A friend said to me in an email: “It’s wonderful you find the energy to keep up this poetry alongside your art.” Well, I’ve been writing poems for a little more than 60 years and I’ve been drawing [with some intent] for about 10 years! I’ve only twice done a poem in a drawing [for our church exhibition last October] – see one of them attached.
[1] As a New Year task I've been working through my drawings - about 300 of them. I’ve been 'playing' on the PC at choosing which of seven categories they fit. I’ve settled for: abstract, art, nature, objects, people, places, stories. Truth to tell I enjoy looking at them very much, and I think it is pleasing [and ‘right’] to enjoy your own creative work.
[2] As for poetry I once noted the remark that: “many people write poetry, but few read it!” I don’t know if this is true. I do notice – without being harsh - that more people “like” my drawings on Facebook than they do my poems. Anyhow I go on writing poems – trying to stick at not more than one a month! There’s usually one on what might be called the back-burner!
[3] At the moment I am greatly enjoying reading Siri Hustvedt ‘Mothers, Fathers, and Others - New essays’ [2021]. She writes with imagination; intelligence; clarity; and civilized values. It’s her husband Paul Auster who wrote: “Writing is no longer an act of free will for me, it's a matter of survival [‘The Art of Hunger’ 1997].” I think that’s about it for me.
