Poem Time: The Magic of Words

by Patrick J. Walsh

For those who know me primarily from my books or journalism or videos, it might come as something of a surprise to find out that I'm also an avid poet.

Then again, if you ever heard me lecture about literature or dug around in the archives at my undergrad alma mater, my fascination with poets and poetics will probably make perfect sense.

And for poets, spring is a special time of year -- and not just because of all those blooming flowers and similarly inspiring symbols of the ethereal dimensions of life.

It's also the setting for National Poetry Month, which each April focuses attention on the art of poetry and its significance to our culture and history.

Founded in 1996 by the Academy of American Poets, the National Poetry Month event inspires many individual celebrations across the country, and acts as a sort of yearly punctuation mark in the ongoing process of growing as a writer and reader of poetry.

In my particular case, the past two National Poetry Month celebrations have meant participating in the "Poem-A-Day Challenge" led by Robert Lee Brewer at his blog, Poetic Asides.

The challenge format provides poets with a  prompt each day as a starting point for molding a new poem. And while it can be a bit daunting to commit to writing a new poem every day for a month, it's also a great way to quickly generate a sizable lot of new drafts, which can then be hammered into finished work as time and circumstance permit.

Whether you're writing or reading, as part of the national celebration or just for your own pleasure, I hope you'll find a little time to focus on poems and poets. It's a great way to celebrate the remarkable magic of words, and all that they inspire in us each day.

Baseball and Writing and Life

by Patrick J. Walsh

Here's something I'm particularly grateful for today: my video Pitching Diamonds: Cy Young's First No-Hitter (http://youtu.be/QNsFJ7cxVR4) has just passed the 5,000 views milestone.

I am so appreciative for everyone who has checked it out over the course of the past two and a half years, and I am grateful for all the views, comments and feedback I've received on all my video efforts.

I first posted the Cy video in the very early hours of April 6, 2012 -- the overnight following Opening Day of the 2012 season for my New York Mets. That day, Mets ace Johan Santana returned from shoulder surgery to pitch a masterful five innings while helping to secure a 1-0 win over the Braves.

Later that season, Johan would pitch the first no-hitter in Mets history. I watched both of those games on TV, with my Mom.

Looking back on them now, and reflecting on all that has happened since — to my team, and in my life — I cannot help but smile when I think of how lucky I am to have had so many great experiences as a baseball fan, and as a writer.

The Cy video marks my first step beyond the Five Minutes in Space series — the first time I've posted a video intended for a broader audience. I had originally launched my YouTube channel in January, 2011 as a way to communicate with like-minded fans of space exploration — the folks who might know me as the author of Echoes Among the Stars or Spaceflight.

When I started researching my baseball project about a year later, it was awesome to have the ability to transform one small slice of the research into an 'instant' short-form documentary that I could immediately share online. It allowed me to reach out to other baseball fans, and to give everyone who might be interested in my writing a chance to see a little bit of my work in progress.

Given the length of time it often takes to put together a big project, and the fact that I am pretty much always working on a whole raft of different writing projects at the same time (like pretty much every other writer I know), it's an especially good thing to be able to quickly, concisely, and continuously share a sample of my work with anyone who'd like to know, you know, "so what are you working on now?"

There were 10 years between the publication of my first book (Echoes, in 2000) and my second (Spaceflight, 2010), and that's a really long time to have to try to describe your current project, again and again, in a manner that's succinct and vivid enough to capture someone's interest. Especially when the project is constantly evolving, or as you shift your attention from one project to another.

Having a video sample helps me to honor the question, and to provide a meaningful answer for those who are kind enough, or interested enough, to ask about my work. I am always grateful for both the interest and the support, as writing can often be a fairly solitary pursuit, and it's important to stay plugged into those who care the most about your work.

Which brings me, not coincidentally, back to the game of baseball.

In baseball, as in writing, as in life itself, there is so much joy to be found in being part of something larger than yourself: a team, a city, a sport, a life, a history…

I like to think that my own experiences of that feeling of joy, however personal or humble, have given me some small idea of what it's like for those who are at the heart of the greatest moments in the history of the game.

Just as time passes and those moments are transformed into memories, all the little joys we experience first-hand remain as near as our connections to the times we shared, and to the people who shared them with us along the way.

And as we remember and record and pass along the stories of those moments, we also pass along a little bit of each of us. Clapping, cheering, breathing right along with our favorite team or favorite players, we all take our seats in the stands as the game rolls on, helping to shape some small part of a day, or a season, or a lifetime.

That's baseball, and history, and life. And I'm grateful for the chance to share it with all of you.

The Hawk

By Patrick J. Walsh

There is a short bridge along the path of my daily walk; it parts the lake in the park at a point where the water is at is narrowest, dividing the upper and lower portions of the pond with a picturesque waterfall.

On a typical day, as I start across the bridge, I place my foot carefully on the first wood plank. I begin as close to the near side as possible, so I can measure out the distance each day from one end of the bridge to the other. It is normally nine long strides the first time across, unless there is ice or snow or slippery rain.

On subsequent crossings, it is often a step or two more, as my stride shortens and my breath quickens with the exertion of my exercise.

On one recent day, as I approached the bridge, a sudden commotion in the brush on the near lower bank startled me out of my normal routine. I turned slightly, trying to locate the source of the disturbance; I had a vague intimation of upward motion.

Then, as though risen out of some ancient lyric once warbled around a primitive campfire in the halcyon days of a younger time, there appeared a bird — a large bird, proud and solemn in its shift from the moist bank to the thin limb of a tree, some ten or twelve yards from where I stood.

Although my inner balance was momentarily set askew by the sudden manifestation of feathers and flight, my presence within the sweep of his vision seemed not to matter in the least to him.

...there appeared a bird, proud and solemn...

His indifference briefly brought to mind the spectral namesake of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven:

“Not the least obeisance made he; 
not an instant stopped or stayed he;

but with mien of lord or lady, 
perched above my chamber door, —”

— but this was no mere specter, nor gothic emblem of despair; and perched not in the sad den of mourning, but instead resplendent against the blue sky and the high clouds on the bright sunny day in early Spring, this bird in the park was the majestic icon of ideas too big to grasp without a great deal of thought.

Among my initial reactions, there was the assumption, for whatever reason, of his being male; and I also assumed, despite the paucity of my knowledge of the subject, that he was most probably a hawk. To me he simply looked like a hawk, as a hawk would appear in my imagination if I were to conjure an image based on memories of having seen such a bird in the past, in a book perhaps, or maybe on television.

Not that any of my assumptions or curiosities — what sort of creature he was, or why his sudden appearance immediately aroused in me the aura of poetry and the aromas of summer days in childhood — were of any concern to him, of course. He was simply living proof of the wisdom of Providence in the establishment of a bulkhead of contrasting experience and abilities between human beings and the creatures of the air and water and woods.

Even now — as I recall the wonder I felt as I looked up at him, he perched high above me in the tree, me imagining the sensation of his gliding effortlessly along the edge of the air on the trailing path of a warm wind — even now, I am aware of a certain sense of divine humor at the thought of my being the superior being in the system whose circumstances gave rise to our unexpected encounter.

And still I ponder, while he has no need of thought, as he makes his way effortlessly forward...

© 2012 Patrick J. Walsh

Other Essays in this Series:

• A Walk in the Park

• Encounter in Autumn

• The First Warm Day of Spring

• A Walk Beneath the Dripline

Revisiting John Steinbeck

By Patrick J. Walsh

Those who know my love for the classics that I first encountered in my youth know that I am a pretty voracious re-reader. I tend to return to old favorites again and again, as though I were visiting old friends.

Lately I’ve been in a Steinbeck mood, so I’ve begun re-reading The Short Novels: Tortilla Flat / The Moon is Down / The Red Pony / Of Mice and Men / Cannery Row / The Pearl.

Accounts of my affection for these particular stories could fill several small volumes on their own. Suffice it to say that I heartily recommend John Steinbeck's work to anyone interested in understanding 20th century American literature and culture.

My favorite here is Of Mice and Men; I have read it more frequently than any of Steinbeck's books, and I was fortunate to see an excellent stage production in summer stock many years ago — a formative experience for me as a writer. The characters are brilliantly drawn, and the economy with which the author tells the story is truly breathtaking. If you've not read it before, the ending will leave you stunned, pondering the enormous power of the demands of love and brotherhood.

Steinbeck's characters are brilliantly drawn, and the
economy with which he tells the story is truly breathtaking...

Abandoned farm in the dust bowl, 1936.
Photo by Arthur Rothstein, from the Library of Congress
Prints & Photographs online catalog,
U.S. Farm Security Administration collection
(http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/fsa1998018995/PP/

The Moon is Down is also very serious business, and particularly of interest to anyone studying the dynamics of occupation and the subjugation of one people by another. My interest in virtually all things related to the World War II era fed my original fascination with this work, but on finishing it the first time, I came to see its story in the larger context of the relationships that occur between people who find themselves in untenable circumstances.

Although I probably do the author some disservice by doing so, I admit that I tend to think of Tortilla Flat and Cannery Row as being somehow related, when in fact they are quite distinct. There was a time when I particularly enjoyed studying Tortilla Flat for its parallels to the legend of King Arthur — a structure that Steinbeck consciously pursued and rightfully celebrated. Both of these feature strong characters and lovingly crafted narratives; even without any academic pretense involved, you will probably just love reading them.

The Red Pony always seems to me to be a work set apart from the others in this collection, which is not to say that it is any less emblematic of its author or divorced in any way from the overall progression of his work; it just seems like such a very different sort of story, told in a different manner from the others.

Maybe it seems so different because of the manner in which it came to be — it was first written and published in parts and then collected into the manuscript that we now know as the finished book. On the other hand, it may also be viewed as an example of Steinbeck's wonderful penchant for experimentation, and the confidence he had in his own ability to convey great stories on a wide variety of subjects, and likely, to a widely varied audience.

Finally there is The Pearl — a brilliantly evocative tale that conveys an enormous amount of wisdom in a disarmingly simple story. It is another of my favorite Steinbeck stories, and the kind of book whose characters and scene and setting will likely drift in and out of your field of vision for a long time after you've reached the final word and returned to the shelf.

And if you are like me, it will be a nearby shelf, and easy to reach, for the next time...

© Patrick J. Walsh

Other heroes well worth knowing:

• That Every Mouth Can Be Fed: Remembering the Extraordinary Desmond Dekker

• The Spirit of Baseball Past (Roberto Clemente)

• Recalling the flight of Friendship 7: John Glenn would triumph...

For more literary adventuring:

• Encounter in Autumn (Beowulf)

• A Walk in the Park (John Donne)

A version of this post first appeared on my author page at Goodreads.

Who Will Publish Your Book?

By Patrick J. Walsh

I was recently pitching an article about the self-publishing phenomenon, and my research for the pitch has led me to a few insights about the "traditional vs. do-it-yourself (DIY)" discussion that seem well worth sharing.

Tradition!

But first a little background: in my own case, I have had two books, both non-fiction, published by traditional publishers. My first, Echoes Among the Stars, was published by M.E. Sharpe Inc. in 2000 and has since had a second hardcover printing, a paperback edition, and recently, an electronic version for the Amazon Kindle (and others).

In 2010, my three volume encyclopedia Spaceflight: A Historical Encyclopedia, was published in both print and in a proprietary electronic edition by Greenwood Publishing, an imprint of ABC-CLIO Inc.

Notice there is a 10 year gap between the publication dates — a good indicator of just how much patience and persistence might be necessary in order to find and complete a traditional publishing arrangement.

One other insight from my own situation: in both cases, I initially received a publishing contract from a publisher with whom I could not negotiate a suitable arrangement, and I then signed a deal with a second publisher.

So the traditional route can be very much a long and winding road, with time-consuming detours along the way.

Ownership

In researching my pitch about DIY book publishing, I came across some wonderful stories about authors who were grateful to see their work in print and pleased with the sense of ownership that self-publishing provides. On the other hand, I also encountered stories of self-published authors who felt disappointed by the failure of their work to succeed financially, or to generate much interest among potential readers.

The take-away? To a very large degree, your satisfaction with self-publishing is directly related to the goals you set for the work at the start. If you want to get your writing read by an audience who can enjoy it or benefit from it, you need to know who those folks are from the beginning — at least in general — and you need to know how to get your work in front of them.

So it seems at least at this point that the most logical reason to choose the DIY approach is to do so only in cases where the work is likely to have a limited but easily identified readership. For example, if someone were writing a history of her local community, it might be logical to self-publish and then market to area residents and organizations...

The Real Deal

So although a lot of people posit the trad vs. self debate as an issue of legitimacy vs. instant gratification, I think the real issue is about the underlying values you have as a writer.

For me, the divide between traditional publishing and self-publishing goes back to the very start of my writing career, when ‘self-publishing’ meant Vanity Press, with visions of driving around with stacks of books in your trunk, selling your precious words by the shovelful in the parking lot at Giants Stadium or something...

Nowadays, with nearly 30 years of seeing my name attached to things I’ve written, and now having the two published books, the sense of satisfaction I feel when I look at my byline in print or online is the result of knowing that having it there represents the faith an editor has placed in my abilities as a writer, or researcher, or reporter.

For me, writing for a “traditional” publisher of any sort of project (book, magazine, online video, etc.) is kind of like wearing the jersey of your favorite team — it’s not just the logo or the colors or the economics of the thing; it’s what it says about the relationship, and how it makes you feel beneath the shirt.

And anything I should eventually choose to self-publish would represent my desire to communicate directly and efficiently with those readers who most want to read that particular writing. Knowing that I am reaching my audience with work whose merits we both recognize would probably be the most compelling argument for me to publish my own work.

So what about you? Would you be willing to ‘hold out’ for a traditional publishing deal even if it meant waiting for years before seeing your work in print (with no assurance along the way that it would necessarily ever happen?) — or are you ready to publish your own book, even if it means settling for a very small readership and maybe no financial return?

Either way, get started today! The longest journey begins with a single step...

© 2012 Patrick J. Walsh

Let me know what you think in the comments below.

And on the same topic:

• Dropping the Oars: The Evolution of Online Publishing

• Make A Living Writing
 

The First Warm Day of Spring

By Patrick J. Walsh

Walking the usual route in the park, along the road that leads up the hill to the upper parking lot, I felt the warmth of the first truly warm day of the Spring.

About a quarter mile distant, out on the broadest part of the lake, a goose was making that odd sound that always reminds me of beer drinkers’ laughter — the weird guttural staccato that makes obvious why some long ago linguist decided that a group of geese are best described as a “gaggle.”

A few more feet toward that part of the road that stretches over the culvert that connects the stream on the left to the wide part of the lake on the right, and my mind drifted back to the days when I used to play along the edge of the stream while my brother fished nearby...

The goose quieted down just as I reached the railing at the left edge of the road, just above the water. An odd gurgling followed; a demented sort of splash, somewhere below and slightly upstream. It was a fish — a reasonably large fish, given the shallowness of the stream — his tail fin slapping the surface as he struggled toward the opening to the tunnel beneath the road.

...my mind drifted back to the days when I
used to play along the edge of the stream...

My first thought: I need to get a picture of this! Fumbling through the pockets of my sweatshirt for the camera, I wondered at the strangeness of the circumstance: the fish desperately trying to make his way forward, his very survival dependent on closing the distance from the scant flow of water where he was, onward to the opening of the wide tunnel beneath the road, and then through to the freedom of the lake beyond... and my initial reaction only the simple-minded desire to document the epic scene with a quick snapshot.

Then another idea took hold: wouldn’t it be relatively easy to simply make my way down the hill to the water’s edge and just reach over and pluck the poor creature out of his gasping, grasping misery? I could just carry him the twenty or so yards he needed, then drop him back into the water at a spot where he’d have enough depth to finish the rest of the trek on his own.

A better thought, this — not that it actually led me down the bank, but better because it immediately raised the question of whether or not it would be appropriate for me to mess around in things about which I knew so little. Catching a fish on the end of a line, I understood; interfering with the course of a fish engaged in a life and death struggle with the very forces that enabled him to live and grow in the first place, well... that seemed a little large for the lightness of the afternoon.

Then, in the sheer instant it took for my thoughts to travel the distance between my initial intent to photograph the poor beast’s struggle and my ultimate quandary about the desire to help and the perhaps questionable propriety of doing so, I lost sight of both fish and stream for several seconds.

In that brief interlude, the dark, thin form flitted closer to the gaping opening beneath the road, and I heard but could not see as he made one last slosh and a plunking sound, as he made one final leap across the surface and then vanished into the murky liquid dusk below.

He was free, released into a wide safe swathe of the lake, to be tested no further by the narrowness of the stream; I was free, to continue my walk in the warm, dry air of the afternoon, pondering the current of my thoughts when tested by the inescapable austerities of nature.

© 2012 Patrick J. Walsh

• Photo, Fish, or Refrain — what would you do in this situation?
  Please share your thoughts in the comment box below...

Related posts (Other Walks in the Park):

• Encounter in Autumn

• A Walk Beneath The Dripline

• A Walk in the Park

Dropping The Oars: The Evolution of Online Publishing

By Patrick J. Walsh

A few years ago, when e-books were first gaining traction and their role alongside printed books began to resemble that of a sail on a motorized dinghy — a colorful overlay to the main article, that was increasingly used to accomplish the same task — a friend tried to convince me that the future of reading lay in the pixels of an electronic screen, and that my writing endeavors needed to head in that same direction if I hoped to continue to find an audience for my work.

My friend posited the problem, and the solution, quite succinctly: “If that’s where the readers are, then that’s where you want to be.”

At that point I had already had my own website for many years, and I had been a featured columnist for the online versions of several trade magazines. But the moment was rapidly approaching when the vast majority of writing on the Internet would shift from essentially being an extension of print media to instead consisting primarily of content generated and consumed entirely online.

Were it not for the displacement that shift caused for many of my friends and for many others in the industry, it would be amusing to recall the titanic struggles that arose at many print publications, as staffers wrestled with ways to incorporate online elements into their long-established approach to publishing.

Like tiny waves heralding the rising tide, writing for publication online in the early years of the popular growth of the Internet provided tantalizing clues to the future course of the publishing industry. Before the rise of the per-item advertising model, publications still sold ads as they did for print, with a static image in a standard size; and online versions of print magazines often carried a static table of contents and design elements that linked them in style to their print cousins — but linked online to nothing at all.

With the utter democratization of online publishing, the opportunity to write and distribute one’s own work electronically has become as easy as starting a blog, or signing up for Facebook. Setting a course is as simple as my friend’s long-ago advice: keep sailing along the same crest as your readers, your sight always on the horizon...

For me personally, there is also an additional rule I must observe as I head into the wind: having worked over the entire course of my writing career to practice my craft as best I can, and having always tried to honor the faith placed in me by the editors and publishers for whom I’ve worked, I honestly try to make every item that I share online as clear and thoughtful as any writing I’ve ever done.

Even though it’s easier than ever to make my work available to anyone who wishes to read it, lazy thinking, shoddy research or sloppy writing are of as little use to my current readers as they would have been to those who read my work in the past. Simply put, if you are willing to take the time to read what I write, I need to take the time necessary to make sure that whatever I write is worth reading.

I’m grateful for all those who accompany me on the journey... 

© 2012 Patrick J. Walsh

A Certain Kind of Anger: Reflections on Baseball’s Great Late-Season Pitching Heroics

[This is an excerpt from the introduction to my baseball project, which focuses on late-season pitching heroics from the earliest days of the game right up to the present day. Using the same research, I’ve also created the short documentary, “Pitching Diamonds,” which chronicles Cy Young’s September 18, 1897 no-hitter, and which is now available online at my YouTube channel.]

By Patrick J. Walsh

...And then, on some days, there are those rare games in which the time of year intersects with the particular circumstances of the team or the individual to dictate that a given starter must try to will himself to a level of play that is painful to reach and debilitating to maintain, but necessary for the circumstances of the moment...

Sometimes, a certain kind of anger becomes almost a necessity, as a key to unlocking the inner reserves. But it is a particular kind of anger, a productive exasperation with one’s own limitations. It is not the anger of Proverbs, or the wrath of the Seven Deadly Sins. It is in fact more like its juxtaposed virtue in modern Catholicism, which contrasts the deadly sin of anger with the blessed virtue of patience.

Anger is, after all, ugly in all its forms but one: that in which it is employed in the struggle against indignity. In that one instance, in the extreme titanic struggle as the twilight shadows lengthen and the final innings draw near, in the proper hand guided by the right heart, it can be utilized -- transformed, as a beautiful sort of anger whose features are polished with courage, determination, and self-respect.

Conjured by a skilled athlete in response to the sudden arbitrary meanness of circumstance, it is an emotion that is carefully controlled and precisely applied, only in the measure necessary to achieve the objective of the moment, without malice or rancor.

As the days grow shorter, and some games take on a special urgency, there are sometimes those individuals who by the nature of their unique position get the opportunity to achieve a greater sort of victory than the kind reflected on the scoreboard. They win by simply refusing to be bettered, by giving their all to the effort, and by playing smart and tough and angry.

It is a task like those few that arise in any lifetime that provides an opportunity to concentrate the frustrations that come from constantly bumping up against the limitations of endurance and age and circumstance, and transform them into a weapon against the arbitrary whim of fate.

And it is a special gift of baseball: for a given game, late in the season, one particular player is given a chance to overcome all the lost chances of the whole long year that have finally, suddenly conspired to demand so much and yet promise so little. In victory, he emerges with his dignity intact, and the gratitude of those who depend upon him.

There are a multitude of examples of late-season pitching heroics throughout baseball history... Some are stories of great pitchers who helped their teams avoid defeat and live to play another day -- often famously going on to success in the playoffs and the World Series. In other cases, the triumph is more individual in nature. But in all accounts, it is the furious will to win that distinguishes each individual performance, and provides a remarkable example of courage in the face of adversity.

© Patrick J. Walsh