I never had a father growing up. When I was six my mother married my stepfather--he adopted me when I was thirteen years old. Despite this, it was hard on me because we don't/didn't always see things eye to eye and there was always this void where my 'father' was supposed to be. It was difficult trying to explain to people that I was adopted because I come from a small/rural town where everyone might not like their father but most people have one. It was just really painful to hear people talk about their fathers in high school and all the things that they did with their father because I never met my biological father and MY adoptive father and I had never been close.
HOW HAS YOUR ADOPTION EXPERIENCE AFFECTED YOUR POETRY?
I used to write poetry to my father and I still do, at times. He was not a good man, I am told, but I can't help but be curious of him. I also write about my stepfather, at times, too--sometimes in love, other times in anger. Unfortunately it is more the latter than the former. He's a good guy, but I don't think he's ever tried to understand me.
PLEASE SHARE A SAMPLE POEM(S) ADDRESSING (IN PART) ADOPTION:
father*
you were void and you
created apertures in me,
the hole you tore through
me in your absence raged
with all the fury of the sea—
you were nothing in my
life, I wonder if that's
why even the zephyr is
deaf to my soft whispers?
(* about my birth father)
of claws and memories
they say you are a monster,
I wonder if I wear your claws —
am I that harpy that tears
people to pieces or that fire
breathing dragon that devours
people with sharp fangs —
is it possible for me to step out
of your shadow, to shake it
away; will I ever be able to forget
the man that I never knew?
ABOUT THE POET:
Linda Crate is a Pennsylvanian native born in Pittsburgh yet raised in the rural town of Conneautville. Her poems have been previously published in Magic Cat Press, Black-Listed Magazine, Bigger Stones, Vintage Poetry, The Stellar Showcase Journal, Ides of March, The Blinking Cursor, The Diversified Arts Project, The Railroad Poetry Project, Skive, The Scarlet Sound, Speech Therapy, Itasca Illinois & Willowtree Dreams, Dead Snakes, The Camel Saloon, Write From Wrong, Moon Washed Kisses, The Wilderness Interface Zone, Samizdat Literary Magazine, and Danse Macabre. Her short stories have been published in Carnage Conservatory, Daily Love, Circus of the Damned, and Linguistic Erosion.
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