Asserting Independence
Reckoning with risks taken as a youngster
Dear friends,
Hallo from London. I’m in England to do some readings and also to attend my brother’s wedding on Monday. The other week my sister (she’s number 4 of 6; I’m number 3 of 6; the brother in question is number 6 of 6) said to me, “Are you looking forward to being the celebrant at the wedding?” I said I wasn’t the celebrant, and that my brother hadn’t asked me. She laughed, and said, “I think you might have agreed, 10 years ago, that if he ever got married, you’d be the celebrant.” Sure enough, a text message later confirmed it. So yes.
My sister has a theory that being number 6 of 6 has indelibly marked my younger brother’s personality. I think she’s right. It’s a nice personality, but it’s a foreign country to this middle child.
Anyway…
This week’s Poetry Unbound episodes were from Brenda Cárdenas and Charif Shanahan. In each, a person reckons with themselves: in Charif’s poem, it’s a person reckoning with their present; in Brenda’s, it’s a person reckoning with the delicious risks they took as youngsters.
When I was young, I’d lie to my parents about where I was staying for a night. “I’m staying at Cathal’s,” I’d say. He’d tell his parents he was staying at mine, and we’d wander the streets all night, bringing thin blankets and makeshift bivvy bags so we could sleep in a woodland. He’d smoke cigarettes that I’d take a drag from. I’d talk about poems. He’d talk about girls. It was ridiculous really; we’d both be sleep deprived idiots the next day. And our respective parents would have — we imagined — freaked out if they ever knew. That was, of course, part of the dangerous delight of it.
After Cathal died in 2000, I told his mother about our exploits. The dramas that he and I had imagined would unfold, were our parents ever to know, were ridiculously exaggerated. She gave a sad smile, and asked what we talked about all night. The worst had happened, so anger had no direction now. And anyway, she half guessed all along.
Brenda Cárdenas’ poem considers risks taken — teenagers out in the middle of the night — and the comfort of climbing back into bed through an open window. Charif Shanahan’s poem considers growing up and coming to terms with an age where you begin to take yourself seriously as an adult. Preparing both of these poems was an invitation for me to pay attention to stages of life, times of asserting independence, and what age does to perspective on risks taken — or not taken.
What’s something you did to assert independence? How did it feel? How do you look at it now?
It might have been something you did at 15. Or 50. Such assertions are needed everywhere.
As always, I’ll look forward to reading your replies. But first, there’s a wedding to prep!
Pádraig
The Latest from Poetry Unbound
Episodes 11 & 12
You can also listen on Spotify, poetryunbound.org, or wherever podcasts are found.
Poetry in the World
U.S.A.
Open Your World with Poetry | Rhinebeck, NY
I’ll be back at the Omega Institute in New York leading another weeklong retreat, October 1-6. Discussions, readings, and writing sessions exploring the place of poetry, craft, language, and form in our lives. Each day, you’ll examine poems — some well known and other lesser known — and explore the artistry behind them. You’ll delve beyond the how of a poem and look at the why of a poem. Why did it need to be written? What does this poem explore about being human? What is the intuition and intelligence of this poem? What is its hunger? There’ll be prompts for you to respond to. Open for all who love writing or reading poetry — or want to! While the format and numbers will be similar to 2022’s event, we will include small groups, and the poems and prompts will be different to the previous year. Details, registration, and information about scholarships here.
I am the first woman on both sides of my family to go to college but it almost didn’t happen. My parents were divorced so my siblings and I were immediately impoverished. My dad was overprotective and didn’t want me (the oldest and only girl) venturing out on my own. My mom never got her high school diploma and worked long days as a cafeteria worker at a private college. In her eyes, a place where rich people sent their children was no place for me.
So I applied to as many colleges as I could afford to pay the application fee. (I even got accepted into Brown!) But when it came time to apply for financial aid, my mother refused to give me her tax information or social security card. Some way I figured out how to obtain her tax transcript, and I was thrilled when it arrived in the mail.
I have never once regretted the risk I took. I now also have a masters degree and am considering (even at age 50) pursuing my PhD in anthropology. Maybe what I did was “illegal” (I don’t remember the rules at that time) but because of my bravery my own children can be proud of the life I have created for them.
Ha! I got married! At the ripe old age of barely 19....Although I didn't realize it at the time, I think it was my ticket out of a big Irish Catholic family (#5 out of 9) - a very rigid and narrow upbringing. I was conflicted about getting married but also, very oddly, felt like I needed to take this offer of marriage because likely no one else would ever want to marry me. How sad. The marriage became violent within a couple of years. I turned to the Woman's Center on my college campus for support and my whole world expanded. It was a rough transition to genuine independence but, by the age of 23, I was grateful that I had gotten married. I recognized that my life had opened up as a result but not in the way that I expected. The truth that I took away was to listen to my own voice instead of the voices around me. For the most part, I have been able to do that.