Welcome to the Monadnock School of Poetry Workshop Page!
What is The Monadnock School of Poetry Workshop?
A Sample from the workshop by Rodger Martin, In Pursuit of the Loon
A Sample from the workshop by Patricia Fargnoli, Invocation
A Sample from the workshop by Bill Garvey, Shuk-ran
A Sample from the workshop by Debra Cae Hurley, Prisoner
A Sample from the workshop by Jim Fowler, Skitchewaug
Some background by Rodger Martin....
First let me provide a
brief history of what we
now call The Monadnock School of Poetry Workshop meeting monthly at Del Rossi's
Trattoria in Dublin, New Hampshire. The workshop began over twenty years
ago at The Meeting School in Rindge. It was a group which included myself,
Gordon Korstange (who now lives, teaches and writes in Saxtons River, Vermont),
David Patterson of Mount Wachusett Community College and a few others.
During the next ten years, the workshop has met in The Jaffrey Inn, the
Fitzwilliam Inn and occasionally a member's home but the idea of an inn seemed to
work best because it provided a neutral backdrop plus occasional food and
drink. When Del Rossi's opened in 1990, their central location, commitment
to the arts, and good food provided the stable meeting place for the workshop
which then spawned the Poetry Sextet and all that has followed.
The workshop itself follows the standard concept
that those bringing work are looking to publish that work and response is
provided with that in mind. First, the poet is not permitted to speak
except in answer to questions of fact. Each member of the workshop
receives a copy, the piece is read twice-- once by the author, once by another
member of the group. Then criticism, often lively and dissenting, is
provided as if the piece had just been read in some journal. The
discussion usually is not so much directed to the author as to each other with
the author bearing the responsibility to note those thing he or she feels
appropriate. Once the discussion has exhausted itself, the group
moves on to the next piece. In order to prevent the poem from
becoming too molded by others, we discourage the poem ever being brought back to
the group except as we may hear the revision during or for a reading outside the
workshop.
The workshop has does
an annual reading at Del Rossi's each
spring in conjunction with The Monadnock School Writes of Spring
series. On the following pages are poems by the current members of the
workshop that have wended their way through the process.
By: Rodger Martin
In Pursuit of the Loon
Shuk-ran
I am in my office straightening the mess
in my IN basket so that to all who enter
it appears I know exactly what I'll be doing next,
when, suddenly, through some force of memory
or miracle of my olfactory, I am reminded
of my grandfather's lentil soup. The smell of it
wafts through the doorway and across my desk
as scantily as a negligee. I imagine someone's
cup of soup with his face on it, his Lebanese nose,
his lips permanently formed around the letter m.
I imagine his thick, brown broth bubbling
in a pot on a gas stove, the lens-shaped
seeds swelling with the flavor of his world -
lamb meat, grape leaves, unleavened bread
and lentil soup - until I hunger for more than lunch,
for a sea-side cafe in Beirut whispering the histories
of the Phoenicians, the Ottomans, Christians
and Druses. My waiter brings me a bowl
of hot soup. I thank him in Arabic as a breeze
from the sea blows the steam from my spoon.
Bill Garvey
first published in The Worcester Review,
Vol. XX
Prisoner
Contentment has his hand on my mouth
stifling my screams and dragging me down
to a green land
a land of pastured sheep and cudded cows
a land of brooks and maple trees.
My heartbeats slow and my eyelids droop
my limbs loose in the meadow grass
and I am nearly asleep.
The hawk keens on columns of sky.
Its shadow scythes the stalks
slashes a flicker across my face
but the grass has entwined through my fingers
and I am bound to the ground
dreaming
the sun sliding into the horizon.
Debra Cae Hurley
