FRIENDS WRITING RETREAT & POETRY PROMPT

A WRITING RETREAT WITH MY BEST FRIEND

Howdy, Campers ~ and happy Poetry Friday! 

Today's PF host is Heidi at My Juicy Little Universe. Her link, my poem, a poetry prompt, and a link to my one-day, 3-hour Writing Poetry class on September 24, 2025 are at the end of this post

This August, Bruce Balan and his wife Alene D. Rice (who have been sailing around the world on their boat, Migration for twenty years) stayed with us for a month. 

Bruce and Alene on Migration, 

their home for over 20 years.

Migration is named after Bruce Balan's picture book,
THE CHERRY MIGRATION; thus, her cherry red hull.

In case you're wondering, they are the most marvelous house guests you'd imagine: they tiptoed in if they came back late at night, treated us to dinners, came bearing gifts (manuka honey!), often left for a few days to visit friends and relatives, and left a bouquet of fresh flowers and hidden thank yous all over the house. Our dog and cat adored them so much, our cat slept on their bed for days after they'd left. (Okay, yes, I was a tad jealous that our pets' affections transferred to Bruce and Alene so completely and so fast.)

Kitty waited at their bedroom door 
until they came home

Bruce and I have been sending each other a poem a day since 2010. Months ago, Bruce suggested that he and I plan a writing retreat when they came to the States, so that we could sort through our 10,000+ poems to find the gems for a book.

What fun!

Here's a peek, culled from my journal, of our first full day:

After yesterday's four-hour drive up the California coast, today has been very productive. 

Morning: Bruce and I made breakfast, then practiced yoga on the front grass (he and Alene do yoga on their boat every day, guided by this app which gives clear—and kind—instructions). The lawn overlooks Peacock Hill Farm's 50 acres of orchards, and the beautiful rolling hills of neighboring farms.

Fields of Peacock Hill Farm and beyond

The owners, whose house adjoined our rental, were out of town--so we were the rulers of this gorgeousness for three full days. At first, we were nervous that the peacocks would wake us up early each morning with the typical infant wailing/screaming alley cat music they make. But it turned out that there were only two who never screeched. We named them John and Mary.

Our work begins. Thank goodness Bruce is so organized. He sets our daily schedule, and I'm grateful for that:

1: Sitting in separate work spaces, we each re-read some of the hundreds of poems written by the other, adding only those we thought might fit our book to a folder. (I made a YES folder of his poems that were "maybes," and he made a YES folder for mine)

2: During another timed hour, we sat across from each other at the kitchen table discussing each possible YES poem with brutal honesty. Well, it wasn't exactly brutal--maybe steadfast is a better word. 

I was wondering how my ego would take the jettisoning of some of my favorite poems. To my surprise, it wasn't hard to agree when he didn't think a poem fit. Take a seat, ego!

3: We took a walk through the avocado orchards (the AirB&B owners invited guests to pick as much of their fruit as we wanted).

4: We worked, separately evaluating poems for another hour...

5: ...then walked, discovering incredibly delicious, ripe tangerines on trees all around us. Those, too, we were also encouraged to harvest. 

6: We evaluated poems together for another hour.

Then, we had delicious Mexican food in a crowded little diner filled with Spanish-speaking diners. Yum!

 And that was Day 1.

Bruce and moi at the AirB&B,
overlooking hills and neighboring fields

We didn't get a photo of John and Mary Peacock, 

but peacocks were everywhere at the rental:

on pillows, paintings, sculptures, books, and so much more

Here's a sample of how emailing poems back and forth has worked for us over the years (except I've added my name and copyright info for this post)

 THE UBBERY TREE
(GREATLY REVISED AS A RESULT OF YOUR CRITIQUE)
by April Halprin Wayland

I wish I could FaceBook our old avocado.   
She held out her arms for us to climb
when I was nine.

My sister dubbed her The Ubbery Tree;
we knighted my sister our Ubbery Queen—
her crown was green. 

We stepped in the middle of our dappled tree tent,
crunched on brown leaves, sticks and dirt,
we smelled wild earth.

We searched for her fruit, climbed her rough branches,
rode her dragon-grey trunk, holding on tight
in filtered light.

We crushed glossy leaves between our fingers,
then breathed her licorice perfume
in our leafy room.

I wish I could FaceBook our old avocado.
She held out her arms for us to climb
when I was nine.

(c) 2011 April Halprin Wayland, all rights reserved

From: Bruce Balan To: 'April Halprin Wayland' 
Sent: Wed, May 11, 2011 10:54 pm
Subject: RE: poem for May 11, 2011 REWRITE OF THE UBBERY TREE

I like this better!
More tree, less sister.
A fine avocado tree
You can’t resist her.

Love,
BB

POETRY PROMPT: Remembering A Special Tree

1) Close your eyes.  Breathe.  Think back; remember a tree.

2) Jot down as many memories about the tree as you can.  Scribble wildly about the smells, about each sense. 

3) You're looking for real details.  The ants.  The nest.  A dead hatchling under the tree. Fruit-juice dribbling down your chin.

4) If you find a tree that reminds you of your long-ago tree, go to it now.  Lie under it. Look up. Run your fingers along its trunk. Crush and smell its leaves. Climb it.

5) I couldn't go back to my tree, so I went to Pixabay and typed child climbing avocado tree, child climbing tree.  Even though neither photo I chose was an avocado tree, the photos brought back the Ubbery Tree and helped me remember more details.

Image by Mircea Iancu from Pixabay

Image by beauty_of_nature from Pixabay

6) Okay.  So now you have the raw material.  Now what?  I finally decided on three-lined stanzas in which the last two lines rhymed.  In the end, the rhythm of each third line is the same. Try this...or find another poem you love and imitate the structure of that. Enjoy your tree memories!

I'd love to hear what tree you (or your students?) chose to write about!

And speaking of students, UCLA Extension Writers' Program is offering my 3-hour one-day Writing Poetry for Children class on Wednesday, September 24th, noon-3pm PST. I'd love to meet you there in your little zoom square!

In the end, it's the specifics, the details that make a poem.

Thank you, Margaret, for hosting Poetry Friday today at Reflections on the Teche

My Summer in Pictures

     I'm wrapping up our TeachingAuthors' series on how (and if) the seasons affect our writing. This has been an unusual summer for me. For the first time in years, I didn't teach a summer camp for ages 9-12. I definitely missed working with young writers and hope I'll have the opportunity to get back to it next year.

Instead, I've spent much of this summer either working on a freelance editing project or promoting my published books. We don't talk much about promotion here. Perhaps we should. (If that's a topic you'd like us to address, let us know in the comments.)

I hadn't planned on doing book promotion this summer. But after Playing by Heart was honored with several awards, I realized spreading the news might draw some much-needed attention to the book. If you follow me on Twitter or Instagram, you've probably seen these images:

Playing by Heart won the 2018 Catholic Arts and Letters Award (CALA) for Children's/YA Fiction

Playing by Heart took Third Place in Books for Teens & Young Adults Category of the
2018 Catholic Press Association Book Awards

Playing by Heart is a finalist in the Young Adult Category of the
2018 American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) Carol Awards.
The winner will be announced in September.

In between promotion and editing, I did find time for some fun, including going on a Troll Hunt at the Morton Arboretum (with my husband John, whom you can see in the photo standing beside Joe the Guardian)







and visiting butterflies at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum.

As summer winds down, I hope to finish my freelance editing job and squeeze in some writing time before I start teaching again in October. If you're in the Chicago area, you can find info regarding my College of DuPage class on "Finding Your Writer's Voice" on my website.

This week's Poetry Friday round up is hosted by Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckled Edge.

Don't forget to always Write with Joy!
Carmela

Pause Politics With Poetry and Songs!

.
Howdy Campers, & Happy Poetry Friday! (The link to this week's PF host, my poem, and a reminder of our latest book give away are below.) 

Today, we in the TeachingAuthors treehouse begin tackling the topic: If/how the season affects our writing/work plans/schedule.

Hmm. For me, it's not about how the season of summer affects my writing, but how campaign seasons affect it.

photo by April Halprin Wayland 2007

In 2004, Bruce Balan and I co-founded a PAC (political action committee), AIC. Every four years since, we've put aside much of our lives to help make our country kinder and more civilized towards children. After the election, we settle back into our lives to volunteer, to play, to parent, to be a friend, to write and to teach.

That's how it used to be. But after the November 2016 election, AIC members asked us to keep working for our children's futures.

What does this mean for my writing? I still write a poem a day, but now, just 100 days from November 6th,  my books have gone "to the back of the bus." Argh.

But there's good news, too. To combat my fury/fear/foreboding while working for change, I've been reading Alison McGhee's inspiring and poetic blog posts, reading the marvelous book, World Enough & Time: on Creativity and Slowing Down by Christian McEwen (actually listening to—the author narrates it in a soothing voice with an English accent), listening to less news and more music.

Ah, music! As a longtime folk music fan, I've discovered and fallen in love with this anthem to peace by Woody Guthrie, which his son Arlo Guthrie put to music as Woody was dying:


MY PEACE
Words by Woody Guthrie, Music by Arlo Guthrie 

My peace my peace is all I’ve got
that I can give to you
My peace is all I ever had
that’s all I ever knew
.
I give my peace to green and black
to red and white and blue
my peace my peace is all I’ve got
that I can give to you
.
My peace, my peace is all I’ve got
it's all I've ever known
My peace is worth a thousand times more
than anything I own
.
I pass my peace around and around
‘cross hands of every hue;
my peace, my peace is all I’ve got
that I can to give to you
...........................................................................................................

I decided to imitate this song for my daily poem. "How hard can it be?" I thought, "It's so dang simple."

So I broke it down to figure out what form Woody used (the letters at the start of each line indicate the rhymes):

A My peace my peace is all I've got
B that I can give to you
C my peace
B
.
D xx my peace
B
A my peace my peace is all I’ve got
B that I can give to you
.
A My peace, my peace is all I’ve got
E
F My peace
E
.
G xx my peace
B
A my peace, my peace is all I’ve got
B that I can to give to you

I have a new appreciation of Woody's songs that often sound simple. 

As writer Lillian Ross said: The act of a pro is to make it look easy. Fred Astaire doesn't grunt when he dances to let you know how hard it is. If you're good at it, you leave no fingerprints.

Soooo...here's my imitative poem—still a muddy draft. (originally the last line was in winter, spring and fall  I wrote this note to myself about it: The repeated line does not deserve to be the last line.)

THIS PIECE I'VE WRITTEN (after Woody Guthrie's THIS PEACE)
by April Halprin Wayland
.
This piece, this piece is all I've made
but I must heed its call
this piece has taken all my days
although I know it's small
.
this piece is gathered from the fields
and from a waterfall
This piece, this piece is all I've made
but I must heed its call
.
This piece, this piece is all I've made
it's raw, uncivilized
this piece I wrote, then put away
it hadn't crystalized
.
I'm feeling brave I'll share it now
(if I can read my scrawl)
this piece, this piece is all I've made
but I must heed its call
.
poem (c)2018 by April Halprin Wayland. All rights reserved.

And so, while fighting the good fight, I am led to listen to, read books by, and try to emulate people who are kind, civilized and articulate.

photo by April Halprin Wayland 2017

And that's how this season has affected my writing.

Thank you for reading this, Campers. And what about you? Do you have looser/different goals in certain seasons, or are you pretty consistent year-round?

And don't forget TeachingAuthors' drawing for a chance to win an autographed copy to HP? WHO'S HE? by Patricia Karwatowicz, which ends August 3rd! Details on Carmela's post.

Thank you, Catherine, for hosting today at Reading To The Core!

posted with hope by April Halprin Wayland with help from Monkey, Eli and everyone who does good work.

More, More, More

Today, I continue our Teaching Authors “What Are We ‘Plotting’ for 2015?” series. Deadlines loom for two educational publisher projects as well as a couple other things I hope to accomplish soon, so I promised myself I would keep this short. What I’m plotting is mostly more of the same: more writing, more submitting, and—this is the new part—more sticking my neck out.

On the first of the year, I wrote about my schedule for 2015. I blocked out more time to exercise and added in some time every week to focus on long-term goals. I have been walking more, which is good for my writing because something about the rhythm makes me think differently. I find myself jotting down notes and dictating text messages to send to my email. When I get home, surprise! Ideas!

my walking companion, Bea

One way I hope to stick my neck out is by participating in Poetry Friday more often. Today, I posted a poem on my blog in response to a challenge Joyce Sidman issued last week in an interview with Michelle Heidenrich Barnes on Today’s Little Ditty: a “Deeper Wisdom” poem, modeled after Joyce’s thoughtful “What Do the Trees Know?” in her gorgeous new poetry collection, Winter Bees & Other Poems of the Cold. I really enjoyed the process, especially with such an inspiring model poem.

I’m also researching editors and trying to submit more manuscripts more regularly. I’d love to participate in conferences. And my web site desperately needs updating. I’d better get to work!

JoAnn Early Macken

P.S. Today's Poetry Friday Roundup is at Live Your Poem. . . with Irene Latham. Enjoy!