In the dark of the night,
when I switch on my light,
my bedside window is an echo of white.
Like a dim extension
of my room, it blends in,
reality merging with bedroom reflection.
At a glance I don’t know
what is quilt, what is snow,
and out of my bed a poplar tree grows
as the snow sings again
its mirrored refrain,
a white counterpoint to a white counterpane.
We caught the day red handed in
sun warm berries
winkled from shady green.
Tiny, achingly sweet first fruit,
a wild promise mounded
in summer starved hands.
Not enough for strawberry jam, we stand
and count to three and laugh as we
cram our mouths full.
Eyes closed, we grin and
groan with ecstasy,
red juice and memories
trickling down our faces.
We caught the day,
red handed.
Now that I am home
laughter lines are deepening,
frown line fade away.
I thought you might be interested in another form of ‘poetry’ that I write – song lyrics. If you click on this link (it’s the fifth song down) you can scroll down and hear the song being performed (from my CD “Breathe”)
There’s a chill in the room
I put another log on the fire
But I know that the flames are never gonna burn much higher.
There’s a chill in the room
No need to wonder where it starts
It’s a cold wind blowin’ over my frozen heart.
The ice – began to form – – years ago
Like a glacier creepin’ through the snow
The ice age came then rumbled on
Freezing my heart like a mastodon
Now I’m ancient hist’ry, me and my frozen heart
It’s all your fault you know.
The way you packed us up in the car
and dragged us across Canada and back.
If it’s Tuesday this must be Swift Current.
First the tent, then the tent trailer
then the bumper dragger.
I slept in the top bunk and hit my head on the ceiling
every morning.
It’s all your fault.
Those summers on the east coast,
lobster dinner in a Nova Scotia church basement,
Green Gables, Cavendish Beach,
the Reversing Falls, the Magnetic Hill.
The dip into the US; Maine, New Hampshire.
Stacks of snapshots and a few jerky regular 8 movies,
mostly of me and Mum standing beside
landmarks and signs to prove we were there.
It’s all your fault that my feet itch.
That I get that late night, headlight,
count the tar strip by the bumps longing
for the open road.
Your fault that when I’m on the coast I yearn for the mountains
and when I’m in the mountains I yearn t’ward the plains.
It’s all your fault, Dad.
Thank you.
#297
There are events that consume us,
that we point to as if they were big black dots on our
lifeline, and we say “after this or after
that, I will have time.” So we defer,
delay, detour around the stuff in between
the big black dots but as soon
as one dot recedes another appears and we
race towards it, blinders on, somehow knowing
that this event will be a turning point, a
special place where the light bulb turns on and
all the silly little pieces fall into place.
I am tired of big black dots.
I want to live between.
I want an interstitial life, sweetly rocked in the
swaying hammock formed by the lines
between the dots.
#296
I wrote down the year today
as nineteen instead of twenty.
as though some errant, swirling time warp
tapped me on the shoulder.
New memories came like visions
from temporal cognoscenti,
and transcended the divisions
between now and then and older.
Which made me wonder what would happen
if one day the time warp hit
straight on, full force, and pulled me
deep into the eerie vortex.
Would it be a hurricane’s eye
where once and future engrams flit
like flying cows and spinning barns
whizzing past my quaking cortex?
Would patterns form and fray and fade,
emerge, then merge again to form
the multiverse of maybes
that spawned my personal, perfect storm?
The brainstorm of the century.
The wormhole to what’s never been.
The one way ticket, first class seat,
to the nearest loony bin.
“Two thousand twelve, two thousand twelve,
not nineteen anything” I say.
I grip the pen as if an anchor
to my actuality.
“I have too much to do to ride
time’s crazy centrifuge today.
the future past is soon enough
to face my own reality.”
#295
The wet stuff.
Lumpy rain.
The ‘S’ word.
Or, as I like to call it,
‘that white shit’
litters the parking lot.
The first warning shot of winter has been fired.
We pick our way
through slush.
Bow our heads
before sleet.
Refuse to wear
our winter boots.
‘This will be gone by the weekend’ we declare.
And it will be.
The sun will shine
and the snow will melt.
But the wooly gauntlet
has been thrown down
making it hard to enjoy
what is left of a Peace Country Autumn.
#292
Thank you
For never giving up on me.
You give a fool hope that a way will come.
Thank you
For the words you said that set me free
And the ones you didn’t when you bit your tongue.
Thank you
For always being there by my side
except when you turned to protect my back.
Thank you
For slowing down when I was tired
As we move on down life’s rutted track
Thank you
#289
My CD "New Traditions" is available for listening or digital download
My CD "Breathe" is available to listen to or for digital download
Linda Studley is a writer, songwriter, independent recording artist, and sometime graphic artist living in Northern BC, Canada
Linda Studley 
Publishing – Things I’ve Learned Along the Way
I promised to talk a bit about the publishing process – so here goes.
Publishing a book of poetry will cost you money up front. You will not be able to find a publishing house that will pay you to publish a book of poetry. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong and if anyone out there has had a publisher hand you a cheque for the privilege of publishing your poetry book please send me their email address immediately, okay? How hard you work at promoting your book will determine whether you earn back your investment or just have a lot of great Christmas presents for family and friends.
Don’t be fooled by online services that will ‘proof’ your book. I proofed a friend’s manuscript once, then it was sent to the ‘publishers’ who ‘proofed’ a bunch of mistakes into it, (sigh). Do your very best to proof (fix the grammatical, spelling, and punctuation errors) and edit (polish the poems, look at line breaks, make sure each poem is the best it can be) yourself first, then find someone you trust (who knows shit from chocolate pudding about poetry) to go through and make suggestions. Caveat! Choose someone who is honest, respectful, and doesn’t have a vested interest in undermining your self esteem. I know the last one seems fairly obvious but it’s truly amazing how often we offer up our art to the most undeserving and then expect a fair response.
You will need to check out printing options. This includes local printing companies, online ‘print on demand’ businesses, or just hitting print on your personal printer. Figure out your page count (don’t forget the table of contents), the size you want the book to be, the type of binding, black and white or colour? softcover/hardcover, will it have an ISBN or a UPC? Who will do the cover design/art?… Then ask for printing quotes. Ask for quotes for different amounts of books too, usually there is a discount if you order more copies. I ended up printing my book “Falling Awake and other poems” through Lulu.com. They did a good job at a price that was low enough that I could build a reasonable profit into the price. They also offer an online outlet, so people can purchase my book online. (For Goodness Sake print a single copy first – then if there’s a mistake you’ve only wasted the cost of one book and you can fix it before they hit print on a full run!)
Computer literacy is vital. If you don’t have it, the cost of publishing your own book is going to increase. Whatever outlet you use to print your book, you’ll need to understand how to format, save, and upload your manuscript EXACTLY the way they ask you to. Screw this up and you’ll have a book that looks so unprofessional it might as well be written in crayon. Understand Microsoft Word – take a course if you need to. You may think you’re perfectly adequate in Word, but if you can’t format your document to include page numbers and a table of contents you need to learn more.
Sales do not happen unless you promote your book. Do the launch, do signings and readings, give away a few complementary copies, get interviewed, write a blog, have a website, create a Facebook Page… promotional possibilities are endless, you just have to be open to them. Also, what works for my book may not work for yours. You may have a totally different target audience – so figure out who they are and play to them. If you’re a normally modest person, promotion can be very difficult. My only advice is – Get over it – if you want to sell your book you need to show people you’re proud of it, that it’s important to you and that it could be important to them. That’s not bragging, that’s being honest. If you don’t believe in your book why would anyone else believe in it (or buy it). Yep, that was my version of a pep talk 😉
Good luck. I’ll post more learned lessons as I remember or experience them!