Seven Poets, Three Poems, One Virtual Reading
Susan Rowe w/Joseph Shea, Katrina Wright, Bob Swandby, Pam Holton, Alex Davis, and Sharon Hanson
Introduction to Renga Poetry
Renga is a collaborative form of poetry, originating in Japan some 700 years ago. In a renga poem, the first poet writes a stanza of three lines in a sequence of 5-7-5 syllables—what many will recognize as the Haiku form. Then a second person, drawing on the first stanza for inspiration, writes a couplet with seven syllables per line. The third poet then draws on this second stanza to write another three-line stanza of 5-7-5 syllables, and so on and so forth.
A renga poem gains its trajectory as each stanza builds on the previous one. However, each stanza stands in relation only to its immediate adjoining stanzas. For example, the third stanza is not read in relation to the first; instead, at the point of the third stanza, the first stanza has disappeared from the text. In this way, a renga poem is not a seamless whole, but a discontinuous series of five-line verse-links.
The unpredictable turns in a renga and the linkages between adjacent verses represent the Buddhist ideals that all life is at once impermanent and interdependent, qualities we have come to understand anew during this time of coronavirus quarantine.
One Virtual Reading
A Renga about Shelter
Between Susan Rowe, Joseph Shea, Katrina Wright
Clouds pointill blue sky
Blankets our slow spinning earth
These days, I look up
Blue white cirrus spreads out wide
Like a quilt against the chill
And I gasp under
The great expanse of unknown
But I do not drown
Through an avalanche of grief
Tender, hopeful stories rise
Darkness dissipates
One ray, three, then morning breaks
Red roses unfold
Blue banded bees turn pollen
Into gold, heads start banging
Thin walls must contain
In the hive and in our homes
Spring’s exuberance
Faint familiar melodies
Awake the disconsolate
Graceless creatures lie
Awake but do not grasp at
Ordinary things
Children grow with cherry trees
Voices sing, “We are home now”
Each child a blossom
Flushed with sweetness pink and white
Moves on so quickly
Like salmon yearn the ocean
We leave home for bigger seas.
It is hard to go
Flying seems much like fleeing
But we are pushed out
At the top of the food chain
Life is sweet, violent, short
Where is there refuge?
How does one escape from harm
On this spinning globe?
We look for these answers and
Find them in the little things
Severe clear blue air
That earthy scent of plowed fields
Enough, let us go!
Thankful for haven with friends
And the shelter found therein.
A Renga about Courage
Between Susan Rowe, Bob Swandby, Pam Holton
On my walk, a girl
Beams me a smile from her bike
“Look!! No training wheels!”
She laughs as her wheels wobble
Black curly hair blowing free
Might I fly away?
Might I soar high from this earth,
Mingle with the stars
Earthbound, we envy the birds
Who sing before worldly cares.
Koi swim peacefully
Relaxing in the warm sun
Earth, air, water one
Who tends earth, air, water, koi?
Filth! Blight! Heron devours koi.
Fox devours heron
Her kits mewl, frolic, grow strong
Stubborn life goes on.
Last night wind and rain blew hard
Everything refreshed again
Again and again.
Ebb, flow; wax, wane; death and life.
And where goes the soul?
Does she merge with other souls,
Or fill an alien void?
Soul is free and floats
It can merge or move alone
Bodyless freedom
If not for body, then how
Could warblers sing, children fly?
Imagination,
Voiceless, sings; without ears, hears;
Flies, tethered to earth.
Now is the time to fly free
Recreate a broken land
Heed our call to arms—
Linking, bracing, circling arms
Shore up faint courage!
Raise, arms, fists; defy discord,
Despair, bondage, disease, death.
Time for sea-change now!
All hands on oars will make it
Don’t forget kindness
Gives sweet strength for the journey,
As nectar fuels hummingbirds.
A Renga about Resilience
Between Susan Rowe, Alex Davis, Sharon Hanson
Ignored, neglected
My iris flowers return,
Green shoots spear dry earth
Purple they emerge at last
Brashly mocking disregard
Alma gifted me
An impossible flower—
Dandelion rose.
A marriage of opposites
Not expected to endure
Nip it now before
It buds, they said with sharp blades
Lop, clip, shear it off
Winter’s last gasp unfastens
White petals. “Welcome,” says Spring.
Fallen flowers stream
In rivulets of her rain
Circling sewer grates
Farewell! Take courage my friends
Riverbound the flower soup
River receives all,
Translates drifters into song
Notes—new currency.
What bends? Trees in wind—River
Banks acquiesce to currents.
Will to control slips away
Mush becomes calendar day
Determined to rise
With the brilliant orb once more
And risk dim failure.
Morning sun on Owyhees—
Or is that Orange Globemallow?
Curly Willow, dear?
Stroll-ers fuss outside the fence
Contorted Filbert!
We shape-shift as times demand,
Chrysalides in the dark.
The full moon’s baton
Guides this symphonic rhythm
Tides climb and retreat.
Unseen, an opening door
Tightrope toes on trust, belief
The urge to let go
rises; surely Spring returns
With or without us.
Reading recommendation? One Long River of Song by Brian Doyle
“Brian Doyle’s One Long River of Song, a collection of the late writer’s best essays, musings, and proems, the description he gave to his prose poetry. It’s a beautiful collection, easy to dip into because the pieces are short. I laughed out loud when I wasn’t tearing up. Doyle’s great gift to his readers is his insistence there is grace and beauty to be found even in life’s most painful moments. It’s a book for our times”
Susan Bruns Rowe writes and teaches in Boise, Idaho. Her writing has appeared in The Louisville Review, The Clackamas Literary Review, Brevity, Creative Nonfiction, and elsewhere. She serves on the editorial staff for the online magazine Literary Mama and teaches creative writing for The Cabin, the Osher Institute at Boise State University, and other organizations. Susan has an MFA in creative writing from Boise State University and an MA in philosophy, politics, and economics from Oxford University.