Try to remember the kind of September

nostalgia in bloom

Sep 12, 2024

August was a black hole

of birthdays, Covid, a knee injury (mine), depression, transitions, and estrogen-induced weeping. I cried every day and wondered if it was a good thing, a necessary cleansing. I thought of trans poet torrin a. greathouse and her remarkable poem about crying, “There’s No Word in English for the First Rain of Any Season.”

It begins:

My friend’s mother used to say
that every time you cry, you are
crying for everything that has
happened since the last time
you cried. Ceramic piggy bank
bursting with a debt of salt.
When I began to transition
it wasn’t into a daughter, but
instead a flood.
- torrin a. greathouse, Wound from the Mouth of a Wound

The estrogen patch was a trial. Would it help the insomnia, the hot flashes, the brain fog which arrived like a low pressure system? Ever hopeful, I tried it for 8 days— then ripped it off my butt when I couldn’t stop weeping.

But the crying continued. I stuck it back on. Such is the hit-or-miss hormonal science of menopause.

I’ll let you know how it works out.

I’ve been reading menopause novels

and damn they are good. Also perimenopause novels and menopause-adjacent novels (i.e. books about women navigating midlife transitions). Once I’ve finished 7 of them, I’ll write a review for Electric Literature.

I’m currently 3/4 through The Sentence by Louise Erdrich and don’t want it to end. I’m in love with the writing and with Tookie, the narrator, a wry, quick-witted Chippewa woman who survived a decade of incarceration by reading books and now works at a small indie bookstore in Minneapolis. That store, Birchbark Books, is the same one Erdrich owns in real life. In the novel, it’s being haunted by the ghost of a dead customer, a white wannabe-indigenous woman.

I love discovering the title’s various meanings, which move and shift throughout the story. The sentence is both a unit of syntax and the harsh punishment imposed on Tookie by a federal judge. It might also be what killed the angry ghost who paces the bookstore.

One year ago

my mother was dying. That time is alive in my body-memory. The changing light of September, the fields thick with goldenrod, the cool nights and warm golden afternoons. The days of sitting with her, holding her hand, watching her breathe.

Trying to stay present in the sacred waiting.

Not knowing what would come after.

I keep humming an old song my mom loved, from the 1962 musical The Fantasticks. It’s a song about nostalgia, and Jerry Orbach sang it to open the play:

Try to remember the kind of September
when life was slow and oh so mellow
Try to remember the kind of September
when grass was green and grain was yellow…

It’s the kind of song that gets stuck in your head, that carries the mood of the changing season—a longing to slow down time even as it seems to speed up before our eyes. A longing heightened by anticipation of the coming cold and dark.

Do you have a song you that embodies this time of year for you? Let me know.

I love the energy of back to school

This fall I’m teaching writing to teens at The Putney School and it’s amazing! What joy to be a guide to the creative process, focusing on narrative nonfiction and building the personal voice. I’ll be using some poems from You Don’t Have to Be Everything as prompts for our discussions and writing, as well as my favorite personal essays.

Meanwhile my own two teens are thriving in college and senior year of high school. The nest is emptying, soon to be empty.

It’s hard to express the complexity, tenderness, grief, and significance of this transition without resorting to cliché. I return to this poem by Catherine Barnett: “Son in August”.

The first lines get me every time:

Dignity, I said to myself
as he carried his last things into the dorm.

For those of you who have recently taken your (almost grown-up) child to college, I see you. Be gentle with yourself.

Writing news

It was hot poet summer at Brookline Booksmith, one of the coolest bookstores I’ve ever been to. I loved reading in July with Stephanie Burt and Anna V.Q. Ross and hearing their fab new poems (Stephanie teaches a class on Taylor Swift at Harvard— can’t wait for her next book).

Thanks to everyone who came or watched the livestream. If you missed it, here’s the recording: Live! Third Thursdays Poetry: Diana Whitney, Stephanie Burt, & Anna V.Q. Ross

Less fun, I wrote about DARVO in our local paper, after our school district’s sexual abuse investigation failed to result in healing or accountability.

Upcoming events ✨

September 12. TONIGHT! I’m reading with some fabulous novelists in the Live Literature Series at Writers in Progress in Florence, MA. 6:30 pm
October 6. I can’t wait to join James Crews, Rage Hezekiah and others for an afternoon of poetry and cider-pressing at the Frost Stone House. Shaftsbury, VT. 1 pm.
October 18: Poetry & Democracy: I’m thrilled to host this event celebrating Vermont’s first-ever Youth Poet Laureate, Harmony Belle Devoe. There will be readings by Rajnii Eddins, Adrie Kusserow, VYPL runner-up Emma Paris, and more. Firefolk Arts, Waitsfield VT. 6 pm.

Write with me

Join me on November 2nd for an immersive workshop at Writers in Progress:
What the Living Do: Channeling Grief into Writing
“I know grief and you may know it too,” writes poet Maxine Scates, inviting us to join her in remembering what she’s lost. In this generative workshop, we’ll gather together to acknowledge the grief we hold and explore various ways to transmute it into powerful writing. We’ll read work by writers like Marie Howe, Tracy K. Smith, Victoria Chang, and Bianca Stone, using their poems to illuminate craft choices and to jumpstart our own drafts. In a safe, compassionate space, we’ll share our new work and receive supportive feedback. You’ll leave with a storehouse of inspiring prompts and the courage to keep going. For poets and prose writers alike!
This workshop will be held in-person and online.
Do you have a project you’re nurturing? My editing/coaching calendar might be full right now, but I’ll be taking on new writers in a few months. Reach out and let me know your writing hopes, challenges, and dreams.
I’m proud to be a Creative Partner with Rootstock Publishing. Check out the books they publish and the innovative way they work with writers!
What I’m reading

Songs for the Landbound by Violeta Garcia-Mendoza. A lush, lyrical debut coming soon from June Road Press. Rooted in the natural world, these wise poems are healing balm for our age of anxiety.
Descent & Rising: Women’s Stories & the Embodiment of the Inanna Myth by Carly Mountain. “The new wave of feminism is embodied,” writes psychotherapist and spiritual guide Carly Mountain. My own therapist recommended this book about the heroine’s journey— a descent into the underworld, one that strips away everything we thought we knew. It’s deeply affirming and offers a mythical frame for our experiences of grief, trauma, illness, and depression.
Blade by Blade by Danusha Laméris. A gorgeous, eminently readable new book by prizewinning poet Laméris. Picked it up for a quick browse and couldn’t set it down.

Quick bites

Jessica Valenti on how Kamala reclaimed ‘family values’ on abortion during the debate. FINALLY, the reproductive rights champion we need and deserve!
What were underground abortions really like before Roe? Who were the activists who organized to get women health care? Listen to the incredible story of The Jane Collective on one of my favorite podcasts, You’re Wrong About.
Honest Blurbs of Classic Books by Electric Literature
Back in the classroom and trying to get your students’ names right? One of my writing clients shared this classic Key and Peele sketch 😂
Thanks for getting into Girl Trouble with me. Savor the September light and embrace the changes.
xo Diana