Poetry (pen) Pals #8 - Stand still

Jo Flynn asks us to slow down through the lines

Photo by JOHN TOWNER on Unsplash

Hello friends,

You probably won’t remember this but right at the beginning I mentioned a poetry teacher of mine, Jo Flynn, that I hoped would come and guest post one day. She’s a brilliant poet (she’s won numerous awards, including a Northern Writers’ Award for her current work in progress), has appeared at the National Poetry Library in London and has taught me so much.

Luckily we live close by so on a recent coffee date (resulting in about twenty ideas for new joint projects!) I told her about what we are doing on here and she wanted to come and play. Which was wonderful because I knew she’d send us some wisdom.

When the email came through it was all I could do to not send it to you immediately.

Take a deep breath…

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Lost by David Wagoner

There are so many poems I wanted to share with you, Poetry Pals, but this one is such a tonic that I needed right now and I figured someone else might need it too.

David Wagoner, Lost

You can also read Lost, by David Wagoner at the Poetry Foundation here - Nelly

Can we please start by taking a moment for that first sentence, ‘Stand still.’ It’s so simple, brave in its brevity (which is something I always try to be most in my poetry, admittedly, maybe that’s why I like it), you cannot help but stop whatever it is you’re doing and obey the poem.

So we’re standing still, and then there’s a breathing forest. Don’t you feel more relaxed already? This poem is pure magic of nature and meditation in one twelve line spell. It makes you feel instantly at one with what’s around you.

I find its title misleading but I can see why he chose it - if you were feeling lost you would come to it immediately, so like its opening, it’s an instruction, a signpost - a way of signalling to the people who need it most. I feel anything but lost once I’ve read through and taken a breath or two.

The direct address repeats and Wagoner doesn’t let you squirm away from it either, more than half the lines contain the word ‘you’. I find this really pins me down and stops me from slipping it into that ‘yeah this is a good poem but I don’t need it yet’ folder of my brain that I’m too prone to do when I’m busy.

Our prompt is to write our own tonic-poem in this direct, instructional but calming way, if we can!

I predominantly write about nature in my practice, so I’m most comfortable when I’ve got my feet on the earth - if you can get outside and take a few deep breaths before we start, that might help - even if you just perch at your front door, or by a window.

Then we’re going to start with an instruction - something you know would make you instantly feel a tiny bit better in this moment; maybe it’s ‘Put your feet up’, ‘Make a brew’, or ‘Stop procrastinating.’ Try to keep it as short and straightforward as possible.

Next we’re going to describe what’s around us, where Wagoner has, ‘the trees and bushes around you are not lost’ we might have ‘the headphones and pen smattering are not X’ and whatever it is you’re snapping yourself out of, or wanting to feel better from go where X is e.g. ‘the headphones and pen smattering are not tired’.

Go on to describe what’s around you as if you are here for the first time - what would strike you most about your surroundings? How might they be perceiving your manner? You might want to use your senses to help with this.

Keep using that direct address, ‘you’ throughout your poem. Repeat your opening instruction again at the end.

Did it work, did you follow your own advice?

Here’s a similar poem of my own called ‘Ginger Harvested In Spring Will Be Tender’, published by The Signal House Edition, Issue 8, in 2021. Can you feel the similarities with Wagoner’s poem? It was unintentional, I hadn’t discovered his work back when I wrote this, but these poems feel related thematically, to me at least.

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Thank you so much Jo. Two poems to comfort the soul. And hopefully our own words will do the same this week.

You can find Jo and read more of her poetry via her website here. She is also on Instagram here. And hopefully she’ll swing by to chat within the comments on Friday.

Have a gentle week everyone,

Nelly x