Oregon's New Poet Laureate

clipped from www.oregonlive.com

Paulann Petersen named Oregon's sixth poet laureate

By Jeff Baker, The Oregonian

April 26, 2010, 6:16PM

Words don't fail Paulann Petersen.

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Petersen, Oregon's sixth poet laureate, had no trouble expressing how she felt about being named to the two-year position Monday

"Thrilled. Excited. So honored to be walking where Bill Stafford and Lawson Inada walked," Petersen said.

Stafford was Oregon's poet laureate for 15 years (1974-89) and is a particular favorite of Petersen's. She's very involved in the Friends of William Stafford and helped organize the William Stafford birthday readings held around the world every January. Inada is Oregon's outgoing poet laureate and served two two-year terms after the position was restored in 2006.

Petersen, 67, is widely published and the author of four books of poetry, most recently "Kindle." A Portland native, she graduated from Franklin High School and lived in Klamath Falls for 31 years before returning to the Portland area in 1991. Petersen taught English at Mazama and West Linn high schools and has led dozens of writing workshops. She has won a Stegner Fellowship in Poetry, two Carloyn Kizer Poetry Awards, and the Stewart Holbrook Award for Outstanding Contributions to Oregon's Literary Life.

As part of the application process, Petersen was asked to submit a public project she might undertake as poet laureate. She proposed doing creative-writing workshops for teachers using "a particular strategy that revolutionized my teaching life." It involves using springboards, not writing prompts or assignments but words or phrases that can propel students into the flow of writing. "Straw for the fire," Petersen said, quoting Seattle poet Theodore Roethke.

"I've seen how this works with students," Petersen said, "and we have a fabulous pipeline through our teachers in the public schools."

There were 17 nominations for the poet laureate position, which pays $10,000 a year with a travel allowance of up to $10,000. A committee of writers and cultural leaders narrowed the field to two finalists, Petersen and Peter Sears of Corvallis.

-- Jeff Baker

Finish

BY PAULANN PETERSEN

I rub my shoulder
against a doorframe’s wood,
getting the feel of this creature
felled and transformed.
My fingers curve to knead blood
toward a muscle’s hurt, lotion
into an elbow roughened by neglect.
Snubbing shoes, I let bare soles
reacquaint themselves
with the wear of pavement’s grit.
Clothes serve the modest task
of long, soft friction.

Bit by bit, night by day,
I grow smoother-grained,
ready for light. Let me be
a mirror in which something else
might catch a glimpse of itself--
the burnished stone beneath
a lifetime of water, flowing.

A Sacrament

BY PAULANN PETERSEN

Become that high priest,
the bee. Drone your way
from one fragrant
temple to another, nosing
into each altar. Drink
what's divine--
and while you're there,
let some of the sacred
cling to your limbs.
Wherever you go
leave a small trail
of its golden crumbs.

In your wake
the world unfolds
its rapture, the fruit
of its blooming.
Rooms in your house
fill with that sweetness
your body both
makes and eats.

Primed

BY PAULANN PETERSEN

It was middle June
during the duration
of a month that was a wait

for each day to come,
during that summer
when I would turn teen,

when I was almost something--
way past twelve and counting.
It was the middle of day,

mid-day heat halfway
between cool and hot,
a double-handed noonday

stroke: the clock's
count of twelve
reminding me of what

I was not. Still a multiple
of two, three, four, six,
I was a mere factoring

of too many baby birthdays--
crazy to be divisible by
only myself and one.

Appetite

BY PAULANN PETERSEN

Pale gold and crumbling with crust
mottled dark, almost bronze,
pieces of honeycomb lie on a plate.
Flecked with the pale paper
of hive, their hexagonal cells
leak into the deepening pool
of amber. On your lips,
against palate, tooth and tongue,
the viscous sugar squeezes
from its chambers, sears sweetness
into your throat until you chew
pulp and wax from a blue city
of bees. Between your teeth
is the blown flower and the flower's
seed. Passport pages stamped
and turning. Death's officious hum.
Both the candle and its anther
of flame. Your own yellow hunger.
Never say you can't take
this world into your mouth.