Five Steps to Your Creative Vision Plan

July 31, 2023 Poet Voice2 Comments

And I/like the moth orchid/

open my petals to the moon

tides swell in me/I wax/I wane

She gives birth/The orchid blooms

My child-self takes form/Ink flows like blood
“Full Moon” by Jacquelyn Markham, from Rainbow Warrior (2023 Finishing Line Press, reprinted with permission)

The waxing moon is in Capricorn until around midnight, July 31, ET (NY) and slides into Aquarius on August 1, Lunar Lammas, a super full moon, the first of two August supermoons! So, wow! lunar energy in abundance as we wind down the summer in full Leo season (in the western hemisphere.)

A new moon rises in Leo on August 16, great energy for focusing on implementing your vision for yourself.

Before we spin around August and enter the moon in Aquarius though, we have a little time to finalize tasks of the Capricorn moon, including setting clear short-term goals (astrological guidance from the We’Moon calendar, learn more here: We’Moon). So, how about a plan for yourself and your creativity?

Does this sound dreary to you creatives out there? Does the phrase Strategic Plan make your eyes glaze over? I understand, but it’s really more rewarding & creative than you might think. Some years ago as an arts consultant for Kentucky Peer Advisory Network (KPAN), I traveled to arts organizations large and small and assisted them with grants, board development, marketing, and yes, strategic planning! That was a great gig except for the driving on mountain roads without guard rails and the long roads to western Kentucky (I was living in Lexington at the time). But, I digress. As an arts consultant, however, I did learn the importance of having a plan to focus your creativity.

My way of making this process of creating a Strategic Plan more fun is to think of it as a *Vision* for my creative life. So, still in the middle of moon in Capricorn, I set about to work on my Vision Plan and finished the details as the clock slipped into today, July 31, while the moon is still in Capricorn.

What about you, dear readers? Want to give it a try? I focused my plan on short term goals from now until December 2023. Here’s the step-by-step process:

Step 1: Write your vision statement. Your vision statement is futuristic and should inspire you. Mine is only three sentences long and I’ve written it in gold ink at the top of a new page in my journal.

Step 2: Next, write your mission statement which differs from but grows out of your vision statement. There are many resources on this process of writing a mission statement (search Strategic Plan) but think simply. What is it you do or want to do everyday? Focus on the present. Keep it brief.

Step 3: Now, short term goals that fit within your vision and your mission. I settled on five, but worked through several pages of writing to see the difference in the goals and the tasks it would take to accomplish them. You could focus on three (a nice number) or more if you are energetic, but I suggest no more than seven. Can some of the short term goals be moved to long term goals, for example?

Step 4: The details, the tasks, the baby steps! What tasks will be needed to meet these goals? (You can break up tasks to smaller baby steps, too.)

Step 5: Create a timeline and in January 2024, review and revise for the new year!

Now that you have carved out the details of your Vision Plan, enjoy the three lunations of August and start to collaborate and network while the moon is full in Aquarius. And always, always, celebrate the fullness and beauty of the full moon and your own accomplishments coming to fruition.

And remember to celebrate your vision plan for the creativity in your life!

How a Spiral Garden Changed My Life

July 22, 2023July 24, 2023 Poet VoiceLeave a comment

This story is a response to a question from Jeff Brown who on the SC Writers Association Facebook feed asked about our favorite piece of writing. I responded:

“I have never thought of having a “favorite piece” of my writing. I write it and it has a life of its own. But, I suppose it would have to be “Story Circle,” a little known and unpublished feminist choreopoem I wrote while at Wolfpen Writers Colony in Prostpect, Kentucky.”

That residency was a month long stay awarded by the Kentucky Women’s Foundation who continues to support women, for example, with the Sallie Bingham Award. That month at Wolf Pen literally changed my life.

So, while I was busy musing on Jeff’s first question, he asked how that experience changed my life. Now, that sent me down another spiral path and here is my musing on that question.

So, other than the obvious—a month away from responsibilities and camaraderie with other writers– it was a combination of cosmic experiences that changed me. Under the dark skies of Kentucky, bonfires throughout the night, a studio far from the living quarters (where my room overlooked a spiral garden), and a library of stimulating material all played a part.

The library belonged to Sallie Bingham, the founder of Ky Women’s Foundation and an amazing writer herself. All these experiences were catalysts for the choreopoem, “Story Circle,” in the vein of Ntozake Shange’s “For Colored Girls Who Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf.”

“Story Circle,” my original chorepoem, is about healing & transformation, so the writing of it was healing. Though I had been an advocate for women since the 70s, I began to focus on healing and empowerment in my life, writing, and advocacy.

*Poet leading a healing chant in the 1990’s*

So when I returned to Athens where I taught at The University of Georgia for 12 years, I was driving down the road when the words “Spiral Dynamics” came to me even though I didn’t know what they meant at the time. Shortly, I founded Spiral Dynamics Women’s Resource and Cultural Exchange. In the 90s women’s studies programs were struggling to be born. Of course, I was on the steering committee for Women’s Studies courses at UGA, but wheels turn slowly in academia and I was impatient, so I founded Spiral Dynamics to promote women’s endeavors–in writing, art, music, and business. Spiral Dynamics never technically become a nonprofit but I simply did whatever I wanted to do, for example, raising money to bring the powerful Luisah Teish, Yoruban priestess to town. It was a memorable time to those who attended with Teish (as she likes to be called) leading us in healing and ceremony.

Spiral Dynamics was quite dynamic for years until it was time to transform the energy into something new. I was hired to implement an SBA grant for a women’s business center, coming full circle since the job was back in Kentucky! I was not an MBA; I was a poet and a professor, but by virtue of my work with women’s businesses through Spiral Dynamics, I was hired. I cut my ties with Georgia and headed into a completely different chapter of my life all from the vision of the spiral garden under my window at the Hopscotch House (Wolf Pen Writers Colony).

And that’s the short story! To be continued in my memoir.

Feed the Creative Mind with Emotional Energy of Venus Retrograde

July 19, 2023July 21, 2023 Poet VoiceLeave a comment

Bonjour, dear readers!

How is your Circling coming along? (See yesterday’s blog post – 7/18.) We have only just begun!

I had an interesting outcome from my Circle activity as I learned my sadness had sprung from my joy and I had lost sight of that joy due to isolation from the heat wave and an attitude that needed adjustment! Ah, a worthy morning of writing, for sure!

This technique of Circling has helped me and many of the people in my workshops to gather together the scattered parts of our lives. Whatever your creative outlet, you can use Circling. Today, add another approach. Draw a larger circle and write around it the names of people, places, or things important to your life. From this simple activity, you may begin to see themes and continuity. In the meantime, you are excavating and collecting a pile of raw material to work from as you dig for the gold!

Only five minutes to devote to creativity at the moment? Add to your Circle. Ten minutes? Choose one of your people, places or things (or joys and sorrows from yesterday) and write continuously for 5 or 6 minutes. Are you ready to devote a few hours? Keep going and repeat the process until as poet Denise Levertov said, “the feeling warms the intellect.” At this point in your process, a poem, story, or painting may appear.

Today we enter the shadow of Venus Retrograde. There are many wonderful and knowledgeable astrologers available to us (as well as books and resources) one of whom is Leah Whitehorse. I learned so much from her interpretation of this planetary event. Venus has been associated with love for centuries, but Venus means so much more than romantic love–love of self, universal love, and all things we value and hold dear. On another day, we will touch on other aspects of the goddess Venus. We have a few months until the planet stations direct and exits the shadow zone!

Venus & Cupid, painted by Artemisia Gentileschi in 1625. The Italian artist depicts sleeping Venus who is wearing nothing except a thin wisp of transparent linen around her thigh. This painting can be viewed at Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, US.

At the same time that Venus enters the shadow zone, the moon in Leo increases urging us to express ourselves and share. (Learn more here from We’Moon)

And planet Earth is doing its part to influence our creativity! Rebelling against mistreatment and neglect, extremes of weather, like heat waves, fires, smoke, and drought impact us as climate change escalates. Our environment, too, permeates our psyche as we create. You may be moved to create a Circle of the Natural World and elaborate on some of it. What moves you to respond: water, birds, trees, mountains, icebergs, polar bears, pileated woodpeckers, the rainforest—Which of these natural phenomena moves you to write, paint, sing, play music for/about?

In my latest book, Rainbow Warrior, available from Finishing Line Press, I both lament the “last Imperial Woodpecker,” extinct from logging (last seen in Mexico in 1956) and celebrate “a rare sighting of Flickers that grace my world./Crescent breast like new moon rising crimson. . .” (“Flicker Montage”).

Spirit Daughter (Jill Wintersteen) is another popular astrologer you may want to check out. She tells us “Where Mercury Retrograde tends to disrupt and confuse mental energy, Venus Retrograde tends to disrupt and confuse emotional energy.” I recommend Spirit Daughter’s analysis too!

In your creative process, try to explore emotions that may surface or those that may stay submerged in confusion during Venus Retrograde (affecting us through October 7). We can also benefit from the increase of creative and physical energy brought on by the moon waxing to full.

Try out the Circling technique from my original journal method as you tune in to moon stars, earth, and self. As I write this and the temperature soars as does our air quality index, I want to return to my Circle of Nourishment and nourish myself as well as extend nourishment to others. I hope you will do the same.

Creatively yours, Jacquelyn

author of Rainbow Warrior, Reclaiming Yourself: A Journal Keeping Approach to the Goddess Within (c1991), & other titles.

Creative Guidance from Moonflower Mentoring!

July 17, 2023July 18, 2023 Poet Voice6 Comments

Aligning creativity with New Moon in Cancer

Aloha dear readers!

It is officially the new moon here in Eastern time in the US of A. I have a question for you that I pose to myself each day: how can I spark my creativity in alignment with the earth, the moon and the planets?

Today, July 17, the new moon is in Cancer and the wonderful We’Moon calendar published by Mother Tongue Ink (an essential part of my daily life for more than three decades) notes that during the Moon in Cancer, we reconnect with our emotions. We can get “defensive” or “nourish ourselves,” the 2023 We’Moon continues (p. 203).

As I sat at my writing desk, my neighbor decided it was a good time to use a loud leaf blower so close to my window I thought he was working in my yard! Oooohhh! I shall not get defensive, I thought! I will nourish myself. So, I turned my music up loud and fixed a lovely meal and glass of iced mint sun tea! Yum. And guess what? Now there is sweet silence as I put my musings together, in hopes of sparking your creativity as well as mine!

A lovely meal while the leaf blower passes. . .

The Circle technique, part of my original journal method, moves us away from linear thinking. So begin by drawing some circles on your journal page (or a blank piece of paper). Label three to work with the energy of the new moon in Cancer: Circles of nourishment, circles of sadness, circles of joy (see image).

Next, write around the circles, thoughts, images, ideas. Circle one, circle of nourishment, ways you could nourish yourself. Circle two, circle of sadness, some emotions of sadness you are feeling. Circle three, circle of joy, what gives you joy?

images by Timmi M. Weingartz, created for *Reclaiming Yourself: A Journal Keeping Approach to the Goddess Within* by Jacquelyn Markham, c. 1991

Next, do it! Nourish yourself with some of the lovely things you could do for yourself. Is it calling a friend? Fixing a yummy salad and enjoying it? Taking a well-deserved nap or walk if your weather permits? Just, do it!

Now, you move on to your circle of sadness and circle of joy. Select one sad feeling and one joyful feeling. Write for five minutes on each feeling in an automatic writing fashion (sometimes called freewriting). Most importantly, don’t stop, just write (set your timer). If your mind goes blank, simply repeat your name, colors, birds, flowers or the last word you wrote. It’s that easy!

After this circling, you may want to circle more or circle back to one of your other feelings or move forward with a poem, a painting, a reflection, or simply be satisfied that you have begun the process of creating in synch with the moon. You may create something–a poem, a story, creative prose, art–from these early musings or may you may circle back around to pick up the threads.

As of midnight eastern time on Tuesday the 18th, the moon moves into Leo and that gives us about 2 ½ days to “let our light shine” (We’Moon, p. 203). Signing off to elaborate on my circles of sadness & joy and to continue to nourish myself.

Creatively yours, Jacquelyn (Moonflower Mentoring)

Moonflower Mentoring

July 1, 2023June 17, 2024 Poet Voice3 Comments

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Dr. Markham uses a variety of approaches to suit each person’s creative process:

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In person and virtual options available. To learn more about Moonflower Mentoring:

Email: Moonflower Mentoring at jacquiepoet3@gmail.com

creativity, mentoring, poet voice

Aftermath of PAD 2023

May 2, 2023May 2, 2023 Poet VoiceLeave a comment

*Siren Song, watercolor by poet, c. J. Markham, 2023*

Hello loyal readers,

In the aftermath of the poem-a-day challenge, I want to add a few poems that slipped by with the fast pace of my literary life since my book Rainbow Warrior was released!

On Day 10 of the poem-a-day challenge, I was uninspired to write a “shanty” poem although many of my poet friends were loving it. No, it was not coming to me!

This was the prompt from Maureen at NaPoWrimo: “I’m playing to my own strengths here, but I challenge you to write a sea shanty (or shantey, or chanty, or chantey — there’s a good deal of disagreement regarding the spelling!) Anyway, these are poems in the forms of songs, strongly rhymed and rhythmic, that sailors might sing while hauling on ropes and performing other sea-going labors.”

Although some of my kindred poets were writing away, I just couldn’t imagine a poem/song to be sung while loading or unloading a ship, etc., so I slipped to day eleven and continued.

Now, I’ve decided to use a poem to the sea from an earlier time to make up my day 10 challenge! Below is the poem: “Offering to Yemanya.” Shout out to Ed Madden, in whose workshop I wrote this poem some years ago (sponsored by the Poetry Society of South Carolina).

Offering to Yemanya

Sometimes the river beckons me

to pipe an offering.

I push my breath through my silver flute.

Sun sparks my notes to Yemanya,

acrobats on the river blue,

somersaults to St. Helena Sound,

gold melodies crest to the sea.

Jacquelyn Markham

Day 30 “The Return of Love: A palinode” PAD 2023

April 30, 2023 Poet Voice5 Comments

*“Painting my heart out”–acrylic painting by the poet*

My poem for Day 30, the final poem of poem-a-day challenge, reflects a retraction of my position on disappointment in love put forward in many poems, including “Hyena,” (day 5); “Sonnet on Love,” (day 9); “Affairs of the Heart: Claims & Warnings,” (Day 16); and “somewhere i travelled beyond good sense,” (Day 25). As I retract my position on love, instead of bitterness and disappointment, I will reverse some of the lines from these poems. Why am I doing changing my tune? I am responding to the prompt below and writing a “palinode.”

Maureen’s prompt: “write a palinode – a poem in which you retract a view or sentiment expressed in an earlier poem. For example, you might pick a poem you drafted earlier in the month and write a poem that contradicts or troubles it. This could be an interesting way to start working on a series of related poems. Alternatively, you could play around with the idea of a palinode by writing a poem in which the speaker says something like “I take it back” or otherwise abandons a prior position within the single poem.”

The Return of Love: a palinode

I waved goodbye from the closed car window,

laughing like a hyena, louder than the wheels

humming on the highway. Then,

the highway turns toward home & you.

Words don’t fit like a puzzle, but

drop like a stone & your once warm

embrace turns chill until sun slips from

behind the cloud & it’s all bright gold.

I asked a fortune teller if I should

continue this time. She predicted

an affair of endless love.

I must retract my earlier bitter words!

My sword-pierced heart flip flops. So, i

send him these words that e.e. shared

“your slightest look easily will unclose me

though I have closed myself as fingers.”

I whisper “rose is a rose is a rose” & shout

“How do I love thee, let me count the ways?”

Jacquelyn Markham (4/30/2023)

Day 29 Pierogi Speaks to Babcia PAD 2023

April 29, 2023August 17, 2023 Poet VoiceLeave a comment

*Pierogi image courtesy of Kingarthurbaking.com*

The prompt: “Start by reading Alberto Rios’s poem “Perfect for Any Occasion.” Now, write your own two-part poem that focuses on a food or type of meal. At some point in the poem, describe the food or meal as if it were a specific kind of person. Give the food/meal at least one line of spoken dialogue.”

In 2022, I was pleased to be featured by Maureen and Napowrimo with my poem “Kielbasa Speaks to the Vegetarian of Polish Descent,” so for this food poem, I wanted to stay with the Polish theme and Pierogis came to mind. Here’s what came out of my meditation on Pierogis! I wish I had some sizzling in butter right now!

Poem removed by Poet Voice for revision and publication elsewhere.

Day 28 Index poem PAD 2023

April 28, 2023 Poet Voice3 Comments

Before we delve into day 28, I want to say that I am so excited to have been selected as featured poet for Day 27 by Maureen, the matrixmind of the Napowrimo site for my “Yellow Celosia of Hope” poem. Thank you Maureen! So happy I have persevered and wrote the poem as well as planted my Celosia in the garden yesterday (I really did!)!

Now, I’ve written a slightly playful, fairly esoteric poem in response to day 28 prompt. I used the interesting index in my old poetry handbook from a time when books still had an extensive index, copyright 1940! For those who would like a definition of the term consonance, here’s one from the poetry foundation. I include one snippet from my index that inspired me.

A consonance to death

Did the Daemon Lover have dactyl words and feet?

Oh, no, he was just a daffy-down-dilly!

Villon’s Des Dames du Tempts Jardis would

not have a thing to do with that dilly!

“I can understand that,” said the

Daughter of the North as she danced away

to “Danty Baby Danty”!

No worries, the Earth Turn South

by morning, if we can make it

through the night despite Eidolons

lurking over the bed. Eidolons—

Eidolons? Eidolons! Is there

an echo in here? No, it’s only

the baby’s Echolalia.

Yes, a baby, no death,

perhaps a consonance to death

will do, bath, myth, broth

or sleuth will suffice!

No death, just truth, after all,

it’s the end of a perfect day!

Jacquelyn Markham (4/28/2023)

3 responses to “Day 28 Index poem PAD 2023”

Carol Jackson

May 1, 2023

Congratulation on being selected. Good job on this one, too.

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1. Poet Voice
  
  May 1, 2023
  
  Thank you, Carol! It is always a great honor to be selected among so many poets! Thanks for reading.
  
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Frances Figart

May 5, 2023

Oh my, another quite intriguing one here. Love the consonance!

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Aligning creativity with New Moon in Cancer

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creative rescue remedy!

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Social Justice & Art

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Offering to Yemanya

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The Return of Love: a palinode

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A consonance to death

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