The 'process notes' pieces were originally solicited by Maw Shein Win as addendum to her teaching particular poems and poetry collections for various workshops and classes. This poem “Moon Jellies” by Lisa Rosenberg was part of her curriculum for The O‘ahu Writers Retreat at Camp Mokulē‘ia, on the island's North Shore in April of 2022.
Synopsis: This poem began in awe, with passion and drive. I reached a point of being stuck toward the end, for three or four years. Then, a single word—in a flash of insight (very obvious in retrospect)—plus a willingness to let go of my initial beloved closing metaphor, and a process of working with sound patterns, allowed it to find a landing place that fit imagistically and rhythmically.
Details: The initial impulse was seeing the novel moon jelly exhibit at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I was struck by the jellies’ shapes and movements; and after reading the display placard, I was more than struck: their interior, flower-like structure was actually rows of eggs. I was thinking a lot about fertility at the time. And so it was a crashing together of desire and curiosity and awe and some wounding, too, like envy.
My poems usually start when I hear a fragment of rhythmic language. I think I began this piece more entranced by visuals, reaching toward imagery for the egg rows, which to me looked like an electric filament. I tried to animate that many, many times, but it sounded overworked. I continued to marvel at the jellies’ movement, and explore other images. When the dactyl “AN-i-mate” arrived, I had a rhythmic lead. I could feel the tone (admittedly authoritative, Plathian) come in, and was able to make my way down to the clumsy spine and opacity part, but couldn’t transition well through the eggs and make them become like a bright, fiery filament in a bulb.
I let the poem be, set aside, in that awkward state of mostly realized but lacking an important part (!). I shared it, intermediate though it was, at a reading or two. I took it up occasionally, making small revisions, aware that I didn’t yet know whatever it was that would help me leap into the last part.
After a few years of small revisions, I began questioning myself about how I really felt when I read the placard, and probably dipping into my hardbound thesaurus, too (it was the early 2000s), then questioning myself some more, and the word stung jolted in. Also a sense of…duh, it’s a jellyfish. The rest of the poem unfolded from there, and a few small adjustments fell into place above it—including enough concrete stuff that I could be a little abstract about my own eggs and structure. I heard a cool assonance with “rows” and “skull,” and some satisfying end-line spondees (my faves, as found elsewhere in the poem). The “hot flower” conjured a filament-like thing through cleaner diction, although it felt slightly indulgent to my inner editor. “Clear skull” felt like a gift arriving at the right time. All this to say that returning to, and staying in, a mode of wonder and curiosity helped me re-enter the experience, and resume making the poem-in-progress.
Envoi: Probably TMI, but I submitted the poem to a lit mag’s annual contest. In a heartening sweep of synchronicity, a letter from that journal arrived in the mail on the same morning I was heading to the hospital for a gritty fertility workup test (the infamous hysterosalpingogram). The poem had won the contest, came with a very fat check, and detailed, gracious notes from both the editor and the judge, who saw intriguing things I had not been aware of or considered. The image of light-filled, fluid jellies stayed with me through the test procedure, and onward.
Moon Jellies
Animate
in the back-lit
black tank
you fly–––
lace-edged
ghost bells,
propelled
by such grace
as I cannot
match with my
clumsy spine,
my
opacity,
the aging truths
inside me unseen
and unborn,
stung
by the fact of
your
eggs in arced rows:
hot flower
in a clear skull.
“Moon Jellies” is from A Different Physics (Red Mountain Press) by Lisa Rosenberg, © 2018. It first appeared in The Bitter Oleander (Vol. 9, No. 2) as winner of the 2003 Frances Locke Memorial Award, judged by Christine Boyka Kluge; Paul B. Roth, Editor.
Lisa Rosenberg is the author of the poetry collection A Different Physics (Red Mountain Press) and recent essays ranging from the phenomenon of flight, to the burdens of memorabilia, and poetics as applied systems. Formally trained in physics and poetry, she worked as an engineer in the space program, and is a frequent speaker on the confluence of arts and sciences. Many of her public events and workshops explore the shared territory of systems skills essential to our modes of inquiry and enterprise. Lisa served as the 2017-2018 Poet Laureate of San Mateo County, California, and is the recipient of a Leonardo@Djerassi Residency, Wallace Stegner Fellowship, and MOSAIC America Fellowship. Her poems and essays appear in venues such as POETRY, The Threepenny Review, The Common, Amsterdam Quarterly, Ruminate, Organizational Aesthetics, and California Fire & Water: A Climate Crisis Anthology. www.LisaRosenberg.com
Maw Shein Win's most recent poetry book is Storage Unit for the Spirit House (Omnidawn) nominated for the Northern California Book Award in Poetry, longlisted for the PEN America Open Book Award, and shortlisted for CALIBA's Golden Poppy Award for Poetry. Win's previous collections include Invisible Gifts (Manic D Press) and chapbooks Ruins of a glittering palace (SPA) and Score and Bone (Nomadic Press). She is the inaugural poet laureate of El Cerrito and often collaborates with visual artists, musicians, and other writers. mawsheinwin.com