Creative! Human! Dynamic!

Creativity: Where Poems Begin by Mary Mackey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Mary Mackey read pieces of Creativity: Where Poems Begin at 2727 Gallery for Poetry Flash. She clearly describes that pre-literate, not-very verbal state of pure being, emotion, reminiscence and physical sensation poetry buds from with miraculous accuracy. I’ve been writing poems for 60 years now, graduated from a MFA program etc. etc., but never heard the practice explained with such elegant simplicity.

When she begins her novel, Immersion, which she realizes much later “is also a 126-page poem,” she says, contemplating an ashtray in the library at her elbow (many years ago, 1969, University of Chicago) : 

“I will search out, find, and resurrect the way I saw the world as a very young child – a world in which categories did not yet exist, in which there was no context, no expectation, no reason not to look at the unimportant details of things as well as the important ones…”

The story of her life leading up to and after discovering that process is unique and fascinating, but can be summed up as the Cosmic Truth she gleaned from it: “So out of great pain came a great gift.”

Follow her path to and from that, with a number of her fine poems along the way. GOOD!

(Published as “Six Creative! Human! Dynamic! Solutions!” in Knox Book Beat, The Berkeley Times, 21 September, 2023.)

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