Tuesday, July 2, 2024

devorah major : Process Note #41

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 process note and poems by devorah major are part of her curriculum for Maker, Mentor, Muse and her poetry classes at the University of San Francisco. Thanks for reading.

 

 

 

Every book is different, and I don’t have a singular recipe I can whip up to get to my method for creating a complete collection of poems that has some kind of distinct form, texture and flavors. But for me, each book of my poetry should have a thru line. It is story that carries no plot, no easy beginning, middle and end and yet, like an improvised jazz set, has an emotional and, in best cases, spiritual arc that can leave a reader satisfied.  Or looked at from a different angle I try to create a through line like the chain that carries a string of pearls, each one distinct, some larger than others, with whole becoming more than the sum of its parts. I must say that I have always preferred freshwater pearls to cultured pearls because of the many free form shapes they take while still being luminescent. But that it a different conversation, except in so far as it reflects my eschewing of poetry forms most of the time, as well as the cultured constructs of upper and lower case script and typical punctuation conventions. 

Of course, there is a reason why this poem is first and that one second and then that other one closes the book.  Many people do not, at least initially, read each, or possibly any book of poetry in the order it was constructed. A poet friend of mine always reads the first poem and then the last and then returns to the beginning and reads the book in the poet’s created order.  I cut a book open (think of cutting a bible) and read whatever poem reveals itself to me. I move to the poem after it and the one before. I then also read the first and last poems and from there decide if I will follow the pre-planned road or roam around the book as I will. I have no idea when or why I created this way of getting to know a volume of poetry. I do think that my reading style has shaped my process in wanting to create a good read that will naturally, seamlessly carry the poem from each poem to the next.

That said, when deconstructing my process of creating califia’s daughter, I started with my intention, which was to create a (more) personal book that revealed more of myself than I typically do and also continually placed me, placed the we who is called humanity in a context which stretched, like us, to and from the stars.  Although it has sections, they are untitled.  I wanted to create the sense of a road turning more than different rooms in one house.  Thus, creating and defining the earth, cosmos, us, me is followed by poems about family and connections to the land, the past, followed by language, silences and death, and culminating in love.  Yet the poems overlap these divisions and create other pathways.

We each are born in a place and that gives shape and substance to who we are and may make us see who and what we are and are not.  I was born, raised and have lived my life in California, a land replete with myth, mystery, history hidden and denied and a plethora of cultures and languages, rhythms and environments that seem to encourage one to look in and out.

While Turtle Island may loosely define the United States of America land mass, California has no one indigenous name. The Spanish, however, were steadily giving out names to counties, coastlines and the state as a whole.  I found it fascinating to learn that California itself was named after a (possibly) mythical African queen named Califia. Although I knew from my own history classes and readings, chief among them They Came Before Columbus by esteemed historian Ivan Van Sertima, that people of African descent had arrived on this continent before Europeans. In fact, the Mandinka, the people from who the Califia story comes, had reached Southern California in the 16th century, I did not know that California’s name had African roots, as do I.  Also, my recent, one hundred fifty plus years, family are (Caribbean) island people. Thus, in multiple ways I am a daughter of Califia.


califia’s song

my heart does not sing songs
of hate, fear, or regret

for my name will be braided
into the lightening of time

califia, daughter
of sea‑faring mandinka

queen of amazon defenders
tamer of wild beasts     

i have ridden the backs of griffins
to come to these rocks

where clothed in sea crystals
draped gold and the evening’s wind

i savor freedom’s harvest

Defining and creating these strands of overlapping and inter-laced poems was fairly organic. Putting califia’s daughter together was for me not unlike what I understand as considerations in the making of a quilt.  I did not have a preset pattern but did want to create more than a random patchwork, which admittedly does have its own beauty. As with a quilt the textures and colors had to be considered, the rhythms that were created by putting this swatch next to that had to be evaluated. I picked a number of poems which my gut told me went together and then printed them and read them often out loud looking for patterns, correspondence and conflicts. I read and sorted creating three poem stacks and piled poems into a “yes” pile into where I saw a concordance, near a pile of maybes, and then finally a pile of nos. I then used the yes poems to establish streams or paths and went through the maybes to see if any fit those streams.  Then I returned to my computer files and sometimes journals to mine more appropriate poems. Throughout all of this I am editing and re-editing not just the poems’ flow but each individual poem.  When placed in proximity to another I can often see the rough edges of a poem with more clarity, become aware of the over-used word, the flaccid ending or trite opening.  After all of that I look for gaps in the through line and find poems to fill those spaces. Overlapping the sections, as mentioned above, were cross threads, not unlike weft and warp of a woven cloth.  As you can see, textiles, made of multiple parts and often colors informed my thinking on the construction of this book of poetry.

califia’s daughter, in its own way, travels from birthing as place

earth memories


water
heat

color
everywhere

wings
fur
flesh

roots
gossamer and rope

seed   sea
loam and sand

an infinite ability
to birth
to heal
to kill
to die

the shape of wind
its sound

and birthing as act

 

 

creation paradox

we hold the great-great
grandparents of our ancestors'
grandparents
in our bloodstreams
in our stomachs
in our hearts

thousands of years
rest inside our souls

in those years lives the record
of our beginning
it is the sweetest marrow in our spine 
the cleanest shine in our eyes   
the open side of our laughter

you can read it in the lines
on the soles of our feet

when we retell the stories
of where we came from
we draw back tree branches
to find hidden fruits which we savor
pointed thorns which make us bleed
the yesterdays that led to here
the here that leads to tomorrow

when we go back to the beginning
we find the stars

in the beginning there was a time
we all say
when we were not

after that time we became

we were created
we were molded
we were spat out
we were sung into

until we learned
how to make
what to form
where to spit
why to sing

but once
long ago
in the beginning

there was only one
and from the one
others were born
and out of those many
came us

that is the story
we all tell

but
before that beginning
before the in the beginning
beginning when we were born

there must have been
another beginning

before the spider crafting web
laying sixteen eggs
before the mountain birthing lovers
birthing children
before the sky settling low
to mate with earth
before light
before darkness
before breath even

there must have been
another beginning

a beginning that lives
in a place we call
unknowable

yet is braided
into our genealogies

and it is said that
it is in this beginning
the beginning before our beginning

it is there that you must go
if you want to find
the faces of god

thousands of years
thousands and thousands of years
rest inside our souls
,

to growth and ancestry,

 

returning home

1.

a boy in  khaki shorts and sandals,
loped down the packed dirt road
black skin sweating years of sun kisses
a large package balanced on his head

as we rode to aunt margaret’s new providence house
with her avocado trees weighted with ripe fruit

africa i queried my father, who drove the tree-lined narrow street
bahamas he answered, but yes in many ways the same, home

2.

eleuthera rocky and green, dressed in smooth white and pink beaches
adorned with empty conch shells humming deeply, home

the ancestors accepted this long thin island as their home
despite hurricane whirl and growl, our family was planted

and we grew thick and lush, spreading branches
bearing fruit under her skirts  until she gently urged us out 

 

through deaths

 

only in dreams

for my father

 

only in dreams
your voice the silence of a dark cave
your skin walnut brown wrinkled around smiling eyes

your voice the silence of a dark cave
who you are/were is the lesson of stars, distant galaxies
the jar of spices- paprika, rubbed sage, garlic granules needs replenishing

who you are/were is the lesson of stars, distant galaxies
i am caught up in tears odd moments, feeling absence as chasm
knowing my shape twisted and sublime is a constant reflection of you

i am caught up in tears odd moments, feeling absence as chasm
yet you still bring me the orange of nasturtiums, the sweetness of plum
it’s like when I was a child and everything was forever new

you still bring me the orange of nasturtiums, the sweetness of plum
your skin walnut brown wrinkled around smiling eyes
only in dreams

 to conversations surrounding life and lives ending with love which, for me, is the glue of it all.

with arms open


i embrace you love
though i have at times
hidden from your touch
because i thought you smothered me
required that i be the air
for others to breathe
the water for others to drink

i embrace you love
though i have at times
denied your advances
knowing that for me to accept your gifts
i must offer those of my own

i embrace you love
having known you
as ladder and crutch 
when i wanted to dance,
to walk, to sit in stillness

i embrace the dreams you send me
and the tears that spill in moments
when you crack open my heart
to remind me how full it is
of star shine and silk 

i embrace you love
who will not catch me when i fall
but instead advise me to swim
in your surging waters

i embrace you love
though you know no forgetting
and insist i continue to feed
on your fruit of forever

ever more powerful
you make me claim you
as intimate companion

To conclude my process for writing this book was organic, intentional and intuitive, was a form of weaving, of quilting of braiding, was walking down connected roads to see where they met, was trusting that the poems would lead me where I needed to go.

devorah major June 2024  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Born and raised in California, granddaughter of immigrants, documented and undocumented, devorah major served as San Francisco’s Third Poet Laureate (2002-2006). A baker of pies and lover of jazz, her poetry has carried her to many countries where she has performed with and without musicians. In 2022 she received the Regina Coppola International Literary Award in Italy where her sixth book of poetry, with open arms, was released in a bilingual edition in 2020. A Willow Press Editor’s Choice her seventh book of poetry, Califia’s Daughter, was published by Willow Press in 2020. She is always looking to build a better world and uses her science fiction stories as one voice in Afro-Futurism. She will put down her pen to march and call for justice. In terms of other publications, she has four poetry chapbooks, two novels, two biographies for young adults, and a host of short stories, essays, and individual poems published in anthologies and periodicals. Ms. major is featured on a number of CDs including Fierce//Love and The Tongue is a Drum as a part of Daughters of Yam, a poetry and jazz performance duo. She has performed as poet and actress with First Voice productions of Song of the City in 2022 and Soul of the City in 2023. Trade Routes, a commissioned symphony with spoken word and chorus, premiered under Maestro Michael Morgan and the Oakland East Bay Symphony in 2006. In June 2015, major premiered her poetry play Classic Black: Voices of 19th Century African Americans in San Francisco at the San Francisco International Arts Festival. devorah major flourishes with cross-genre interactions and has had productive creative collaborations with musicians, composers, painters, storytellers and writers.

Maw Shein Win’s most recent poetry collection is Storage Unit for the Spirit House (Omnidawn) which was 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. She is the inaugural poet laureate of El Cerrito, CA. Win's previous books include full-length poetry collection Invisible Gifts and two chapbooks, Ruins of a glittering palace and Score and Bone. Win often collaborates with visual artists, musicians, and other writers and her Process Note Series features poets on their process. She teaches in the MFA Program at the University of San Francisco. Along with Dawn Angelicca Barcelona and Mary Volmer, she is a co-founder of Maker, Mentor, Muse, a new literary community. Win’s full-length collection Percussing the Thinking Jar (Omnidawn) is forthcoming in Fall 2024. mawsheinwin.com