Female Faith Poet-Tania Runyan
While pregnant with my second daughter (and busily parenting a toddler), I decided to create a “non-materialistic” Christmas for my extended family by writing a suite of Nativity poems as a gift. I wrote each poem from the point of view of someone present at the Nativity and the days immediately following–Mary, Joseph, an angel, a shepherd, Anna, and Simeon. I was especially drawn to writing from Mary’s perspective and continued writing in her voice after Christmas. Then I moved on to Eve and Sarah, again drawn to their experiences with pregnancy and motherhood. At that point, I got the idea of writing an entire book arranged around women in the Bible. I determined to finish the manuscript before Rebecca was born–then went on to revise it several more times!
“With one word they have hurled meTo the heavens. I cannot believe…”I don’t remember how I started that one, as it was written around a decade ago. But even with that excuse, it’s generally a hard question to answer! I usually start the process by freewriting rather stream-of-consciously and getting a “skeleton” idea of a poem. Then I isolate phrases I like and start forming lines and structure, changing, moving and sculpting as I go. It’s intuitive but not arbritrary, even if I have trouble explaining it! When it’s how it needs to be, I just know. Then when I look at it several months later, I change the lines all over again.
Regarding the example above, it’s set in couplets. Then in ‘Children of Near Death’ (Jairus’ Daughter) you begin, “Edward, Drowning” with triplets (and they’re not rhyming triplets). How does one decide such a thing?
I tend to write a lot in non-rhyming couplets or triplets, but again, I’m not entirely sure why. I just know when a poem needs one or the other (or something completely different, like no separate stanzas at all). Sometimes thoughts cross my mind–is there some sort of dualism here? Or a trinitarian theme? But usually my gut makes the decision, then a person smarter than I points out how it all works together. I like it when that happens.
I’ve always tried to squeeze in some time, whether it be before the kids wake up or after they go to bed (though I’m not a great night writer). The biggest help arrived in the form of an NEA grant, which helped me pay a sitter to watch my two younger kids a couple afternoons a week as I worked on Second Sky. Now all three kids are in school all day, but it’s still tough to fit in quiet writing time. Always so many distractions, and it’s easy to get distracted from the hard work of poetry. Retreats and conferences do give me little boosts throughout the year. Often I generate several rough “skeletons” at a place like the Glen Workshop then work on them at home in the following months.
I started off wanting to be a playwright but found myself obsessing over the rhythm and sound of dialogue over anything else. Plot stressed me out. As I became more deeply immersed in poetry, I ended up choosing it as an emphasis for both my undergrad and graduate degrees. That said, I’ve been writing quite a bit of prose this past year or so, experimenting with flash fiction and writing creative nonfiction regularly for Image Journal’s Good Letters blog. I released How to Read a Poem, which, though about poetry, is prose. My wheels are turning again about writing another nonfiction book.
Read poetry. Read it slowly and savor it, even if you don’t think you “get” it. The words will slowly infiltrate your bloodstream and enrich your life.
