Poetry and the Pandemic - Lucia Robinson
Walter Brueggemann has a wonderful book called Finally Comes the Poet, which I bought as one who dabbles in poesy and grew up believing God handed the King James Version down to Moses on Mount Sinai. Its primary concern is preaching, which Brueggemann would have infused more with poetry and drama than scholarship and moralizing.
Having “finished” my EFM course as I embarked on teaching college literature and writing and so considering it a ministry, I can attest to their spiritual effectiveness and their interrelationship with relationships. The poetry of our rituals gives great sustenance. I live alone and besides that I broke my shoulder at the beginning of the pandemic, so the National Cathedral’s daily online prayer and services as well as COS’ online services and, of course, the ubiquitous Zoom have been a great blessing to me.
A girlhood friend, an Episcopalian in California, and I have imagined ourselves worshipping six feet apart in the Cathedral some Sundays. Zoom has also brought me into the COS Monday Prayer Group, so I am closer now to several COS women—a few of whom I didn’t even know before—than I had been; and I was amazed to find that Haiku is part of it!
And Zoom has certainly been a boon to my poetry life. Not only has my little writers’ group here been able to meet virtually, but I’ve been able to connect with a poetry society in Florida that formed after I moved but kindly invited me to join. There are several younger members I’d never met or knew only slightly, and it has been a joy to meet and share with them; we’ll continue virtual sessions even as restrictions lift.
I’ve been able to Zoom with some workshops in North Carolina too that otherwise I’d have missed, so technology has helped me broaden my acquaintance, knowledge, and experience from home. (It even let me read my first “first” in a North Carolina Poetry Society contest at the annual meeting.)
But my greatest joy has been seeing more of my daughter, albeit not under the best circumstances, as she and her dear spouse have been my “quarantine pod” and literally sustained me while I had one arm strapped on a block (thank God not the right one, or a hip or a leg!) by bringing groceries and meals and taking me to the orthopedist and their home. We’ve been able to Zoom with my dear niece and her family near Boston, and I even had virtual physical therapy—on a program called Doxy-Me!
