and Art" videos each Friday this month to celebrate April, with a word for the week and a piece of mixed media art exploring that word.  This week, I decided to look ahead as we march toward summer, and our nation's 250th birthday. This week's word is "LIBERTY," and I've had fun making another journal with antique ephemera bits and nods.  Click here for the video. 

 

In this video, I feature a few ending lines from a poem by Sarah Jane Lippincott (1823-1904), found in CROWN JEWELS or GEMS of LITERATURE, ART, and MUSIC by Henry Davenport Northrop, D. D., Mutual Union Publishing Co., St. Joseph, Mo., 1888.

 

from "FREEDOM IRREPRESSIBLE"

 

...

 

Thus, thus, defeat and scorn, and shame,

  Is his, who strives to bind

The restless, leaping waves of thought,

  The free tide of the mind.

 

Sarah Jane Lippincott (Grace Greenwood)

 

Thanks so much for the feedback on these videos (and the time spent watching them as I learn how to make them!).  This has been a good training ground as I plan to launch bite-sized versions each week through artsyletters this year.

 

Here are links to a couple of things I mention in the video: Jenna Bush Hager Sits Down With 4 Former Living Presidents Bush, Clinton, Obama, Biden and The American Revolution by Ken Burns on PBS.

 

Big thanks to the oh-so-imaginative Irene Latham for hosting us all this week at Live Your Poem.  Be sure to read about her intriguing new book! 

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers - It's a busy day over here, and the Authors Guild web gurus evidently fixed last week's issue that prevented folks from leaving comments.  (So sorry about that!)

First, Happy Inernational Haiku Poetry Day! Be sure to check out The Haiku Foundation's annual "EarthRise Rolling Haiku Collaboration" to celebrate/contribute a poem if you're so inclined. 

 

And continued Happy Poetry Month.  

 

For my National Poetry Month project, "Poetry and Art," I've got my third installment of a video on Poetry Friday celebrating a word in someone else's poem and in my own mixed media artwork.  This week's word is "spring."  For Haiku Day, I included an entire poem instead of the one word in my art. 

 

Click here for the link to my video.  [I know, it is TOO long... let's see if I can make something short and sweet for the last one next week!]

 

Here is the featured poem by Kobayashi Issa, translated by David G. Lanoue.

 

the setting place
for the spring sun...
wisteria blossoms

(year unknown)

 

David has tranlated more than 13,000 of Issa's haiku, and you can get lost in the searchable database here! 

 

But wait - there's more!

 

I've got our seventeenth line of the Kidlit Progressive Poem today. 

 

We're halfway through Poetry Month, and halfway through the Progressive Poem! This fun adventure was started by Irene Latham and has been tended in recent years by Margaret Simon.  Like an old-fashioned progressive supper, the poem travels from blog to blog to have a new line added.  Tabatha Yeatts kicked us off this year and also added a map of "The Land of Poetry," which is delightful and has had place names added by Donna Smith and Heidi Mordhorst. (I hope I got all that right.) My blog platform only allows one image per post (boo!), so please scroll on back a few posts if you haven't seen the map, or look for it to pop up again soon.

 

Carol Varsalona handed me a lovely line which ended stanza four, about "poetry in motion" and how it stretches from "forests to sands." These were the words of a wise Raven who just entered the picture.  In my line, beginning the fifth stanza, I let the Raven have a little more say, while ushering along some movement. (My line makes more sense, too, if you see the aforementioned map!) 

 

 

The Land of Poetry

On my first trip to the Land of Poetry,
I saw anthologies of every color, tall as buildings.
A world of words, wonder on wings, waiting just for me!
Birding for words shimmering, flecked in golden gilding.

 

Binoculars ready, I toured boulevards and side streets
exploring vibrant verses, verses so honest and tender,
feathery lyrics, bright flitting avian athletes
soaring 'cross pages in rhythmic splendor.

 

In the Land of Poetry, I am the conductor,
seeking oodles of poems that tug at my heart,   

a musical medley of sound and structure,    

an open mic in Frost Forest! Wonder who'll take part?

 

There's a pause in the program; no one takes the stage
the trees quiver, the audience looks up. Raven lands,       

singing Earth's message of the sage.   

"Poetry in motion will be forevermore, from forests to sands.

 

"Scatter," she croaked. "Beyond Wilde Pond, to each and every beach."

 

And now, the poem wings its way to the oh-so-talented Michelle Kogan.  Take it away, Michelle!

 

Here is the list of contributors.  

 

April 1 Tabatha Yeatts at The Opposite of Indifference 
April 2 Cathy Stenquist at A Little Bit of This and That
April 3 Patricia Franz at Reverie
April 4 Donna Smith at Mainely Write
April 5 Janice Scully at Salt City Verse
April 6 Denise Krebs at Dare to Care
April 7 Ruth Hersey at There is no such thing as a God-forsaken town
April 8 Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities
April 9 Margaret Simon at Reflections on the Teche
April 10 Janet Clare Fagel at Reflections on the Teche
April 11 Diane Davis at Starting Again in Poetry
April 12 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance
April 13 Linda Mitchell at Another Word Edgewise
April 14 Jone MacCulloch at Jone Rush MacCulloch
April 15 Joyce Uglow at Storied Ink
April 16 Carol Varsalona at Beyond Literacy Link
April 17 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge
April 18 Michele Kogan at More Art for All
April 19 Kim Johnson at Common Threads
April 20 Buffy Silverman
April 21 Irene Latham at Live Your Poem
April 22 Karen Edmisten
April 23 Heidi Mordhorst at my juicy little universe
April 24 Mary Lee Hahn at A(nother) Year of Reading
April 25 Tanita Davis at Fiction, instead of Lies
April 26 Sharon Roy at Pedaling Poet
April 27 Tracey Kiff-Judson at Tangles and Tails
April 28 Tabatha Yeatts at The Opposite of Indifference
April 29 TBD
April 30 TBD

 

For this week's midway-through-Poetry-Month Poetry Friday Roundup, please make your way to My Juicy Little Universe, where Heidi hosts us all.  Thanks, Heidi.

 

Remember, Jama and her team of bears and other Alphabet Soupers have rounded up Poetry Month events in the Kidlitosphere here.  Enjoy!

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers - is it still Poetry Friday?!  It's after 2 p.m. as I'm posting this, after a prior 48 hours full of techno-challenges and a new AC/heating unit having to get installed at our house.  Thanks for your understanding!  I hope your Poetry Month is off to a great start.

 

I'm kicking off a "Poetry and Art" mini series on Poetry Fridays with links to short studio videos. (Well, today's is 10 minutes long - I'll try to shorten that in the next ones!) Each week I'll celebrate a different word, sharing a poem written by someone else, along with some art made by moi (such as the journal I made for today's post.). This week I've got a poem by Patricia J. Franz, featuring the word, AND.

 

These videos are trial-and-error (a fair bit of errors so far!) as I'm planning something more fulsome with artsyletters along these lines soon.  Feedback welcome!

 

Here is today's link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7aG79O6KS4

 

And here is the poem I share in it, celebrating the word "AND" with our talented Patricia J. Franz, from here post kicking off 2024.

 

 

Ode to AND
 
It's grammatical, dramatical.
It's also mathematical.
 
 
A diplomatic follower of
controversial commas.
 
 
It's optimistic, synergistic.
In the end more realistic.
Characteristically it's found
in multi-taskers.
 
 
It coordinates.
It conjugates.
It could be said it consummates
 
 
phrases matched to clauses,
interjections with soft pauses.
 
 
A uniter, not a fighter.
Softer on the ear.
Gentler than BUT.
 
 

AND —my word this coming year.
 

                                                                                                                  ©draft, Patricia J. Franz

 

Here is Patricia's whole wonderful post. And it just so happens Patricia has today's line of the Kidlitopshere Progressive Poem right here - follow along for all the fun!  (My day to contribute a line is April 17.)

 

You can find all of this week's posts rounded up by Matt at Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme, where he's reflecting on a year of rainbows! 

 

Remember to check out all the Poetry Moonth goodness in the Kidlitosphere over at Alphabet Soup.  Thanks for rounding these up, Jama & crew!

 

If you wanted to look up a couple of things I mentioned in my video this week, here is a link to mixed media artist, teacher, and author Seth Apter, and here's a link to a lovely small women-owned scrapbooking and mixed media shop in the mountains of north Georgia, Scrappy Shak. 

 

Happy Poetry Month, and wishing blessings to all, especially those celebrating Easter or Passover this week.

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers!  Spring has covered everything around here with powdery gold, so Poetry Month is on our doorstep. 

 

But first, a sonnet from the Bard....

 

Sonnet 98

 

From you have I been absent in the spring

By William Shakespeare

From you have I been absent in the spring,

When proud-pied April, dressed in all his trim,

Hath put a spirit of youth in everything,

That heavy Saturn laughed and leaped with him.

Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell

Of different flowers in odour and in hue,

Could make me any summer's story tell,

Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew:

Nor did I wonder at the lily's white,

Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose;

They were but sweet, but figures of delight

Drawn after you, – you pattern of all those.

    Yet seem'd it winter still, and, you away,

    As with your shadow I with these did play.

 

This is one of dozens of sonnets our dear William penned for a "Fair Youth," whose identity scholars continue to debate.  Were these sonnets platonic? Romantic? Cases have been made for both.  I wondered, having recently watched Hamnet, if some might have been for Shakespeare's lost son, but those in the know don't think that was the case, though others have wondered, too.

 

(Did you see the film?  I was determined to watch it before the Oscars, and managed to squeak it in that Sunday afternoon after our kiddos left from a visit.  I knew it would be devastating and also brilliant, and I thought it was both.  I first saw Jessie Buckley in Wicked Little Letters and have loved watching her this year in interviews.  What an extraordinary talent, and she seems to be a down-to-earth and super smart human as well.)

 

For proud-pied Poetry Month April, I think I'll dip my toe in the Poetry Friday projects this year! I will offer short studio videos each week featuring a word to ponder with poetry and some original mixed media artwork. Plans are to launch an artsyletters® series along these lines down the road.  Looking forward to all the happenings everyone is conjuring up!  Be sure to visit Alphabet Soup for Jama's Roundup - and endless cheers to Jama and all the bears for this labor of love. 

 

Margaret is once again organizing the Kidlit Progressive Poem ("founded" by Irene Latham several moons ago); you can see the weekly hosts here.  And, sign up for one of the last few spots if you haven't already! It's a lot of fun, and all are welcome. And, while you're there, celebrate Margaret's brand new book, What's That Sound? Birds of the Bayou!

 

Marcie Flinchum Atkins is kindly hosting our Roundup this week. And, while you're there, celebrate Marcie's's brand new book, When Twilight Comes - The Animals that Bring Dawn and Dusk to Life! ("Crepuscular" has always been one of my favorite words.)

 

Wishing you a lovely end 0f March/beginning of April, and special gratitude for all who are marching Saturday in this 250th year of our country.  

Greetings, Poetry Lovers!

 

In the midst of the world's beyond-turbulent news, I'm always grateful for unexpected turns which can delight.  In the past few days I've stumbled upon a few references to something I've always adored:  handwriting.  

 

If I remember the story correctly, as a second grader I was up at the front of the blended first- and second-grade classroom demonstrating cursive on the chalkboard.  (No whiteboards back then!) I've danced with calligraphy through the decades, even taking a course with Peter Thornton back in the day (late 1980s, maybe?). This love is one reason I named my lilttle art business "artsyletters," and I'm knee-deep in projects and plans for more communing with words and lettters in my art.

 

I love sharing a passion for art and mixed media with many of you all, and your work always inspires me.  Driving back and forth to Asheville Wednesday to hear son Seth preach, I listened to the "Friday Feature Artist" interview from the amazing folks at Take Two. [Warning - the online courses offered by Take Two are simply amazing, and beautifully shot.  They are pricey, but I've taken three and all have been marvelous.] But you don't have to enroll to enjoy the artist interviews, as videos or podcasts.  I like looking at images of the artists' work online before listening in my car. 

 

Last Friday, Sophie Edwards brought us French artist Stéphanie Devaux, "whose practice moves between calligraphy, embroidery and artist books. Her work explores the space where text shifts from ink to stitch – where language becomes texture, gesture and form." The artist has a rich French accent, and I enjoyed to moments when she was searching for a certain word to describe some ephemeral but important concept, and had to speak in French. The whole interview was a "thoughtful conversation about materials, attention and the poetry between reading and seeing," and you can find it here.

 

She also briefly mentioned asemic writing, a frequent component of collage and mixed media pieces these days. ["Asemic" is a term which was coined by editor John Byrum and taken up by artists Tim Gaze and Jim Leftwich in the late 1990s to describe the practice of mark-making that resembles actual writing but does not include actual words.  Here is a 2023 interview by Sam Woolfe with Tim Gaze, explaining the history of the recent movement.]

 

Back to my Wednesday.... On the way back home, my car, as usual, was drawn like a magnet into a great little vintage store called "The Garage on 25."  I always find something there to separate me from part of the available balance on a credit card.  Thursday, I walked out with the old wooden tray above, full of character itself, and also full of all kinds of mechanical pencil holders and packages of leads (most full and many unopened), a pen holder, various rusty nibs, and even an old Rapidograph pen.  (I could never get one of those to work years ago, even in a brand new state.)  I plan to ignore what these items would sell for individually on eBay and actually use them! The other item pictured is some gorgeous handwriting on a French legal document from 1898 (bought on Etsy).  I found out the hard way that the beautiful onion-skin type paper is extremely fragile, but it's all right, as I'll incorporate pieces into collages.  (I copied this excerpt onto vellum, too, for cardmaking, and I'll be more careful with the rest of this document!)

 

I wrote a haiku back in 2016 about using a dip pen, the year my daughter got married:

 

wedding invitations
the press and release
of the nib

 

©Robyn Hood Black

Third Honorable Mention, Harold G. Henderson Haiku Awards, Frogpond, Volume 39 Number 3, Autumn 2016

dust devils - THE RED MOON ANTHOLOGY OF ENGLISH-LANGUAGE HAIKU 2016, edited by Jim Kacian & The Red Moon Editorial Staff, Red Moon Press, 2017

 

I also found this touching poem by Wesley McNair, apparently also written in 2016:

 

 

My Mother's Penmanship Lessons

By Wesley McNair

In her last notes, when her hand began

to tremble, my mother tried to teach it

 

the penmanship she was known for,

how to make the slanted stems

 

of the p's and d's, ...

 

Read the rest here. 

 

Finally, and what prodded me Thursday morning into fashioning this post, here's an NPR story called, "Cursive is back. But should students be learning the skill?" by Ava Berger on All Things Considered. My answer is an immediate, "Duh - yes!" but there are other opinions.  I loved reading about a teacher's middle school cursive club in Virginia.  What say you?

 

Please enjoy all of the poetic offerings this week at Tanita's blog, where she offers up the Poetry Sisters' March challenge as well as hosting. Thanks, Tanita!

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers!  I've missed you these past coupla weeks.  And now, it's almost St. Patrick's Day....!

 

I felt inclined to share some words by an Irish poet today, and one can't go wrong with Eavan Boland (1944-2020).

 

Amethyst Beads

by Eavan Boland

And when I take them out of
the cherrywood box these beads are
the colour of dog-violets in shadow. Then
at the well of the throat where
tears start
they darken. Now I wear at my neck an old stress
of crystal: an impression of earthly housekeeping.

 

... (Read the rest here.) 

 

I resonate with the tone of this poem this week, with its bit of myth, mothering, compromise, and wistfulness, though, honestly, I was in search of a bit of an escape from current events.  

 

Also, this poem brought to mind an interesting news/feature story from earlier this month. In case you missed it, scientists have discovered chimpanzees much prefer crystals over ordinary rocks.  (Click here to rabbit-hole that.)  What always surprises me is that scientists seem so surprised at these things.  Well, I've been a vegetarian for 38 years (vegan for the last several), because nothing surprises me about the intellectual or emotional capacity of animals. I mean, more than 98 percent of our DNA and all, and we humans certainly gravitate to bright shiny objects, right?

 

Wishing you a week with the passion of purple, the renewing green of St. Paddy's Day, and happy surprise reflections and refractions in whatever color you like!

 

Speaking of shiny objects, Linda at TeacherDance is kindly rounding us up this week with "more than a lucky penny"!  I always love reflecting with Linda. 

 

Off to go work in the Fairy Garden before the wee grands visit this weekend....

Woops!  Home this week, but Friday is rolling in faster than I was ready for it. And next week, I'm on the road Thurs. eve. and Friday morning. I miss everyone - and look forward to settling back into the clover patch here in mid-March.  This week, please paddle over the The Teche, where the talented Margaret has the Roundup.  She also has chicadees, swallowtails, and a lovely church interior.  And next Friday, get thee over to see the wonderful Karen Edmisten. Spring is on the horizon!