L'aura del Campo

Hymn of Wisconsin; Met Susan Wittig Albert

Hymn of Wisconsin

Rocks of Ages clothe my fields.
I must yield or work the clay,
moving stones that clog the rows
mowing hay to feed the cows.
Rocks of Ages, piled away.
Let me praise my Lord today.

[164.35]

Hmmmm. What is this based on? And why did I write it? Ha! You'll have to go to "Plum petals, Roseberry thorns"  and look at Prompt #19 or my prompt entry below to find out! Nanners, nanners, dandelions ...

         
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L'aura del campo

Spring: 4 Jalal 164 (12 April) 49 degrees and sunny.

'é a lua, é a lua, na quintana dos mortos'
♣ Federico García Lorca ♣

I had the pleasure of meeting Susan Wittig Albert

Was treated to a lecture by Prof. Wittig, who now devotes her life to writing. She spoke about the evolution of the 'mystery' genre from Poe to Paretsky, and how women were eventually included. I took notes that I will share as soon as I can.

She writes the China Bayles Mysteries, the Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter, and has concluded the Victorian/Edwardian Mysteries by Robert Paige that she and her husband, Bill Albert, collaborated on.

She exhausts me! For her, writing is a 90 day cycle of writing 1,500 words/day. She sets up her schedule to complete her newest novel 3 months before it is due. And tries to complete her 90 day cycle in 75.

There is much much more to report, but her websites:

http://www.susanalbert.typepad.com/lifescapes
http://www.mysterypartners.com

I promise to post more soon. Now I have to get her books out and read them all . China Bayles has titles named after herbs (which gives a plot line and clues) like: Love Lies Bleeding (like the poem I just wrote!), Rosemary Remembered, Thyme of Death or her newest, Spanish Dagger (yucca).

WRITING AND REVIEWING

Wrote to a prompt as above [35]. More prompts in my forum: "Plum petals, Roseberry thorns" .

My plugging is working! Still needing reviews: "Alps" , "Crow feathers" , "Love-lies-bleeding" , and "Spear" . Added: "Flight of the unwanted son" .

These are in the folder "Room 222 - New Poems" ; they pay 222 gps per review. This is working out. I'm not likely to get hate rates and in addition the reviewers must rate on their own rating scale and not play follow the leader to a anon 5 or 2.5 or a newbies' Great = 3.0 (everything must be average) to the old "it's Shakespeare, it must be good" = 5.0, "you're nobody; I don't agree with you" = 2.5 dreck. Let editors play that game. That doesn't help me worth shit.

BEWARE OF RANT:

I have not been reading other reviews on a regular basis but today I stumbled across one that boiled my blood for a bit. And I took a moment to send an anonymous response (cost me a well-worth-it 25 gps, cheaper than a therapist). This is what I wrote:

I am concerned about your review. 1. This is rated 18+. How old are you? 2. This is a fictional writing piece. If you do not like the language, too bad. It is properly rated. 3. It is not an opinion piece and didn't deserve a rant coming back. 4. This is not a Christian Writers' Room. Your response can easily offend in return.

Now, what was I upset about? A (1) newbie who is obviously young and Christian was ragging (unjustly I felt) on a (2) newbie, age unknown, about using the 'f' word in a fictional piece about losing a friend and blaming God ... now, personally I may disagree with either or both if this were an opinion piece, but it was clearly marked fiction and 18+ and a personal "you got Christianity all wrong" response seemed clearly out-of-line. Would a person (real or fictional) who lost a friend ever blame EVERYONE and use a naughty word . Like, duh.

For me, this site is a place for my poems to sink or swim not a place for religious argumentation unless a specific word/image is misused or it is an opinion piece (sometimes I have to take it on the nose in this blog ... oh well) in which case it is most definitely fair game. I also don't think of WDC as being the private preserve of Christians. There are other sites for that. Here we are all called to a higher level of tolerance ...

So ... is there a Christian Forum or Clean Up Crew here that could help this obviously devote newbie in how to handle folks that do not share his/her views? I know MY views are offensive to some; but I have been equally offended by others.

It may be a factor of age and experience. Many of my poems are read by under 18 and even under 13 site members, which for a piece rated 18+ becomes an issue of whether certain reviews are even worth reading. The stats that appear after 10 reviews helps. Which is why I don't even respond until there are ten and have put my newer poems on 'review needed'. No more hate rates! Yay.

Me, my friends and my family

Okay ... still haven't gone out today. A touch of something that is keeping me close to the terlet.

Yesterday I spoke up at a public forum about transportation. The buses here stop at 8, don't run on Sundays, don't go to the county jail (KDOT's fault) and they are going to double the cost which only hurts poor folk. Argh.

Eating: fish . I need to cut back on my coffee pots per day ... {e:spastic}

Robin still sitting on its nest. How many days?

Daily Scripture

... And further: The stages that mark the wayfarer’s journey from the abode of dust to the heavenly homeland are said to be seven. Some have called these Seven Valleys, and others, Seven Cities. And they say that until the wayfarer taketh leave of self, and traverseth these stages, he shall never reach to the ocean of nearness and union, nor drink of the peerless wine. The first is The Valley of Search.

The steed of this Valley is patience; without patience the wayfarer on this journey will reach nowhere and attain no goal. ...

— Bahá’u’lláh

Excerpt from The Seven Valleys. link: http://reference.bahai.org/en/t/b/SVFV/svfv-1.html

WATT'S GNU!

Water where you least expect it!

They grow prawns in Kentucky now! There IS life after the tobacco subsidies were taken away. Hmmmm ... maybe they should take away the corn and wheat ones too? How about the taxes on alcohol that encourage the cities to keep the bars in business?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070412/us_nm/usa_tobacco_prawns_dc

And how much water is under Darfur in Sudan? Mining water is controversial here in Kansas because it is being taken out in greater quantities than can be replenished. Don't even ask about the inter-state politics. There are also HUGE environmental debates and social concerns about sustainability. Lake Darfur:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20070411/sc_livescience/ancientmegalakedisco...

And if you still haven't played with this yet it is worth bookmarking: http://www.crayola.com/coloring_application/index.cfm?referrer=/index.cfm&mt=dig...

IMAGES and RAMBLINGS

Like I haven't gone out yet ... later ...

The weather has been chilly and grey, but sun today.

A good weather link: http://www.wunderground.com

READING

Just got took out the complete poems of Elizabeth Bishop. Yay.

BLOGVILLE AND THE WDC COMMUNITY

500! congratulations to: GG very happy . Visit her last entry and leave a smile: "Invalid Entry" 

A beautiful sig of a cactus and wren in Wren 's blog entry: "one year anniversary" .

To missing friends: At one point the moon over Blogville was glabrous and waxing. It has now been waning for some time. perhaps moving through a dark phrase. There are those of us here who will try to keep the lamplights burning until your return at dawn or the night when the moon waxes full again.

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 Kåre Enga
~ until everything was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow! And I let the fish go.
~ Elizabeth Bishop,
The Fish