jessingrassellino

Tag: creative writing

  • Reading the world, slowly

    Back in 2015, I had my final inpatient mental hospitalization. That May, I’d experienced the first break-up of my second marriage. I was hurt beyond imagination – we both were. Then there were dramas with my family. Summer of 2015 hit me hard, and I was unsure if I could tolerate my own hopelessness and grief. 

    So unsure, that I drove myself to the hospital for help. I spent the next two August weeks with a small pile of books and a roommate who was an art student, ten years younger; the thing I remember about her is telling crazy stories about my childhood and my life and teaching, and the two of us laughing so hard at midnight that the nursing staff banged on our door to tell us to shut up. I spent time thinking about how to reconnect with my purpose of being.

    At some point during those weeks, I committed to dive head-first into becoming a better human. I embraced my curiosity as a lease on life. as the thing that could save me from being swallowed by my own small mind. 

    When I got home from that last stay, I did two things: I got my tattoo, and I started thinking about making meaning in my life. I started reading more blogs from different writers. I don’t recall where on the internet I found this blog about one woman’s mission to Read the World in year, but it struck me then as such a profound way to experience the vastness of the world, and the beauty. I decided I would read the world, but, slowly.  Starting with the books I already owned (yes, book collector for life!), I began reading and learning from voices and perspectives and stories that so differed from my own. 

    As I read a story, book, essay, or poem from an author in one country, I’d make notes in my journal, and write short reviews of the experience. Through a series of unfortunate technical fails, the blog content was lost in 2016. All I have remaining from the reading and writing I did during that year is a google sheet where I tracked authors and books from each country, and the status of my reading. A checklist. I was so frustrated that I left the project behind not long after (I think maybe I updated the spreadsheet once in the past 5 years). 

    Until recently, I had all but forgotten this project, and its origins in my life. Opening that spreadsheet with its checklist, I remembered the awe I felt when first compiling it. So many countries, so many histories, and so many stories that exist, and for each of those, multitudes that will never be told. 

    In a way, I’m glad I forgot about this, because when I started it, it was probably more “goal oriented” than it should have been. Remembering anew has caused a desire in me to dig into stories, to learn from this world that has felt so inaccessible this past year. And now, six years after that hot August hospital stay, I have so many better questions to ask the stories.

  • The Gate (Nooner)

    This poem is after a close reading of the poem The Storm (Bear), by Mary Oliver. I focused intentionally on attempting to replicate the rhythm and meter Oliver chose, as well as other grammatical choices she made, such as tense and sentence structure. Find the poem and my close reading below

    The Gate (Nooner)

    New upon the shaky gate my kitten
        climbs, crying determined mews
        with new confidence.

    Spine and tail, wriggling, anxious,
        her view of the top, she claws, grasps
    Until the gate’s cloth divider freys
        in small, delicate pieces,
        An early warning foreshadowing
        the struggles of my mind in this world.

    You know, I didn’t see it coming myself.

    Close Reading and Notes


    Reading Mary Oliver’s original poem The Storm (Bear) and working from it caught me by surprise, because in my first reading, it seemed simple. That simplicity is deceptive upon closer reading. As I worked to tell the story of my kitten, Nooner, I noticed that Oliver’s poem’s simplicity was quite intentional and well-crafted.

    Oliver sets up the reader with the scene, setting, and details, using familiar and causal language that make it easy to connect with a scene between animal and human. In the second stanza, Oliver expands on the narrative set in the first, connecting the verb in the first stanza to the three parts of the second stanza.

    The first part of the second stanza, Oliver describes and expands on the verb; in the second part, she reveals the ending or aftermath of the action/verb; in the third section, she uses metaphor to relate the experience of the animal in that moment to the human experience. In Oliver’s poem, she uses the following as the third section of the second stanza:

         a long sentence, expressing
         the pleasures of the body in this world

    In the third stanza, she responds to the metaphor she has expressed with her own voice and feelings on the matter.

    Normally, I try to use the overall tone, grammar choices, and narrative structure of a work as a guide to my study, but it felt important for me to discover how Oliver crafted such a beautiful work that resonated with clarity and beauty, leaving the reader with feelings both simple and profound. I’m glad I spent time with this poem and worked to attempt to understand how Oliver constructed such a poem. I enjoyed this week’s etude, and I hope you enjoy Mary Oliver’s poem, as well as my own attempts to learn from her work.

  • Beauty in the Process

    This week, I experienced starting a lot of different types of learning. I am working on obtaining my AWS certification, so studying for that; I also started working on a piece of music and that meant needing to learn how to use a new looper pedal! AND I started writing a new poem.

    Toward the end of the week, I also read a tweet from a good friend who felt very frustrated with his inability to focus. This got me thinking about the idea that we have to focus our energy in long, intense sessions in order to achieve something.

    For example, this week (and most weeks), I don’t really have TIME to focus for very long. Maybe I get a free half hour during the work day, and then another hour before bed to do calmer things like reading, writing, or planning for my day.

    One of the things I tried this week was practicing an etude. It turns out that etudes are a great metaphor for many things we want to do in life. Most musicians detest etudes at some early point in their career. Etudes seem a bit pointless; we practice them, but the benefit is unclear in the short term. During my undergrad, those 30 minutes a day I spent on my weekly etude were frustrating at first. After a year, though, I started to love etudes! These short studies forced focus by only being “about” one thing – one bow technique, or one left hand technique, or one musical technique. The structure of the etude allowed me to use a shorter period of time to improve one area over the span of a week.

    In that spirit, I have approached the past few weeks. My learning and products are not done. Is learning ever done? At any rate, I was pretty reluctant to share this week, because it’s hard to share something when it doesn’t feel finished. That said, I think it’s important to share with you the poem I’m halfway through writing.

    handwritten draft of a poem I’m working on, after Lady Lazarus by Sylvia Plath

    The above picture is of my journal from this past week, as I’ve worked on my poem, modeled after Lady Lazarus, by Sylvia Plath. It is one of her later poems, one that I’ve known for more than twenty years now. In all that time, I never read the poem quite as I did during the past week. For the first time, the rich depth of her imagery became apparent to me. It is difficult to craft a poem the way she does, and I found myself stuck. I couldn’t finish the poem in time for this week’s post. Instead, I give you this, an unfinished work.

    A reminder: just because you don’t have all the time, all the energy, all the focus, or all the answers, doesn’t mean to let go of what you want to accomplish. Accept yourself, where you are, and know that you’ll get where you want to be with steady effort, regardless of the bumps. And hopefully, I’ll be able to share a complete poem with you next week. Cheers!

  • How To Leave Home

    I have chosen to model this poem after the poem Facts by Philip Levine (in What Work Is). The poem attempts to employ a casual, narrative tone, exploring one large narrative by creating smaller narratives within each stanza. I have made every attempt to adhere to the spirit and style of Levine’s work. I definitely felt the challenge in my learning this week as I stretched these muscles!

    How To Leave Home

    july 19, 2020

    The ferry from New York to Vermont rocked on the
    lake, not yet frozen solid. Every fifteen minutes, at
    all hours of the day, boats departed. On the ferry,
    our cars swayed, and we swayed inside.

    If you’re careful, you can actually transport a
    table, and all four chairs, more than one hundred miles,
    tied to the top of a 1986 Oldsmobile Cutlass Cruiser
    station wagon — just in case you ever need to.

    I didn’t plan to leave Plattsburgh, in the beginning.
    Sure, some people did, but most people I knew stayed.
    They stayed and complained about their dead-end jobs,
    egotistical bosses, abusive husbands or nagging wives.

    John Dewey, renowned philosopher, attended the University of
    Vermont. A student there insisted to me that Dewey wrote his
    great works in one of the residence halls. I was on my way to my
    admissions audition; the student was probably high.

    An Oldsmobile Cutlass cruiser is a moderately reliable vehicle, and
    people from Plattsburgh routinely drive fourteen-year-old cars.
    Monthly payments for new cars are too costly, but the repairs for
    old cars can be put on credit and paid, over time.

    My boyfriend’s brother was ashamed to be seen riding in my
    fourteen-year-old Olds, when he visited Plattsburgh from
    Queens. If he had worked for the privileges in his
    young life, he would have felt differently.

    I don’t blame the student for being high, especially with a
    dull job as the student librarian. He may have been bored, or
    fighting anxiety, for the library is filled with intimidating
    intellects such as myself, unafraid to speak our minds.

    There is a lie in the previous stanza. Yes, I’m
    smart, but not intimidating. Frequently, I face my own
    ignorance and despite my best efforts, I’m still stunned by the
    increasing gap between myself and that which I don’t yet know.

    I was the most ignorant when I lived in Plattsburgh.
    Mediocrity was not questioned, and chaos was normal.
    I looked for escape in second-hand encyclopedias and
    piles of library books, growing a world in my mind.

    The upstanding citizens, professors and business leaders,
    praised my curiosity, but chided my ambition. They didn’t
    understand my need to be a part of a bigger world.
    Each was satisfied to be the big fish in a shrinking pond.

    I will never return to Plattsburgh, or Burlington, not to
    watch the leaves dance on autumn trees, nor to
    pay homage to family or tradition. I know that I
    don’t belong, and I don’t have the heart to face it.