Encouragement And Hope

Written by Ellen Grace Olinger

June2011Flowers 012

old photos
on my desk–
bleeding hearts in bloom

This is a favorite haiku of yours, and thank you.  I was reflecting upon the haiku this morning that are reprinted on my poet page on the Haiku Registry.  This haiku was published first in Time Of Singing, Volume 21, 1994; and this poem was also selected for THF Haiku App.  I was new to haiku.  We learn in different ways.  I learn best by reading, and I tend to write spontaneously from my heart.  Yet I can see in my records how many revisions a post may go through before I feel it is ready.

The important thing is to be encouraged and to practice.  Rest as needed too.  The range in years of the poems on my Haiku Registry page is from 1994 – 2015.  There have been fallow times.  When I was not able to write this much, I checked out a wide variety of books by many authors from the library, and bought some books too.  Sometimes I’d look at the list of their books, and note the length of time sometimes between books.  Sometimes I’d look at a poem and think, “I can never write like that.”  And then a poet would share about the number of revisions for their poem, and how long it took for a certain work to be published.  Examples of authors include Madeleine L’Engle, Luci Shaw, and Barbara Crooker.

That is perhaps part of the art of teaching: the right amount of challenge, with encouragement.  Time and patience.  Like tending a garden.

Time Of Singing was founded in 1958 by Dr. Benjamin P. Browne.  Charles A. Waugaman was the editor when I began subscribing.  Lora Homan Zill has been editor since 1998.  Lora’s site is the blue collar artist.

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The photos are by Karl (June 2011).

5 thoughts on “Encouragement And Hope”

  1. Sometimes we just don’t realize the amount of work or history behind a piece of verse. I think if we knew, Ellen, a deeper appreciation would follow.

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    1. Hi Don, Thank you. I also learned from Madeleine L’Engle that sometimes the work knows more than we do. Her book, Walking On Water, Reflections on Faith & Art (1980, Harold Shaw Publishers) was important for me, and also a great comfort. Then I learned of Luci Shaw.

      Previous owners planted bleeding hearts here, and my mother had them in her yard too. Also beautiful peonies. Her mother died a year before I was born, to the day. There had been losses when I wrote this haiku, and many more in the near future. There was a decade or so, when it seemed someone was called Home almost every year, from three generations. Some were in their 90s. After my mother’s passing in 2004, the first spring, the perennials pictured Easter. My dad died when I was 29 and she was only in her 60s. I think we are better at sharing grief these days. When she died she was at peace, with so much love.

      As you say, “the amount of work or history” – takes time for sure. Always a work-in-progress.

      Many blessings to you and your family, Ellen

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      1. Thank you for sharing this Ellen. Such a privilege to read and listen to. I’ve always been amazed at how the simplicity of a flower’s growth and life and death can speak in to our own, so much of what you captured in that Haiku.

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    1. Dear Gallivanta, Thank you and blessings for your work too. Blogs are surely an art form themselves – whether prose, poetry, photos, gardens, paintings . . . daily life, recovery, new hope .. .

      Many blessings to you and your family, Ellen

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