Nightingale & Sparrow

Category: Promos

  • Author Statement: A Daughter for Mr. Spider by Megan Russo

    Dear Reader,

    I’ve been trying to find a witty or creative way to phrase my feelings about my mixed media collection, but all I can seem to think of is how much of a release it has been for me. I’ve struggled with my identity for most of my life. I grew up never knowing my father and falling into that stereotype of combative, jaded daughter with my mother. I was aloof and unable to connect parts of who I was to the people around me, but I found an almost magical kinship with my grandfather. He was the tempo that kept my life on track. A steady beat that I could always rely on and feel within the beating of my own heart when I was faced with uncertainty.

    His passing caught me by surprise, but he was the kind of man who put others before himself and strived to see happiness in the people around him, no matter what it cost him. I feel that taking time to write about him has given me the chance to reflect on what he truly means to me rather than obsessing over the fact that physically he isn’t with me anymore. There isn’t anything anyone can do to stop death, but for the last three years, I’ve kept reliving those moments and trying to think of something I could have done.

    I spent my last hour with him exhausted from work, thinking that I would just come back to the hospital next day, and then we would get to go home because nothing was seriously wrong with him. He had beaten cancer twice, lived through working years in an asbestos filled steel mill, broken both of his arms – at the same time!! He was made of stronger stuff and I believed he could fend off anything. I was living in a dream that there was nothing that would take him from me but the passage of time. The truth that he was dying, and he knew it. The days that followed his passing were like waking up in a world I could have never imagined.

    It caused me to change my life in drastic ways. I quit my job and moved across the country, desperately trying to get away and start over. I’ve struggled to connect with my family members, because of my lingering anger. I was stuck in a mindset that being far away from my problem would fix things, but he was still there with me.

    Loss is a difficult thing to navigate, and the one thing I’ve learned is that grieving is a process we all handle in our own ways. There is no right answer for how to process dramatic changes in your life, and there is nothing wrong with seeking help if you find yourself unable to handle it on your own. This collection is dedicated to everyone who has lost someone close to them and found themselves adrift. My words to you are take you time and try to be kind to yourself even in those moments where you feel hopeless.

    You are loved, and the memories we carry with us of those we love will let their legacy live on within us.

  • “And so, The Black Girl Sings in a Whisper,” an excerpt from Dichotomy by Mikhayla Robinson

    And so, The Black Girl Sings in a Whisper

    I might be too loud for this one,
    Maybe a little off-key.

    My life has been an echo-chamber of complaints,
    Of things I will never be allowed to do.

    One day I’ll skip down the street
    Running straight through traffic,
    Afro and all.

    I’ll look at everyone who uttered an order,
    And I’ll break every rule.

    Most importantly,
    I’ll love myself more than anyone else did

    from Dichotomy

  • An Interview with Mikhayla Robinson

    First and foremost, what inspired you to write Dichotomy?

    Dichotomy started off as a way for me to express myself to myself. They were poems that I had written over the years that I felt may connect to others that see the world from a similar perspective.

    You designed the cover for this chapbook yourself—can you tell us more about that design and process?

    I felt that the symbolism of differing types of flowers with the distinctive black and white color scheme provided a way to see into the book without ever opening the cover, giving the reader a chance to absorb the meaning of the chapbook itself.

    Did you have the idea of this being a manuscript from the start or did this start out as individual poems?

    I feel that it started off as individual poems, but through the course of writing and rereading them I realized that the messages connected into a theme.

    Do you have a favourite piece from this collection?

    I put a lot of thought into each work, and I view each one almost how a mother isn’t “supposed” to have a favorite, but, if I had to choose, I’d have to say Save Yourself is something that I connected with at that time.

    Were there any sections you decided not to include in the final version? Or pieces you added later in the process?

    No there wasn’t. At the time that Dichotomy was picked up, it was virtually a finished work.

    Who would you most recommend Dichotomy to?

    I feel like everyone can read Dichotomy and get something from it whether it be a sense of acceptance, understanding, or perspective, however, growing up as a black woman, it was written with that in mind.

    What have been your favourite and least favourite parts of the publication process?

    I would say my own ignorance in a sense is both. I despise the fact that I don’t understand the entirety of the process but experiencing it and learning has been an enjoyment.

    Do you have any advice for those who might want to follow in your footsteps?

    I wouldn’t call myself some kind of expert on the process but I would say that if you are going to write and express yourself in this format, you have to be true to what you believe in and write that.

    What project(s) are you working on going forward?

    I have another collection of poetry that I am working on that has yet to be named, but it is similar in content.

    Besides the amazing work you’ve created here, what’s your favourite piece you’ve ever created? How about your favourite by someone else?

    My favorite book is Their Eyes Are Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston and I don’t really have a favorite piece by myself as of yet.

    Dichotomy will be available 24 March

  • An excerpt from A letter from your sheets // if your sheets could speak. by Elizabeth Kemball

    Your lips whisper into my folds,
    garbled litanies, muffled screams,
    when it’s cold
    you give out tiny snorts,
    calling for more air,
    for warmth,
    you stretch your hand
    over the empty space,
    but it’s just me, your sheets,
    and your arm goes limp.

    from A letter from your sheets // if your sheets could speak.

  • An Interview with Elizabeth Kemball

    First and foremost, what inspired you to write A letter from your sheets // if your sheets could speak.?

    It was actually in a university seminar in my final year; we were dicussing perspectives in poetry and tasked with writing a poem from the perspective of something which wasn’t human. I went through a few different ideas in my head but something about sheets just felt so right.

    What drew you to the idea of sheets specifically?

    I was thinking about how I could make something inanimate also feel intimate and universal, which drew me to the idea of beds – I like that humans all sleep, and whilst we sleep we’re so vulnerable, and sheets also are physically close to our bodies. Perfect poetry fodder. Two images especially drew me to sheets: the idea of someone tucking all of their body inside of a blanket so that they become nearly invisible, and also the weird marks from the fabric that are left on our skin when we’ve slept in the same position for too long.

    The cover image is, of course, absolutely stunning—what led you to choose that imagery?

    I wanted to depict something that encompassed the relationship between sheets and humans, a sort of codependecy and desperation, but also simplicity. I like that the image of a hand grabbing sheets could be interpreted in so many ways as well, is it passion, anger, sadness, stretching… it adds another part for the reader to unravel in their own way.

    Did you have the idea of this being a micro-manuscript from the start or did this start out as “just” a poem?

    It actually started as a performance piece – I wanted to write something longer which would sound good when performed with varied moods and tones throughout and words that felt juicy as they were spoken. It was only when I started splitting the poem into stanzas for the page that I realised this could transform into something very different than a performance piece, a more fragmented manuscript, with more space around each page for the words to breathe.

    Do you have a favourite line or stanza from this collection?

    My favourite little section is:

    ‘it’s abstract verbal calligraphy,
    too twisted in on itself
    for me to decipher.’

    Were there any sections you decided not to include in the final version? Or pieces you added later in the process?

    There were definitely cuts and changes, but the piece as a whole didn’t change that much throughout the process, it was more the layout and formatting that took a while to perfect.

    Who would you most recommend A letter from your sheets to?

    Lonely people. I wrote this poem when I was in a phase of life where, no matter how many people were around, I couldn’t help but feel very alone. I think you can feel that when you read it. We all feel lonely sometimes, it’s a good poem for that mood.

    What have been your favourite and least favourite parts of the publication process?

    My least favourite part is easy: clicking submit. That’s the scariest bit; the gnawing feeling in your gut that you should’ve changed something or you haven’t filled the submission in right or you didn’t proofread it properly. After I click submit I generally submit myself (no pun intended) to the ‘what will be, will be’ mindset. The favourite part was a little after acceptance, when I got to sign the publishing contract – it felt like a huge step in my writing career.

    Do you have any advice for those who might want to follow in your footsteps?

    Make sure your manuscript is one you’re confident in before you submit. Before this manuscript was accepted I’d been sending around a chapbook which received a few rejections (it was even longlisted by Nightingale & Sparrow) – I was very much just wanting to get a body of my work published and now looking back at it, it’s not right. I can’t explain really how it’s not right because the manuscript is full of poems I believe in, but I need to go back and rework it, change the order, add and remove and so on. This microchapbook felt right as soon as I put it together; from the cover art to the way I split up the poem onto the pages, I just knew that this is something I wouldn’t change before submitting again if I needed to, it was cohesive. I hear a lot of advice saying ‘just send things out, go for it’ and so forth but I think before that, you need to really believe that what you’re sending out deserves to be published and that it will have an impact on other people.

    What project(s) are you working on going forward?

    I’m currently working on that chapbook I mentioned before, I don’t think it’s a chapbook anymore – it’s a full length collection that needs more of my poems and reordering. It’s going to be centred around sections of ‘light’. I’m also working on a novel! A constant project that, I guess, won’t go away until I finish it.

    Besides the amazing work you’ve created here, what’s your favourite piece you’ve ever created? How about your favourite by someone else?

    I have always been proud of a poem I wrote called ‘Styx and Stones’, it was the first poem I wrote that really made me feel like a writer – it felt original, it had a voice, my voice. I’ve still not found the right home for it yet, it’s quite hard to let go of. It’s hard to pick a favourite by someone else, for poetry I’d probably say (at the moment, though it changes with mood) the poem ‘Bird’ by Liz Berry.

  • Editor’s Note: A letter from your sheets // if your sheets could speak. by Elizabeth Kemball

    When reading through microchapbook submissions this winter, A letter from your sheets // if your sheets could speak. was one of the first to catch my eye.  I never could have imagined a conversation with my sheets. I wash the sheets each week and battle the cat to re-make the bed afterwards—I never thought to ask how they might feel about that.

    Elizabeth Kemball’s microchapbook considers the sheets’ thoughts and feelings.  Her poetry personifies something so seemingly insignificant—bed linens, of all things—and makes them into the star of the show.

    Have you ever stopped to thank your sheets? After reading this book, you might want to. In Kemball’s interpretation, they are silent protectors, quiet comforters, a different kind of lover holding you close.  Your sheets watch you through your most intimate moments, think of you when you’re gone from them, and long to call out to you.  Their affections may be unrequited, but still, you return to your bed–to your sheets–and yearn for the solace they bring.

    I couldn’t ask for a better title to launch our 2020-2021 microchapbook series than this beautiful little book.  A letter from your sheets // if your sheets could speak. will be available in print, Kindle, and PDF editions next week. Be sure to stay tuned for more information on our other upcoming releases as well!

  • Author Statement: If your sheets could speak // a letter from your sheets. by Elizabeth Kemball

    Have you ever felt like something was watching when you were all alone? Or wish that something was? Laid down at night to find yourself straining to hear anything other than your own breath and heartbeat in the pitch black? Have you dreamt of someone, something, and woken to find only air between your fingers?

    A letter from your sheets // if your sheets could speak. gives a voice to that feeling; it explores the idea of vocalising to the inanimate, through imagining a letter written from a person’s bed sheets. When I started writing this piece, I was looking at writing a poem distanced from the ‘I’ which I find myself writing most often; I wanted to instead write from the perspective of something that does not have a voice of its own. Sheets are witness to a huge portion of humans’ lives: sleep, sorrow, romance, sex, death and more. This book is a voyeuristic but gentle observation of a place in which humans are often at their most vulnerable; it is a fragmented narrative, of flashes of actions and images that gives us an insight into the person’s life through the moments that they spend in their bed.

    Our sheets are primarily places of comfort and solace, but also isolation. Loneliness is something we all feel – something I certainly have felt, especially when staring at the ceiling lying in bed in the darkness. I was intrigued by what people are like when they think nothing is watching – when they are allowed to be their barest self. It may read like a confession or a love letter, and I think to each person it will vary depending on their own relationship with sheets and sleep (one of the few activities all humans partake in). For some, these sheets may not be sheets at all; sometimes we find our own voices, or others, in the most mundane objects.

    Thank you to everyone who reads this book; I hope that, perhaps, this will make you feel more connected to the world. Not everything can speak, but everything says something.

  • An Excerpt from Cemetery Music by Birdy Odell

    ‘when it’s all over
    we shall not see the light,
    neither sky, nor bitter ocean
    but the thin, pure moment
    of creation’

    Cemetery Music - excerpt

  • An Interview with Birdy Odell

    First and foremost, what inspired you to write Cemetery Music

    When I begin a collection of work, I’m not entirely sure which direction it will take.  In fact when I drew the little birds that illustrate the poems I did it separately. It wasn’t until later on that I began to attach words to the images.  I wasn’t sure they would resonate with people. In fact, I very nearly didn’t submit this collection for that reason.   

    I’ve always been at odds with the notion of dying.  It seems, on one hand, a lovely reprieve, and on the other a spectre that hovers over me each day threatening my happiness.  It’s not that I set out to write about death, it’s what bubbles up as I sift through piles of cut up words. I think of it as a form of therapy.  

    Why found words?  

    My process is organic.  Intuitive. I am not a writer who studies various forms of poetry and follows a prescribed set of rules. Writing poetry is, for me, an expression of emotional thought, a way to put unnamed feeling into words.  Using found words allows me to go into a completely relaxed headspace. I let the words come forward. I may find a phrase that I like and that will be the jumping off point. Sometimes it comes easily and other times it will take days to complete one poem.  If I overthink it, I get nothing. The words sound too contrived. Working without forcing my agenda onto the words provides a more organic experience. It’s like a treasure hunt. And I am thrilled when I find something that just fits.  

    Birds are a recurring (and oh so beautiful!) image throughout this collection–is there a particular significance to them?

    I think I find in them a beautiful sadness and I’m drawn to that.  They may be charming little chatterboxes or thoughtful predators. But I don’t know that they ever seem entirely comfortable.  We find beauty in a seagull soaring overhead. But its own experience is an endless quest for food. I am thrilled when the geese fly off in the fall and love to hear the hush, hush, of their wings in between calls. I take joy in such a peaceful moment but for them it is the beginning of a perilous and exhausting journey.  A chickadee huddled in on itself in the dead of winter says so much to me. As does the first sight of a robin in the spring.  

    When I was 10 years old I found a great horned owl beside our house when I went to get the garden hose.  It scared me to death as a child but as an adult, I think how lucky I was to have seen that. And not long ago my husband and I were driving in the country.  A snowy owl was perched on a post. It took flight but low to the ground and just in front of the car all the way down the snow covered gravel road. Like a guardian leading us home. 

    Did you struggle at all, writing about a topic as difficult as death?

    I think I was born into the middle of an existential crisis.  I’ve thought about death for as long as I can remember. So in some respects it’s been a constant companion.   Death, while difficult, isn’t as hard for me as loss. That’s much worse. I think most of us would say the same.  We don’t fear our own demise as much as that of those we stand to lose. 

    The first funeral I attended was that of a family friend who had been beaten to death.  It was sad. For sure. But it was his existence that really wounded me. It was tragic.    

    I find writing about death kind of lovely in a way.   I love the poignancy, the nostalgia and the peacefulness of a cemetery walk.  There is a strange comfort there. And yet knowing we are all going to die is still terrifying to me.   It is an absolute paradox. An unsolvable riddle. One I continue to pick at through poetry. 

    What was your process in writing this book?  Did you create the pieces individually and notice these through-lines or set out with this final product in mind? 

    I had been writing fiction for awhile in an attempt to be a novelist.  But one day I just made the conscious decision that anything I wrote from now on would be only for me.  I wanted to simply enjoy the process. That’s it. Once I gave myself permission to do that it was amazing how productive I suddenly became.   So with this book the birds came first. Every day I’d just paint a little bird. In the meantime I was working on found poetry with vintage photos, which is my first love really, and then one day I pulled out a picture of one of the birds and added  the words, “between the beating of heavy wings, the weary heart smiled” and that was it. The words dictated the image. I most often find the words first and then the image they depict. The process itself is tremendously cathartic. It’s a mood. I try to explain it but most often if the writing is going well I feel as if I’m just the messenger.   And as I completed more and more of the poems I realized that I was writing about death. I hesitated about the imagery but by then it had a mind of its own. 

    Do you have a favourite piece(s) from this collection?  

    I love so many but I think the one that sort of sums it all up is this,

    ‘I am but
    A place in time
    Echoing the sun’

    It is the circle of life, days come and go, seasons change.  Babies are born, people die. But in echoing the sun I am able to find joy while I am here. 

    Were there any pieces you decided not to include in the final version? Or pieces you added later in the process? 

    Yes, a few, mostly for formatting and page count.  Here are two.

    above the tiny garden
    perfumed lavender
    little streams, very blue
    all wet with tears
    as it began to rain

                 —

    the old man was weeping
    watching birds hop from
    branch to branch
    he felt pity for them
    like any ordinary day
    among the cherry trees

    Who would you most recommend Cemetery Music to?

    I think that anyone who has suffered a loss will identify with the poems in this book.  But because the images are lighthearted it isn’t limited to those who grieve. The poignancy of a small moment captured in very few words is something we can all relate to.  I write in vignettes on purpose. I prefer a few words that make me think or resonate with me. And even though there is a melancholy tone to the book it is still a book of comfort and sweetness.  

    What have been your favourite and least favourite parts of the publication process?

    This year from start to finish has been a learning curve.  Having my first chapbook published has been thrilling at times and at others I’ve been ready to close the blinds and hide.  But all in all I couldn’t have asked for a better experience. Having an editor/publisher who understands both sides of the process has been a gift.  And when my proof copy came in the mail I felt like I’d crossed an imaginary finish line.   

    I have actually enjoyed the whole process.  The only part I find difficult is tooting my own horn.  But I’m learning.  

    Do you have any advice for those who might want to follow in your footsteps?

    I would say write what you want.  Don’t try to imitate anyone else’s voice.  Start small. There are so many lit mags that are happy to support new writers.  It’s fun to see your work out there and feels great to have publishing credits to add to your submissions.  Never give up. And be grateful.  

    What project(s) are you working on going forward?

    I’m feeling the need to work on something about shame.  This ties into my childhood themes and will still be in the found word style.  At the moment I’m working on artwork again. When the time is right the words will come.  In the meantime I have other manuscripts out there in the world of submissions and art to make for an upcoming show. 

    Besides the amazing work you’ve created here, what’s your favourite piece you’ve ever created? How about your favourite by someone else?

    That’s a tough one but I love a short story I wrote called ‘The Gardener’,  (you can find it on Commaful) in fact there are a few I adore, ‘Goodnight Alice’ is another one. ( Imagine Alice in Wonderland on her 90th birthday.)   Each piece I create is my favourite in the moment. 

    I feel like my favourite poem about death is appropriate here.  It’s by Christina Rossetti.

    From the Antique (1852)

    The wind shall lull us yet,
    The flowers shall spring above us:
    And those who hate forget,
    And those forget who love us.

    The pulse of hope shall cease,
    Of joy and of regretting:
    We twain shall sleep in peace,
    Forgotten and forgetting.

    For us no sun shall rise,
    No wind rejoice, nor river,
    Where we with fast-closed eyes
    Shall sleep and sleep forever.

  • Review of Cemetery Music by Birdy Odell

    Review by Marie A Bailey

    Cemetery Music by Birdy Odell has sad notes dealing as it does with death, loss, and grief, but Odell’s artwork—including whimsical little birds with silly hats and
    balloons—lifts the music of her chosen words, encouraging this reader at least to
    sometimes find delight, perhaps even joy, in this chapbook. Odell’s renderings of softly drawn birds and flora are paired with found words pasted to the drawings as like a scrapbook, a meditation on sad but inevitable events, the fact that you cannot have Life without Death.

    Death stormed into my life when I was rather young, with the loss of a three-year-old cousin, and has continued to wreak havoc ever since, increasing his presence exponentially as I entered my sixties, forcing me to accept.

    Odell gives voice to my uneasy reconciliation with Death: “she believed in what remained.” Five simple words that can have different meanings depending on its context. In Cemetery Music, the meaning of “she believed in what remained,” is soothing, reassuring, a notation that much remains after Death has visited, much remains to believe in, to embrace.

    Death or its aftermath may be “a still moment [which] showed neither peace nor sorrow,” but Odell encourages us to “be happy with familiar objects” such as “small, bright beads” and “wooded hills” and “wallflowers.” The found words snips of single words, couplings or phrases—are placed on the pages like a breadcrumb trail, navigating the reader “near the graves” where “nothing was left but little stolen hearts.”

    Anyone who has spent time in a cemetery, particularly ones where the dead have lain for centuries, will read Odell’s poems as those epitaphs etched into granite, sandstone, or marble, some so worn by time and weather that words seem “rubbed with the balm of love.”

    As I approach the prospect of more deaths in my life, more times of mourning and grief, I’ll want to have Birdy Odell’s Cemetery Music by my side. While her poems speak of loss and the pain of being left behind, she reminds us that “life was [and is] still beautiful and breathing.”