Loose Leaf Notes

The wolf doesn’t need sheep’s clothing
if the door is left open
if the bad apples are poison
and the fences are broken

if the good people are sleeping
and the rest are herded
the pack is emboldened
and the vulnerable forsaken

Cry wolf every time
Don’t follow the dishonorable
Don’t fall from grace
or fall prey to lies
Don’t pull the wool
over your own eyes

__________Colleen Redman / Poets and Storytellers United

1. I like to ponder sonder: The realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as coined by John Koening, author of The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows.

2. Is that why I find the practice of people watching so interesting?

3. Artist Megan Altieri has an art exhibition called The Art of Empathy Through Eavesdropping. She also has a book of the same name that features a photo collection of overheard conversations, of sonder moments, that she prints on clothes. See HERE.  

4. After writing about the unintelligible din at the pool that turns words into a hum of sound until a recognizable phrase breaks through like a loud speaker announcement, I started writing down what I was overhearing: “Has it stopped bleeding?”  “My brother got me one of those.  His was chocolate.”  “Do not do this.” “Count down to three.”  “It’s too close.”

5. At the Little River Poetry Festival, we were asked in a workshop to write the first sentence of your life story. Mine: She got a bathing suit for her May birthday but had to wait till summer to wear it.

6. I led a workshop at the LRPF on instructive poetry with a prompt title “How To,” like THIS one. The workshop resulted in poets sharing on-the-spot poems with titles like How to Say Goodbye (Zeina Azzam) and How to Write a Poem while a Spider is Staring at You (Trevor Huffman) and How to Make Art with the beginning line of “Turn your pain into paint.”

7. Later, a LRPF attendee who was at the “How to” workshop sent me a poem titled “How to be Perfect” by Ron Padgett. Here are some excerpts: Get some sleep. / Don’t give advice. / Take care of your teeth and gums. / Don’t expect your children to love you, so they can, if they want to. / Don’t be depressed about growing older. It will make you feel even / older. Which is depressing / Answer letters promptly. Use attractive stamps, like the one with a tornado on it. / Do not go crazy a lot. It’s a waste of time. / Take out the trash. / Love life. / Use exact change.

8. On Father’s Day we had brunch at Outer Space and heard live music by a musician who fittingly goes by the name Big Papa.

9. Don’t Forget to Write – Put a pen in my hand / before you lower the casket / and plant me like a kiss goodbye / Put a pen in my hand / so I can write Dear John letters / to everything on earth I have loved / And if the afterlife is boring / I can take up writing fiction / I can work on crossword puzzles / and doodles to pass the time

10. I posted the above poem on Facebook and a friend commented: “You can’t write without a thin dark line.” I answered, “The dark is fertile. It comes from the ground and later hits the sun.”

11. I once had a job where I had to do case notes. They weren’t accepted unless they were written in black ink.

12. According to Koening, onism is the awareness of how little of the world you will experience in your lifetime, as you are limited to one body that can only be at one place at one time.

13. Here is an excerpt from the book I am reading, “Sea of Tranquility,” that is mostly set in the future and is boggling my mind: “Think how holograms and virtual reality have evolved, even just in the past few years. If we can run fairly convincing simulations of reality now, think what those simulations will be like in a century or two. The idea with the simulation hypothesis is, we can’t rule out the possibility that all of reality is a simulation.’ __________Thirteen Thursday

Katherine Chantal and Colleen Redman will be presenting a poetry reading at the Soup Shop on Sunday, June 26 at 2 pm. Located at 7360 Floyd Highway in Copper Hill (just beyond Check Elementary School), the one-stop Soup Shop is the inspiration of owner Susan Huff, who supports local farmers by using locally purchased farm fresh ingredients in her soups and other menu items.

Chantal will be reading from her book Poetic Memoir of a Nascent Senescent: Poems from My Sixties and Redman will read from her book Objects Are Closer Than They Appear in a call-and-response conversational reading style. New poems will also be included in the mix. Rowan Chantal of the Chantal Coffee Company will be providing freshly brewed coffee tastings.

Chantal and Redman are longtime friends with two distinct voices, yet the topics they cover intersect and are complimentary. The reading is one in a series from the poets’ Grief and Relief Soulful Aging Tour, presented at local venues as an honest sharing that has been known to draw laughter and some tears.

Chantal, a ceremonialist who guides life passages, including weddings and deaths, says “More and more it is becoming a life living with and through until death. Reflections of what that means is going deeper and quieter.” Her book’s author’s note states that she is “walking into her elder years with wonder and curiosity.”

Redman believes that “poetry is the work of the psyche, and it’s work that asks more of us as we age.” She states that her poems are universal as well as personal. They explore aging as a developmental stage, not as a commentary on geriatrics or as upbeat advice of living to the fullest, but as building a legacy of the soul.  “Life’s foundational milestones go according to some unspoken schedule and with every stage we can say ‘I’ve never been here before,” she said.

“Very good for the heart and soul in many ways,” said Kalinda Wycoff, an attendee of a recent tour reading. “Loved it. Engaging, funny and thought provoking,” added Juniper Healy. Attendee Agnes Crow recommended that others attend future readings if they have the opportunity, saying, “The hour flew by and everyone enjoyed themselves.”

Photos: 1. The SOUP SHOP HERE. 2. Chantal (center) and Redman (right of Chantal) read as a duo at the Little River Poetry Festival on June 5 HERE. 3. Chantal (third from left) and Redman (fourth from left) with friends at a February Soulful Aging reading at the Jessie Peterman Library HERE.

Put a pen in my hand
before you lower the casket
and plant me like a kiss goodbye

Put a pen in my hand
so I can write Dear John letters
to everything on earth I have loved

And if the afterlife is boring
I can take up writing fiction
I can work on crossword puzzles
and doodles to pass the time

________Colleen Redman / Poets and Storytellers United

1. Poolside: Waiting for the sun to come out from the clouds so I can swim is like waiting for a good song at the Roadhouse so I can dance after two songs in a row didn’t inspire me to.

2. The clouds move in slow motion like the hands of the clock that I watched in school while waiting for the end of the day bell to ring.

3. The sun finally comes out and I have the pool to myself. Still and empty, I watch a small round bug floating on a strip of plastic, a lone insect wing missing a body, and two winged ants treading water, all reflecting life’s fragility.

4. The unintelligible pool din turns words into sound that hums like cicadas or like a stadium full of chanting fans. But some words break through like a loud speaker announcement. Three little girls bobbing in the water are shouting ‘Mama!’ and then mewing like cats. “Good lord,” Joe says as the wakes from his nap.

5. I ran into an old friend recently and asked how she was doing. I loved her answer: “I’m not going to complain. It’s your lucky day.”

6. Which reminded me of THIS poem by Star LaBranche at the Little River Poetry Festival.

7. And THIS one, which I call my antidote poem, the one that I read when I see sad faces in the audience after reading some of my heavier poems and I want to lighten up the mood.

8. In answer to ‘who do you write for?’ Natalie Goldberg said: “I was writing for everyone and everyone was me. Rest in the structure that holds you up, and keep one foot in each world. Stay close to your own reality and stand also on the bridge that takes you out into something larger – our understanding that we’re all finally in this together.”

9. When Lucy and Desi slept in twin beds / and you hid under a desk during nuclear drills / You played with matches / and picked your favorite Beatle / while your heroes were assassinated / and your brother was drafted / You slathered on baby oil / for the promise of a tan / before napalm babies in Vietnam burned / and 50,000 vets killed themselves / Now strangers hang their clothes / in your mother’s closet / and children hide under desks / so they won’t be shot… Read The Inventory in its entirety HERE.

10. I do an IN THE NEWS run down on Facebook, posting a collection of news and commentary excerpts, quotes and tweets. Here is one from a recent news clip: “The One Witness at the January 6 Hearing Who Matters Most- It’s you… Fatalism can function as an excuse. If nothing can be done, then no one can be blamed for not doing it. If nothing can be done, then we’re all off the hook… Vice President Mike Pence did a lot of wrong things before he did the right thing on January 6, 2021. But if there is one lesson to take from the Trump years, it’s not the cynical Twitter joke “LOL nothing matters.” The lesson is that everything mattered: every act of conscience, every act of honest reporting, every denial of the Big Lie, every ballot…” David Frum, The Atlantic

11. Amiss or A mess?

12. I have a computer file called “Random Poems,” which recently reminded me that Random House co-founder Bennet Cerf is quoted as saying, “We just said we were going to publish a few books on the side at random.”

13. Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit a shirt  by Garrison Keillor: “THEM: How are you? ME: Fine. Can’t complain. Contentment is a conversation killer in New York. Complaint is an art form here. If you aren’t in a serious struggle with the world, you don’t have a life. Maybe it’s an evil neighbor in your co-op who refuses to admit that smoke from his fireplace is giving your wife asthma or the upstairs neighbors who’ve taken up clog-dancing or surely you’ve seen a miserable movie or read a nitwit novel or heard about a prestigious prize given to a piece of pigeon poop. And even if your road in life is smooth, you can still bitch about the unindicted crook who did outrageous things in broad daylight and still attracts crowds of yahoos in states with the lowest average SAT scores. But not me. I am content…” Garrison Keillor

________Thirteen Thursday

A record number of first time readers and poets of all ages and levels of experience filled the large striped festival tent and took to the mic to share poetic humor, comradery and emotional depth on a wide range of topics.

“Poets scratch below the surface and give each other permission to be in that profound and meaningful space,” said featured reader Zeina Azzam after being introduced to the stage by festival co-founder Judith Stevens.

Azzam, who is the Poet Laureate of Alexandria Va read from her book Bayna Bayna, which reflects her experience as a daughter of Palestinian refugee parents and refers to the in-between, “between home and exile, language and culture…”

More than 20 Saturday morning kayakers shared river poems under the large overhanging rock (dubbed “the amphitheater”), where festival founders and poets Jack Callan and Judith Stevens first conceived of the poetry festival.

Poet/musician Jim Best turned his kayaking experience into a haiku …The traffic of lists / would not fit in my kayak / Now the river sings… during a Haiku Workshop led by Katherine Chantal. Chantal, who read from her book A Year of Haiku: Saying More with Less described writing in haiku form as her awareness practice.

Another workshop, led by Colleen Redman, was on instructive poetry with a prompt title “How To.” The workshop resulted in poets sharing on-the-spot poems with titles like How to Say Goodbye (Zeina Azzam) and How to Write a Poem while a Spider is Staring at You (Trevor Huffman). Izzy Beasley began her poem How to Make Art with the line “Turn your pain into paint.”                                                                                                                                       

Returning reader and former Floyd County teacher Sharon Wood, shared some new mountain stories, including a comical one titled Studying Ancestry with Grandma, an account of a family with too many shared names and a punchline about one named Polly Aster, who was indignant when asked if she was named after polyester.

Don MacKeller, a LRPF regular who traveled to the festival from Santa Fe, New Mexico, read a poem that referenced a white cotton shirt from Nepal that he wore kayaking on Little River. …It’s stained with sunblock / but still quite white enough to for the ghost dance / that so far hasn’t managed to bring anyone back /from wherever death has taken them.

Two duo readings done in back-and-forth conversation style were performed by mother and daughter Jamie Williams and Cas Horn and by long-time friends Chantal and Redman, whose thematic series on soulful aging was emotional but not without humor.

An ensemble performance, titled If I Could Dream, showcased the work of five poets, Thayer Cory (with Lisa Cooper reading for Cory), Eric Forsbergh, Karen Kendall, Judith Stevens and Jack Callan.

Sunday afternoon, a collaborative and improvisational free-style rap was performed by four young women, and was a highlight that brought the audience to rousing applause. The women, Krista Gerber, Izzy Beasley, Vanna Barbarian and Coral Kendall, did not know each other before the festival.

Impromptu song, including throat singing by Brian Magill, was part of the program, as was music by Magill on a gender’ barung Javanese percussion instrument and Jim Best on hang drum. Stevens led Walt Whitman Gentle Yoga each morning and guided attendees in a closing meditation Sunday afternoon.

For the final open Mic on Sunday, a first-time poet from Virginia Beach shared a playful poem about her festival experience. …So many laugh lines upon these faces / So much freedom, plenty of space / Bandana and Vanna / Here I lie with all this tie dye / Bubbles and brisket / I’m sure gonna miss it…

Jenna Veazey, a Fredericksburg member of the Poetry Society of Virginia, summed up her experience, “I’m so glad I came and am excited to come again. I love the open mic experience. I love being in community with poets. And I just love the outdoors, camping and kayaking. ______Colleen Redman

Photos: 1. The Little River Poetry tent. 2. Star LaBranche was one of the featured readers on Friday. 3. Linda Ankrah-Dove PSV member from Harrisonburg read from her latest manuscript, which included the poem “Walking the Bridge” that includes a tribute line to the late John Lewis. 4. Zeina Azzam, the Poet Laureate of the city of Alexandria, reads on stage. 5. The audience applauds a reading. 6. Lunch in the meadow.7. Trevor Huffman read a poem at Friday’s Open Mic titled “This is Not a Pretty Poem,” which was written with alliterations of the letter P. 8. Sharon Wood shares poetry and stories from her autobiographical fiction “Uncle Web.” 9. Saturday’s poets pose for a group picture. 10. Mother and daughter poetry duo, Cas Horne and Jamie Williams. 11. Colleen Redman (left) and Katherine Chantal read their Grief and Relief Soulful Aging 12. Krista Gerber, Izzy Beasley, Vanna Barbarian and Coral Kendall pose after performing an improvisational free style rap. 13. Brian Magill playing a gender’ barung Javanese percussion instrument. 14. Judith Stevens leads poets in a closing meditation. 15. Poetry Society of Virginia member Jenna Veazey reads a poem titled “Red Flags Your Partner Might Not Be Emotionally Available to You.” 16. Time out for bubbles.

Watch more videos HERE.  Put “LRPF” in this blogs search bar (upper right hand corner) to read about past festivals since  the beginning.

When bras were white
even after Labor Day
before they were burned
for free love and peace
and falsies were tissue paper
stuffed in A cups
a visible slipped strap
was cause for embarrassment

When cigarettes were glamorous
and your mother’s closet
was an exotic taboo
where you tore open a sanitary napkin
to see what was inside

When Lucy and Desi slept in twin beds
and you hid under a desk during nuclear drills
You played with matches
and picked your favorite Beatle
while your heroes were assassinated
and your brother was drafted

You slathered on baby oil
for the promise of a tan
before napalm babies in Vietnam burned
and 50,000 vets killed themselves

Now we mourn the lost days
when sticks and stones
didn’t break our bones
and fires were for burning fall leaves

Now strangers hang their clothes
in your mother’s closet
and children hide under desks
so they won’t be shot

The American Dream
has brought a rude awakening
Our buy now pay later
bill is due

_______________Colleen Redman / dVerse Poets Pub  / Poets and Storytellers United

1. The words ‘when bras were white’ recently came as a first line of a poem that I had no idea how to finish. Another line came when I was at the Little River Poetry Festival and was looking at my hand while holding a pen and thought ‘I should be buried with a pen in my hand.’

2. We buried my dad with a lottery ticket in his casket because we couldn’t find his TV remote.

3. Seen recently on a blog: “The ordinary is worth cultivating, I figure. There’s so much of it.”

4. All the poems I’ve written over the years were steps to get to the one below.

5. Funny how when you forget what you what you were going to do you can go back to the place where you first thought of it and most of the time the memory comes back.

6. Reading or weeding? As long as it’s not cleaning the kitchen. Again.

7. “The way you love someone, and how you talk. Your smile and your personality. What you believe in, and all your dreams. The way you drink your tea. How you decorate your home. Or party. Your grocery list. The food you make. How your writing looks. And the way you feel. Life is art.” – Helena Bonham Carter

8. You add your own words / to the sum of parts / Distinct as fingerprints / A poet’s north star / You write it down / and read it out loud / Your thoughts are the medium / and your voice is your art.  More HERE 

9. I don’t know where it comes from or what makes it start. Sometimes I start receiving dictation while I’m working on something else. It’s like watching a TV show and the newscaster breaks in with a message. I grab a pen and write it down. I don’t have to know what it means. It’s not the time to fuss about where it will be used or to complain about the lack of wages it will earn. I know who my boss is. I do my grunt work. Write it all down on anything I can find. Some writing starts in a notebook and ends on the side of a popcorn box scribbled in a dark theater. – From The Voices in My Head, a blog post from 2007 HERE.

10. “The Vital Importance of Human Touch: It has been found that touch calms our nervous center and slows down our heartbeat. Human touch also lowers blood pressure as well as cortisol, our stress hormone. It also triggers the release of oxytocin, a hormone known for promoting emotional bonding to others. Psychology Today… The research demonstrating the need for human touch is vast. From a developmental standpoint, infants literally cannot survive without human touch. Skin-to-skin contact in even in the first hour after birth has been shown to help regulate newborns’ temperature, heart rate, and breathing, and decreases crying…” -Psychology Today

11. “I pity the paranoid Second Amendment crowd with the AR-15s in the front hall closet so they can defend themselves against leftist public school teachers coming to inject them with critical race theory vaccine or false-flag Girl Scouts selling cookies that contain transgender virus. It’s a miserable life, shades drawn, meeting fellow lunatics in secret websites, aware that the FBI has tapped your phone and is sending info to George Soros. The rest of us enjoy a picnic among the rhododendrons and mountain laurel, no pistols in our picnic baskets, no ammo belt under our T-shirt, and we feel more attached to our cellphones than to our weaponry. Life is good in this beautiful country that God has blessed, and the paranoids in our midst are missing out on all the best stuff. The shooting range is a grim place compared to a ball game…” Garrison Keillor

12. The pioneers have left / for the uncharted New World / They fell off the horizon / when the world was flat / When I was 3rd of nine / in an unbroken family line / before survival was optional / and paradise was a gamble / we had already won … Read Setting Sail in its entirety HERE.

13. “Life goes on, great plans crash on the rocks, there is no such thing as 24-hour dry cleaning so get over it, that dog won’t hunt, and the printer prints gibberish and you ask Alexa for Chopin and she thinks you’re going shopping, and yet — last night, sitting holding my love’s hand, the phone rang and it was an old friend I hadn’t spoken to in ages and nothing has changed, we talk and it’s music. If I drove up there tomorrow, I’d be welcome. This and her and a cup of ginger tea and a novel in progress are all this man requires. That and six glasses of water and regular flossing.” Garrison Keillor ____________Thirteen Thursday

_______Wordless Wednesday

“It takes a village,” Calhoun said. “We couldn’t do it without all the people in this community.”

Along with well-known national and international headlining acts – which this year include Melissa Etheridge, Turnpike Troubadours, Ann Wilson of Heart, Old Crow Medicine Show and Lake Street Drive –  Floydfest Heartbeat 2022 (July 27 – 31) is geared up to continue their tradition of featuring local and regional talent, both in their “Local Love” performance line-up and their On the Rise patron voted competition, in which local and regional bands compete for prizes and a chance to play the main stage at the next festival.

“Floydfest was created just as well for artists. We want to help these artists create careers,” said Floydfest co-founder and Chief Creative Officer Kris Hodges in a 2021 interview for the Citizen’s Coop Community Show.

“Many of our artists have come here and played for free. We feed them and take care of them,” Hodges continued. “This is an opportunity for the up-and-coming to experience what it’s like to be in a professional setting in front of a large audience.”

Local Love Music Road Co musicians agree.  The popular Floyd-based ensemble band plays original dance music with an international flavor and are scheduled to perform Thursday and Friday night at the Floydfest Libations Tent.

“It can open a lot of doors and just get our name out there. And really, it’s just a blast,” said MRCO drummer Jake Thomas about playing at Floydfest. He spoke about all the great musicians and bands that he has seen at Floydfest who inspire him to practice more.

“They’ve included us so much over the years and that’s really nice,” added his brother Luke. Luke Thomas noted that the band members bring their families for the long weekend festival. He stated that he really likes the people that run the festival, which includes festival CEO John McBroom and Hodges, who both play in several Roanoke-based bands at the festival.

“None of us do this for the money,” said MRCO’s Janiah Allen, who has played every festival in the past 20 years in various bands. “We do it because we love the music and Floydfest gives us a tremendous opportunity to express ourselves in front of the most enthusiastic crowd of the year.”

Native Floyd musician Morgan Wade is a local success story who exemplifies the idea that exposure at Floydfest can help build a musician’s career. Wade’s career took off after a 2018 performance at Floydfest that led to her being discovered by Sadler Vaden, the Nashville-based guitarist for the Grammy-winning Jason Isbell band who was headlining that year.  Sadler produced and co-wrote some songs for Wade’s widely acclaimed album Reckless, which was named #1 Country/American album of 2021 by Rolling Stone.

Wade, who recently signed a record deal with Sony Music Nashville, debuted at the Grand Ol’ Opry, played on Austin City Limits and toured with Luke Combs, is coming back to the Floydfest stage as a headliner for Floydfest Heartbeat 2022, playing a Friday night Main Stage set from 6:45 to 8:15.

Mason Via, who grew up in nearby Stuart, won runner-up in the 2019 On the Rise competition. He is now a member of Grammy-winning Old Crow Medicine Show of Wagon Wheel fame who are headlining on the main stage Saturday night.

This year’s On the Rise competition includes Palmyra, a trio of three Virginia natives, two of who currently live in Copper Hill. The band plays traditional folk string instruments, does three part harmonies and foot percussion and are becoming known for their dynamic live shows.

Emmaline Hicks, also from Floyd County, will be debuting her original songs at the Workshop Porch on Sunday at 1:00. “You grow up in Floyd hearing about Floydfest all the time.  It could be a big step in my musical journey,” the singer/songwriter said.

The festival’s Local Love program is rounded out with a good representation of musicians and bands from Roanoke and surrounding counties, such as the Jordan Harmon Band, Dead Reckoning, Blue Mule, The Ambassador and more.

Isaac Hadden, who heads up the improvisational jazz-infused funk-rock group called the Isaac Hadden Project, is another rising star on the festival roster. Hadden, who Calhoun refers to as a prodigy, grew up in Blacksburg and started coming to Floydfest with his parents when he was a baby.

Floyd musician Brad Collier heads up a busking team of musicians who play along the festival walkways. “It started as a way to give space to some Floyd musicians who weren’t playing on the big stages,” he said. “They are a big part of what Floyd is about and it gives them a way to get out to the festival enjoy it and play some music.”

Collier, who grew up in Copper Hill, said it can be challenging to find a quiet spot to busk but that he hosts a morning jam session (between 8:30 -9:00 a.m.) at the covered patio in front of Red Rooster café.  “Patrons come out and sing along and sip their coffee,” he said. This year’s team consists of about 10 local musicians.

Calhoon reported that Floydfest has an annual economic impact on the area of between 3 and 4 million dollars, according to a 2018 impact study. He suspects that number is closer to 4 million or more now. He noted that the festival is partnering with Virginia Tech to do an updated economic study for 2022.

“It’s heads in beds, gas in tanks and grocery store trips,” he figures.  The festival also donates ticket packages to about 30 businesses for their fundraisers, and, through its Blue Cow Arts non-profit, gives up to $32,000 annually to local causes, non-profits and needy individuals. __________Colleen Redman

Photos: 1. Floydfest Bus Stop. 2. Some members of Music Road Co. at Floydfest 2019. 3. Kris Hodges (drums) and John McBroom jam. 4. Morgan Wade Floydfest 2019. 5. Mason Via (left) with Old Crow 2021. 6. Palmyra at Dogtown Roadhouse 2022. 7. Issac Hadden with his mom listens to a band on the Workshop Porch 2019. 8. Brad Collier plays at the Floyd Center for the Arts Mayfair 2022.

-Still two more days to check out the festival at On the Water Outfitters.  Here is the Saturday and Sunday schedule:

The pioneers have left
for the uncharted New World
They fell off the horizon
when the world was flat

When I was 3rd of nine
in an unbroken family line
before survival was optional
and paradise was a gamble
we had already won

We navigated destiny
with safety in numbers
with a lifetime of chances
and luck that runs out

Now I’m 1st of six
unanchored from my sidekicks
The children are orphans
marooned from the mainland
and I am an Island
waiting for a ship

_________Colleen Redman / Poets and Storytellers United