In the Dark

Going through my poems from years ago, I read this one. It was published by Jayne Jaudon Ferror on Your Daily Poem. I still get emotional when I read it.

In the Dark by Glenda Council Beall Next

I lie here in bed, my cheek against your shoulder, remembering a night, long ago, on your boat. I was afraid. I felt too much, too fast. But you were tender, and love crept over us like silver fog, silent on the lake. We were never again the same. We stepped like children through that door that led to long passages unknown, holding hands, wide-eyed, but brave. Here I am years later, listening to your soft breath and feeling your warm smooth skin. In the dark, now might as well be then. From Now Might As Well Be Then (Finishing Line Press, 2009) Used with the author's permission.

Now Might as Well be Then

My poetry book Now Might as Well be Then, was published by Finishing Line Press. 

I was honored when poet, Scott Owens, wrote a review of my book. I was thrilled because Scott is a poet whose work I greatly admire. I have almost all of his books and a CD with his poems. 

I am publishing his review here because Amazon is not selling my book anymore and many folks think the book is out of print.

Read the review, please, and if you would like this book, you can order it from me or from Finishing Line Press for $12.00. If you order from the publisher, I do not receive any payment. 

If you order from me, I make a small profit.  The book makes a lovely gift and I will be glad to sign it for you.  I will also send you a free copy of another poetry book. Please share this post with others. 

Posted By Scott Owens to Musings at 3/10/2010 02:31:00 PM

There are no surprises in Glenda Beall’s new book of poems Now Might As Well Be Then. The title gives it all away. These are poems about timelessness, specifically about the timelessness of human experience. There are no surprises, but there is great joy. Not that every poem tells a joyful story. Quite the contrary, some of the best poems here are the most tragic. But even in these poems, there is great poignancy, and in that poignancy the joy of recollecting, of being reminded of how it feels to be human, of having, in fact, those feelings cathartically intensified through the poems.

Beall begins the collection with a love poem that celebrates the timelessness of a relationship. The speaker in the title poems says, “You brought me spring in winter // youth when I was old, / you found my childhood self.” If not for the dedication of the poem which announces who is intended by the indefinite second person pronoun, one could easily read this as a celebration of many things--god, nature, the mountains of North Carolina—and interestingly, any of these meanings would fit for the poems that follow as these poems celebrate the presence and influence of all of these elements.

One suspects, in fact, that the relationship between speaker and mate in “Now Might As Well Be Then” is inseparable from that between speaker and place. That suspicion is supported by the next poem, “Mountain Seagull,” in which “Lake Chatuge wraps the mountains, / lapping love,” and the speaker says “My spirit soars above the scene / a seagull far from home, / But yearning to embrace / and build a nest.” Four poems later in “In the Dark,” the theme of timelessness in this relationship appears again, as does the title of the collection and the first poem: “Here I am years later, listening to your soft breath / and feeling your warm smooth skin. / In the dark, now might as well be then.”

The timelessness Beall reveals to the reader is not the magical, mysterious, miraculous sort of timelessness that remains inexplicable and unearned. 

Beall, instead, makes clear in poems like “Woman in the Mirror” that the timelessness she speaks of is fostered through the vital effort of memory: “What happened to those days / I ask the woman in the mirror. / Gone, she says, all gone, unless / you can remember.” The final line break of that poem becomes an impressively empowering device, creating both an imperative and a confirmation for the reader to carry into his or her own life.

To show us how this creation of timelessness is to be done, Beall practices her own imperative throughout the poems in this book. She remembers the sound of rain in “Listening for the Rain” and is reminded of her father:
Too late for the corn, my father says,
across the bridge of time.
Maybe it will save the pasture,
give us one more haying
before summer ends.

She goes on, then, to recall other events from her childhood, the tragic story of “Roosevelt” (perhaps my favorite poem in the book), the story of her “Father’s Horse,” another story of tragic loss in “Clearing New Ground,” and finally, the beautiful and touching concluding poem “Blue Moon Every Twenty Years,” which successfully reminds the reader of all of Beall’s themes by tracing the singing of a particular song every twenty years, the last time when the singer was somewhere around 70 years old and still proclaiming, “I’ll sing your song for you again / in twenty years.” Just so, these poems will sing to the reader, again and again, reminding us to embrace life through our relationships with people and places and to make those relationships timeless through the vital habit of memory.

--Please leave a comment. It will not appear immediately, but I will read it and respond to it. Thank you.

Not out of Print - find it here

https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/now-might-as-well-be-then-by-glenda-council-beall/

A poem from Now Might as Well be Then

A Very Old Photograph                          by                              Glenda Council Beall  Shy with the camera, she stands in her white sailor dress one arm behind her back. Her dark eyes, so much like mine, glance right. Her lips almost smile. I wish I had known her then. We’d have been friends, going to pound suppers, singing alto in the church choir. She was loved as I was loved, sheltered by Mama, strengthened by her Papa’s expectations. How could she have imagined ageing? Certainly not at fourteen and looking so lovely. She never thought she’d grow old, lose her memory, and depend on me, her daughter, to care for her.

From Now Might As Well Be Then (Finishing Line Press, 2009) Purchase a framed print of this poem.

Contemplating - What Poems do I include in my manuscript?

Glenda reading poetry at Poetry Hickory

In 2009, my poetry chapbook, Now Might as Well be Then, was published by Finishing Line Press. The book was released in October and Barry had died from cancer in July. He never saw the finished product. The reading pictured above was one of the few I made when the book came out. In my grief, I had very little interest in setting up readings or appearances. My sister hosted a book party at her home in Roswell, Georgia and her friends bought books. We also had 100 pre-orders from friends and family. 

It is a fact that most poetry books are sold in person-to-person situations. Also, most poetry books are bought by other poets, but I am pleased that many non-poets purchased my book and let me know they enjoyed it. 

One of those non-poets was a French lady in Marietta, GA who used one of my poems on her blog page with lovely pictures that fit with each verse. Another was Nancy Purcell, a fiction writer who said of my book:  You touched my heart over and over again with your words. I've already read the book (Now Might as Well be Then) three times...I'm so glad I own a copy.

                                                       

Steven Harvey, author and essayist, said "I enjoyed reading your chapbook, "Now Might as Well Be Then."  I was interested in it, of course, since you frame it as an exercise in memory, a subject that I am much interested in these days as my class at your "writer's circle" probably made clear. "The Woman in the Mirror" reads like a call to duty for the poet as rememberer.

I do like the narrative impulse behind some of the longer poems such as "Inundated" and "Roosevelt" and "Blue Moon Every Twenty Years" because you allow them to build in a way that conveys the emotions, usually of loss, but in the end the lyrics were moving, too, pieces like "Beneath the Beauty" where your vision of life as a mix of beauty amid ugliness is powerfully presented. You can be proud of this small book!"

Dr. Harvey volunteered his comments after reading my book and I was as excited about his compliments as I would have been if my book had won first place in a contest.

I am contemplating submitting another manuscript of poetry this year. I think I might include some of the poems in "Now Might as Well be Then" because the book was not widely read, and I hope the new book will reach more readers.

If you have my book and have read it, will you let me know which were your favorite poems? "The Woman in the Mirror" seems to appeal to most people, but I would love to have your input as to which poems you think I should include in the new book.

Email me, gcbmountaingirl@gmail.com   or leave a comment on this blog.

Article by Lucy Gratton - Rice and Beall read at JCCFS

JOHN CAMPBELL FOLK SCHOOL

              On Thursday, August 21, 2014 at 7:00 PM, John Campbell Folk School and N.C. Writers Network West are sponsoring The Literary Hour, an hour of poetry and prose reading held at Keith House on the JCFS campus. This is being held on the third Thursday of the month unless otherwise notified.  The reading is free of charge and open to the public.  Writers Estelle Rice and Glenda Beall will be the featured readers, both of whom are well established poets in the mountain area. 

    

ESTELLE RICE

Estelle Rice, author of Quiet Times, a book of poetry, is a well-published writer whose short stories have appeared in The Appalachian Heritage Journal, the Journal of Kentucky Studies, and in anthologies and magazines, including Lights in the Mountains and Echoes Across the Blue Ridge.

She is a native North Carolinian, born in Rock y Mount and raised in Charlotte. She now lives in Marble, NC. Estelle received her BA in psychology from Queens University in Charlotte and a MA in counseling from the University of South Alabama. She is a retired Licensed Professional Counselor. Although she is a full-time caregiver for her husband now, she still attends writing workshops and continues to create poems and stories. Her poetry has been published in The Back Porch, the Freeing Jonah series and others.

Estelle has been a member of  the North Carolina Writers’ Network West for many years and has endeared herself to her friends and co-writers alike.

GLENDA BEALL

Glenda Beall’s poems, essays and short stories have been published in numerous literary journals and magazines including, Reunions Magazine, Main Street Rag, Appalachian Heritage, Muscadine Lines: A Southern Journal, The Dead Mule, School of Southern Literature and Wild Goose Poetry Review. Her poems have been anthologized in Lights in the Mountains, The Best of Poetry Hickory Series, 2011, Kakalak: North Carolina Poets of 2009, and Women’s Spaces, Women’s Places, among others.

Glenda enjoys writing articles for newspapers on subjects that are important to her such as indoor air pollution and spaying and neutering pets. She supports animal rescue shelters with her articles. She  taught memoir writing at John C. Campbell Folk School for several years. She also teaches writing at Tri-County Community College.

Glenda served as program director of North Carolina Writers’ Network West in 2007 and 2008, and is now Clay County Representative for NCWN West.  Glenda is author of  NOW MIGHT AS WELL BE THEN, poetry published by Finishing Line Press, and she compiled a family history,  PROFILES AND PEDIGREES, THOMAS CHARLES COUNCIL AND HIS DESCENDANTS, published by Genealogy Publishing Company.

Glenda is Owner/Director of Writers Circle where she invites those interested in writing poetry or prose to her home studio for classes taught by some of the best poets and writers in the area.  Find her online at www.glendacouncilbeall.blogspot.com and www.profilesandpedigrees.blogspot.com

Journal of Kentucky Studies

Years ago, when I was beginning to submit poetry for publication, Carol Crawford told me to try the Journal of Kentucky Studies, published by  Northern Kentucky University

Carol Crawford

. 

She had met an editor at Appalachian Heritage who said he would soon be an editor there. He had invited her to send some poems and she suggested I do the same.

I have always admired Carol's work so I followed her advice and was overjoyed when one of my poems appeared across the page from Carol's in this nice book.

Dr. Gary Walton is the editor for Journal of Kentucky Studies. 

Their writing program has evidently grown quite a bit since those days when they published several of my poems. I visited the site and I see they have a good creative writing program. In fact, the editor of my chapbook, Now Might as Well be Then, Leah Maines at Finishing Line Press, is listed among their faculty.

I read their English Department blog and found this post that might be of interest to my readers. One of the college's alums is an older woman, Mary Anne Reese, who went back to school after years of working as an attorney. She lives in Cincinnati, OH, and earned her MA at Northern Kentucky University. She gives some good advice, I think.

http://nkuenglish.wordpress.com/2013/10/21/alum-feature-mary-anne-reese/

Karen Holmes, Kelsay Books, Poetry Collections

My friend, Karen Holmes, is a terrific poet. Her poetry collection Untying the Knot, will be published next year by Kelsay Books.

This is an excerpt from an interview with Karen Kelsay of Kelsay Books. I post this to reiterate what I tell my students and to guide you to read this post:

 Have you ever had to turn down a chapbook manuscript you loved? Maybe because it wasn't right for your press, or any other reason?

Yes, there have been a few I really thought were well written and clever, but they just didn't follow the guidelines closely enough. I absolutely hate to do layout work on experimental poetry. The lines need to be justified to the left and in a traditional manner. I will let a few slip by if they look like they won’t be too much trouble, but I will refuse the manuscript if it is filled with crazy lines going all over the place.

I am in process of putting together a poetry manuscript that I hope will be complete before too long. My chapbook, Now Might as Well be Then was published by Finishing Line Press in 2009, the same year my husband passed away. That book is a bitter-sweet reminder.

photo by Michelle Keller

I enjoyed working with Leah Maines editor, and Kevin Maines at Finishing Line. I hope the publishing of my next book will go as well. 

Poets can run into some nightmares with publishers. A friend had her book accepted, but the press failed and after holding her manuscript a long time, the book was never published. Writers must research, carefully, and still one never knows what might happen. 

A novelist, Nancy O., published her book in the U.K. That company went out of business and stopped sending her checks, but the book continued to be listed on Amazon.com. She could not reach anyone to ask if her book was still selling and if so, why was she not receiving any revenue.

With self-publishing and print on demand (POD) becoming easier, some poets are doing their own thing. Some of our greatest poets, like Walt Whitman and T.S. Elliot, paid to publish an early book. The first book is often used to build a name for the poet if he has not already done so.

I believe that Karen Holmes has made a perfect match with her poetry and Kelsay Books.

With winter looming and the cold days that keep us inside, this is a good time to sort poems and to arrange short stories to see what I have and what might be worth sharing with others. Would you, my readers, have any interest in collections of my poems and stories?

Memories, from the corners of my mind

A Poem to celebrate an anniversary. On July 4th, 1963, I met the man I would marry.

The Walker Beach House

The house leans slightly toward the sea,

weathered silver by wind, rain and molten

streams of sunlight. The front porch stretching

north to south is furnished with a creaking

glider and two chairs that huddle and sag

like an old couple waiting for their sunset.

On the clothesline, two red towels flap

in a giddy summer folk dance. Precious

sea oats nod atop the tallest dunes.

I make my way along the narrow path between them

to the Atlantic lapping in eternal rhythm.

My artist mind brushes clouds on the horizon,

blending sky with the water's line.

I find you there sprawled on a blanket

smelling of coconut, defying the Big C

as you bake brown. My sandy foot nudges

yours and rasps you awake. We trudge

the path and shower by the porch.

After lunch we sleep together in Walker's bed. 

---Glenda Council Beall, from Now Might as Well Be Then, published by Finishing Line Press