Poetry & Risk—Margaret Randall & the Journey of a Creative Life

By Mary Dezember

Margaret Randall is the author of more than 150 books of poetry and prose.

Her memoir released this year, I Never Left Home: Poet, Feminist, Revolutionary, a memoir of time & place (Duke University Press) combines many of her artistic talents: her creative non-fiction story punctuated by a selection of her poems and photography.

A page-turner, it details her life-long social and revolutionary activism. Her “first overtly political mission”—smuggling diaphragms from Tangiers to Spain—was to aid poverty-stricken women, many of whom birthed a baby annually. She states:

Franco was in power, birth control was outlawed, and the sale or use of any device limiting procreation was punishable by death (66).

As I read her story, I follow a remarkable, exciting yet rugged trek of her personal life, social activism and abounding creativity, from New York City, to New Mexico, to Spain, back to New Mexico, back to New York City, then to Mexico, to Cuba, to Nicaragua, and back to New Mexico—and with visits to many additional countries.

I will highlight just a few of the markers of Margaret’s journey of creativity, interspersed with my related observations, as subheads, about the creative life:

Wander INTO Art with Elaine Ritchel—What a Trip!

By Mary Dezember

Visual art is much more than decoration. Art doesn’t have to be merely viewed. Art provides an experience. Elaine Ritchel knows how to engage us with that experience.

Unlike tours that place you as audience for show-and-tell about the collection, Elaine Ritchel of Santa Fe Art Tours guides you into an image for a true art trip.

By Mary Dezember

Conflict and Non-Violent Resolution

Creative writers know conflict is an essential ingredient for compelling stories. The conflict can be internal or external, and often, it is both. Internal conflict that leads to character development makes captivating stories.

The steps taken by the protagonist to resolve the conflict hones the story for audience engagement.

Typically, with strong stories, protagonists (the stars of their own show) struggle and grapple with the conflict. An example is protagonist “rabbinical student” Leo Finkle of the wonderful and wonder-filled story “The Magic Barrel” by Bernard Malumud.

Leo doesn’t want to see the truth about himself (that he doesn’t know how to love), and yet, because he wants to be authentic and effective as a rabbi and husband, he:

• faces himself with honesty and introspection;

• experiences an epiphany about himself;

• changes for the better;

• acts on a resolution.

Specifically, Leo decides he must let go his set ideas about love, risk the uncertainty, and practice loving others.

By Mary Dezember

Come, she says. Let’s look at the New Mexico night sky.

Outside, in the stillness, above us, breaking through the veil of the universe, shining dots of light—pinpricks in the luminous darkness, revealing the Creator’s existence behind it all, behind what we see, pushing through to reach us.

These are your memories, she says.

“They are stars,” I say.

Let’s use our imagination, she says, continuing:

What you see is the light that lasts, for the act in each moment of your abundant life is far behind what is left. What is left is what you remember.

The act, as is true with many of these stars, no longer exists. What we have is the brightness of that moment, of what was. The star might be gone, but its light reaches us, shining as if it were still there.

Isolation is the perfect time to create. All creatives—inventors, visual artists, poets, authors, musicians, performers, filmmakers, the person behind the superhero mask —typically find that solitude helps the creative spirit to find us and become our Muse.

And when the act of creation happens, something magical happens. Creation creates. Our art takes over. Our characters make choices. Our poetry makes our hands flow over the keyboard or with the pen. The fiction becomes real. And we get to ride the thrilling waves and glide on the wings of it all.

Then, to ourselves, we read or view or listen to or perform our creations, marveling in what has happened—something from nothingness.

At this time, the thrill of creation seems to be all that is important about being a creative.

But then, a strange desire overwhelms us. Suddenly, we want to share this work of art.

Reading poetry by Rumi and by Hafiz are blissful life-walks with the Beloved.

Reading poetry by Teresa E. Gallion continues that walk, which soon becomes a hike, reminding us that while the state of living in bliss isn’t always, well, blissful, the Beloved always traverses the varying and often rough terrain of life with us.

Though influenced by hikes in New Mexico, Contemplation in the High Desert: Quatrains inspired by the Poetry of Rumi (Inner Child Press, 2011), is just what it is titled – a contemplative stroll, a walking meditation, as we saunter though the inspiring lyrical pages.

A total of eighty awesome quatrain poems, this book is perfect for reading a poem a day, allowing one’s mind and heart nearly three months of wandering and wondering, while embracing each day.

To experience non-representational visual art is passing through a magical portal into an enchanted landscape.

Entering the enchanted land of Tamar Kander’s art offers the viewer stepping-block paths through a rich interior landscape of life’s possibilities and the sense of satisfaction at the end of those steps — while we are sitting or standing right where we are.

Tamar states:

I attempt to expose the beauty hidden in the so-called mundanity of everyday life.

And Tamar does. In soul-stirring hues, Tamar’s paintings reveal beautiful shapes and textures that provide a progressive motion fluid as music.

Tamar states in her Artist Statement on her website:

My work is neither figurative nor abstract, rather I see it as a metaphor for experience. We all have collective memory, as well as highly individual thoughts and associations. The statements embodied in my work come ultimately from a place that I believe is present in all of us - a central core or spiritual store-house unique to each of us.

Yes to Mo’ Joe and Mo’ Zozo!

Whenever I am a bit gloomy, feeling trapped in a maze of pandemic haze, I have a fantastic solution for regaining joy…I simply do a bit of globetrotting with Zozobra and Joe the Poet!

Zozobra Poems by Jules Nyquist

Until Zozobra Poems by Jules Nyquist (Poetry Playhouse Publications), the legendary, happiness-affirming-giant-phoenix-puppet has only had a history — one recurring flaming night each year since 1924. But Jules gives Zozobra a life full of travel, engagement with others, and mundane tasks…all revolving around his great purpose in serving humanity….

Joe the Poet (and John Roche) — The Joe Poems, Mo’ Joe and Joe Rides Again

Thanks to John Roche, Joe the Poet traverses throughout the pages of two books – The Joe Poems: The Continuing Saga of Joe the Poet by John Roche (Foothills Publishing) and Mo’ Joe: The Anthology (edited by John Roche, published by Beatlick Press and Finalist for the 2015 NM/AZ Book Awards in Anthology).

Joe will ride again in a third book, the soon-to-be-published Joe Rides Again by John Roche.

Joe is a lively poet; John describes Joe as “a fully revealed avatar who [can] time-travel and incarnate in male, female, or other guises. He/she/it appeared in ancient Palestine, medieval Ireland, and even on an intergalactic space trawler”…

Though released in 2005, Off the Map – a film depicting the transcendent quality of art, New Mexico, earth, sky and sea – speaks to us today in our pandemic “moment.”

With leisurely progression, Off the Map is paced-for-the-patient. Why rush? is one message many of us are currently experiencing in our physical isolation. What better time than now to relax, breathe in the Zen-nature of Off the Map, hold in its themes, then breathe out with renewed patience.

Though Off the Map balances the border of romanticizing hardship with highlighting the dignity of families managing the stark realities of poverty, it does inspire this question – what do we truly need in our lives? …

…I’m excited because the artist who actually created the paintings is Stan Berning of Santa Fe, and today I will be virtually visiting live his studio and meeting him. And you can, too!  

…

Before bears in windows, before “street dance parties” in separate front yards, before communal singing from balconies, before all the creative ways that social distancing is bringing us socially closer, there was We Are Neighbors.

Published in early 2019, We are Neighbors: Albuquerque, NM speaks presciently to our current pandemic “moment” about the importance of connection and being neighbors in a world of personal isolation. We are Neighbors takes us into the wonder of wondering – in a caring way – about our neighbors.

In this collection – compelling prose poems and flash fiction by Hakim Bellamy with evocative photographs by Justin Thor Simenson of Albuquerque neighborhood scenes – the photographs show many trucks and cars, also corners and cacti and hydrants and shoes and porches and trees and shrubs (victim to “Manscaping”) and, of course, homes, homes, homes…but no people. Our neighbors are absent from our neighborhoods.