For Love of Poetry: This Choice, podcast hosted by Ren Powell

Here's the tiny pencil sharpener typewriter my father gave me once upon a time with Emily Dickinson's 1263, "There is no Frigate like a Book," sitting in the carriage on my desk next to the framed tiny feather and butterfly wing I wrote about in one of my first posts for Feral Mom, Feral Writer, The Desk, back in 2007 when I was still nursing an infant and "November Butterfly" was just a poem I had written and miraculously placed in 2005 in The Dickens along with "God's in the Butter" (co-winner of the Eugene Ruggles Prize for Poetry). 

Just days shy of my due date for my third child, I had to be coaxed out that night by a warm and loving email from the editors urging me to attend the award ceremony (without of course tipping off that I'd won). We drove through a heavy downpour, Braxton Hicks contractions coming and going, my children falling asleep to steady sweep of the windshield wipers. My husband stayed with the kids and I went on in alone to read the poem to a room full of lovers of poetry, grateful for the interlude, grateful that my father and his wife met me inside.

Photo by Robyn Beattie

Ren Powell generously gave me the chance to read "God's in the Butter" again here in her podcast, This Choice, as well as the chance to answer her artful questions about poetry's grip on my psyche and the manner in which exposure to world religions on a childhood commune, my subsequent experience of motherhood, and my latest Tarot devotions shape my relationship to my body, mind, and the poems I can't seem to stop writing. 

(Also included in the podcast is a reading of Dickinson's poem.)

You can listen here to the full podcast: 

This Choice, Tania Pryputniewicz

And also check out the first interview in the series:

This Choice, Kelli Russell Agodon (Agodon is the founder of Two Sylvias Press, and co-creator of the Poet Tarot deck).

Photo by Robyn Beattie

Related Links:

Ren Powell: Poet and Teaching Artist

Wheel of Archetypal Selves: The Many Faces of Change, my next Tarot Writing class, begins April 11 and runs for 9 weeks. Major Arcana under study: Chariot, Wheel of Fortune, Devil, Hermit, Strength, Tower, Death and Fool Cards. No prior experience of the Tarot cards necessary.

To learn about my approach to Tarot Writing, visit Tarot Tuesdays at Wheel of Archetypal Selves on Facebook where I post a Tarot writing exercise every Tuesday or visit Tarot for Two where writer Mary Allen and I consider a card, one per month, and the role the card played in our month.

Photos by Robyn Beattie (with exception of typewriter photo).