I missed the Poetry Sisters’ challenge last week because I was too deep inside the whirlwind of preparing for Ohio’s Casting for Recovery spring retreat (our first spring retreat and our first at our new “forever home”). It went REALLY well, in spite of the pouring rain on Friday. The weather cleared, lots of fish were caught and released, nature and laughter and the power of being SEEN by those who have shared like experiences gave us all a respite from The World.
To review, the Sisters were writing golden shovels using a line from Elizabeth Bishop’s “Letter to NY” and trying our best to stick to our year-long theme of conversations. For the record, my poem was written in May, in time for the challenge. It just didn’t make it here.
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Fast forward to today, the Thursday before the first Friday of the month, which is when the Inklings share their responses to a member’s challenge. I came home from the retreat with piles of laundry and miscellaneous after-retreat tasks to prioritize, but also to the final full day of the replacement of siding and gutters (bam bam bam BAM BAM…then blessed silence when they finished), putting the yard and beds back in order (at least a pint of nails left behind on the ground), washing screens and windows outside (AJ) and vacuuming piles of dust that sifted in from the corners of every. single. window. (me), a blood draw and doctor’s appointment, book club, volunteer work, and teaching a clothing embellishment with embroidery class. Whew!
The Inklings challenge, was offered this month by Heidi:
Watch a few videos from the WE DO NOT CARE CLUB on Instagram or other platform.
Read some comments. Die laughing (or crying).
Write a poem that lists or explains some things that you as a woman no longer care ‘bout for whatever reason. It does not have to be because of peri/menopause. Try to replicate Melani’s deadpan delivery, if that’s possible in a poem. TWIST: include something that you DO care about, that requires you to make space by jettisoning some of the other stuff.
And now I don’t care that I didn’t manage to post my Sisters poem last week, because what a conversation that poem and today’s poem are having! What a conversation I’m hosting inside my head between my now-self and my then-self! Friends, it is beyond hard to rid yourself of the teachings you learned implicitly and explicitly from your mother and from society. We are all works in progress. It is never too late to start accepting yourself for who you are and others for who they are. Full stop.
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As Tanita mentioned in her post last week, the Poetry Sisters blew right past their monthly online work/gab session. Well, so did the Inklings. I’m not sure who’s posting, so I’ll let you find them in the roundup if they make it this week. A whole bunch of Life is happening this weekend for lots of them. Have fun, ladies!
Buffy has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at Buffy Silverman: Children’s Author.
It’s time to schedule roundups for July – December. Folks, we’re halfway through the year and it’s blowing my mind. Choose your week here.
A(nother) Year of Reading 
Each of these poems spoke to means I loved them so much! Here’s to me showing up more often in my own writing. Thanks for sharing.
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Glad the retreat went well! Yes to accepting one’s quirky self and focusing on the miracles, including kindred spirits!
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I’m so glad I know you and can hear your own voice so clearly in these two poems. I think we’ve both evolved from the awkward teenager “dragging main.” I remember getting my license and strutting to the grocery store taking the long way home so I could honk in front of my friends’ houses. Did that make me cool? I sure thought so.
Congrats on the successful retreat. And then all the stuff you came home to! I don’t know if I’ll write for the Inklings challenge because I haven’t yet and here it is, Friday. I may steal one of your lines. Which one? They’re all great and so relatable. I especially love the miracle ending.
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Lovely, all! Mary Lee, I, too, once “cruised the mall.” It was brutally painful, and yes, a waste of precious time… and your second poem makes me think of my brother, who has inner demons that shout “your house should be spotless” to which he counters: “we LIVE here.” ‘Nuff said. Thank you for your beautiful voice in the world and wow, does retirement agree with you! xo
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Hooray for you, accomplishing all those things in spite of/on top of household maintenance and other unavoidable obligations. I sometimes feel I have too many irons in the fire, but isn’t that what makes life such a “miracle of existence”? Thank goodness for kindred spirits!
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Heidi’s comment via email because WordPress doesn’t always play nice:
“And now I don’t care that I didn’t manage to post my Sisters poem last week, because what a conversation that poem and today’s poem are having! What a conversation I’m hosting inside my head between my now-self and my then-self!” And WHAT a conversation your post is having with my post, that your poems are having with mine! (It’s almost like we met and discussed it all.) As you say, as I say, it’s all about feeling free to set your standards and delineate your limits of caring–the freedom to craft your own soul. Thank you, sister ML! (I think we could do some good work hosting a Personal Manifesto Workshop. And I just realized how the word MANIFESTO encompasses multiplicity *and* a party!)
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Love both of these, Mary Lee. Oh how impossible it was to accept our quirky selves (I’m guessing in hindsight the athletes and cheerleaders had self-doubts, but will never know for sure.) Here’s to focusing on the miracles, and not let the caring overwhelm.
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Wonderful Mary Lee! NAILS in the flower bed/hedge is an Aaaargh! we’ve cursed/cleaned after onsite fix-ups.
Your fullsome globe span, word plan, life grand ideas are lyrical Leaders. Luv this post & You, so much.
[+TY for yet again, rounding us Up!]
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Not only did I enjoy the poems you shared, Mary Lee, I also enjoyed the layout decisions you made in presenting them. They drew my eye anf piqued my curiosity. Your second poem possesses a rich vein of honesty in which the reader can easily see themselves.
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I’m so lucky to live in a world where you are my friend…that you care about what matters and don’t about what doesn’t and even take care breaks to focus. I could not love that poem, or you the poet, more!
That line from Bishop is a great one as a striking line. “accept your quirky self” is speaking to me. Thank you for this lovely post.
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Oh yes to all of this! And yes to those hummingbirds and sunrises and zinnias and all the things!
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*thunderous applause* Love these, Mary Lee! Your loving, kind, and generous spirit devoted to all things good in the world is so inspiring (and I don’t know how you manage to do all the things you do). Thanks for being you — I “would” care if you stopped being true to yourself.
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Echoing the thunderous applause! I love the conversation between these two poems and love everything they proclaim. I stumbled on Melani’s reels a few weeks back and I adore her.
Thanks for sharing all this in the midst of such busyness! Retirement looks good on you. (I DO NOT CARE how society defines “retirement” or “seniors” or age or much of anything. I DO CARE about human beings who have rich wisdom to share via their poetry.) ❤️
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I just wish it hadn’t taken me so long to start not caring so much about what others think! So much wasted energy, so much unnecessary stress and worry. My mother had tried to tell me, but of course, when you’re young, you know everything, right? Oh well, better late than never, I suppose!
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Marylee, I love both of your beautiful poems! I relate to some things in both of your poems. In your second poem I especially love this line:
“but I do not care if my apology is not enough for you if I drop a stitch.” Yay, Marylee, you go! I am so glad you don’t care about: “losing my words or whole trains of thought.” I need to get better at not caring about this. “Or the punchline of jokes” Ditto for me. I like your build up to your last two stanzas, which I especially love and relate to. I am glad that you know you have to “but every now and then I have to stop caring
in order to focus on this one beautiful, imperfect life I’ve been given…” Yes, to “sunrises, hummingbirds, zinnias, kindred spirits…” Great work! Thank you for sharing your honesty, spirit, and inspiration. After I read your poems and Margaret’s poem, you both have inspired me to write one of my own I care/I don’t care poems. It seems like it will be therapeutic.
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I adore both of these poems. The first is a lovely admonition to be yourself, and so is the second. The way you’ve set the list of what you care about in a couplet with what you do care about makes the poem sing.
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