Chapbook by Maryann DiEdwardo, Poet

1.     Proposal of Maryann DiEdwardo Ed.D.

2.     Introductory Essay and Review of the Research by Maryann DiEdwardo Ed.D.

3.     Chapbook by Maryann DiEdwardo Ed.D.

Pennsylvania College English Association Conference 2013

                                      Gettysburg. PA
Name: Dr. Maryann DiEdwardo
Institutional Affiliation/Position: Lehigh University, Adjunct Professor for the Computer Science and Engineering Department Graduate School (Writing Coach) and Adjunct Associate Professor University of Maryland University College (Adjunct Professor for Literature)
Mailing Address: 3435 Dartmouth Dr. Bethlehem, PA 18020
Phone number: 610-349-1573
E-mail address: mad207@lehigh.edu
Title of proposed presentation: Poetry of Landscape of Gettysburg: Wild Imaginative Musings of War and Death

250-500 word abstract:

Poetry of Landscape of Gettysburg: Wild Imaginative Musings of War and Death

In my original poetry that I create about Gettysburg, I write sets of works to synthesize and to suggest that Gettysburg is a living memorial, alive with ghosts of the past that will remain forever.  Based on my own sensory experiences as a biker, camper, road trip enthusiast, painter, poet, and Pennsylvania resident for my entire life, I relate such specific moments as hearing haunting sounds, seeing ghost sightings, and related experiences through free verse poems to echo my truths and to create the artistry present in these experiences. Based on my regular visits to the Battlefields, as an artist and poetry scholar, I write new sets of poems in 2013 to express my reflections.

For the truth we find in the meaning of landscape in the aftermath of the most brutal war in America leaves us with great loss. Yet, as a dwelling for the future generations to recall and to re-experience the Civil War, Gettysburg is a living memorial landscape. As artisans of the word, poets can use poetry as a vehicle to seek to recreate the human condition. Loss is so imbedded in Gettysburg that we can feel the pain as we traverse the landscape.

Furthermore, through my own experience of basing original poetry on a travel diary, I create strategies based on the travel journaling based on my own unique interpretations of the Gettysburg Landscape.

As I embark on this 2013 poetry endeavor, I rely on my past experience as a poet and an artist. Previous published poems include: DiEdwardo, Maryann. Brown Bagazine 4.  “Like the Snow.” Spring 2008. Tucker, Georgia: Gypsy Daughter. Editor, Any Lynn Hess. www.gypsydaughter.com    “Spring Wind” “Cloud Shadow” “Gentleness” “Friend Frog” “Nutritious Fun” “Anointing” “Daffodil” “Dances” “The Gate” “Soar” were in a book co-authored and illustrated by Maryann Pasda DiEdwardo entitled Write a Book of Haiku that was recognized by Dan Poynter and first appeared in 1994. “Joseph” won Honorable Mention, first appeared in American Poetry Anthology Volume VI, Number 1, Spring 1986. “Growing Toward Death”  semi-finalist, first appeared in The International Library of Poetry 2002.“Like the Snow” first appeared in Pennsylvania Voices Book Three co-authored and illustrated by Maryann Pasda DiEdwardo 2006. “Rivers” first appeared in Pennsylvania Voices Book Three co-authored and illustrated by Maryann Pasda DiEdwardo 2006. “The Day the Trees Spoke” first appeared the The Art of Trees co-authored and illustrated by Maryann Pasda DiEdwardo 2006.

POET Maryann DiEdwardo Ed.D.

Essay

2013

Poetry of Landscape of Gettysburg: Wild Imaginative Musings of War and Death

     In my original poetry that I create about Gettysburg, I write sets of works to synthesize and to suggest that Gettysburg is a living memorial, alive with ghosts of the past that will remain forever.  Based on my own sensory experiences from 1992 to 1998 in my home state of Pennsylvania, I visited the historic sites as a biker, camper, road trip enthusiast, painter, poet, and Pennsylvania poet; I relate such specific moments as hearing haunting sounds, seeing ghost sightings, and related experiences through free verse poems to echo my truths and to create the artistry present in these experiences. Based on my regular visits to the Battlefields, as an artist and poetry scholar, I write new sets of poems in 2013 to express my reflections. Obviously, I am quite thoughtful about my experiences in Gettysburg.

      The poetry project began on the day that I created my proposal for the Pennsylvania College English Association Conference in Gettysburg in 2013 (December 9 2012).  My technique includes imagery, memory, and story. For the truth we find in the meaning of landscape in the aftermath of the most brutal war in America leaves us with great loss. Yet, as a dwelling for the future generations to recall and to re-experience the Civil War, Gettysburg is a living memorial landscape. As artisans of the word, poets can use poetry as a vehicle to seek to recreate the human condition. Loss is so imbedded in Gettysburg that we can feel the pain as we traverse the landscape.  As a visual artist and writer, I study my own practice of writing as a healing endeavor, which is necessary for human intelligence (DiEdwardo. The Horse Keeper. 2008).

     Furthermore, through my own experience of basing original poetry on a travel diary, I create strategies based on the travel journaling based on my own unique interpretations of the Gettysburg landscape. Influences include Herman Melville, Carl Sandburg, and Biblical Poetry such as the Psalms and the Book of Job. Free form and haiku are my favorite forms of poetry, so I began with a haiku on December 9, 2012. Other poems include “In the Mist” which I wrote on December 12, 2012 and “Past Present and Future” which I finished on December 29, 2012. In 2013, I created “Day is Night and Night is Day” (February 3, 2013) and added my newest poems to a Chapbook Project that is finished as a presentation of narrative free form with the one haiku as a opening poem and “Ending” as the closing poem.

     Poetry helps me heal from grief which can be about life changes, deaths of loved ones, or catastrophic events. For instance, as a student at Penn State University in the 1970’s, a graduate student at Lehigh University in the early 80’s, and a poet since my career in writing started in the late 80’s, I often ponder memoires of Gettysburg landscape as a metaphor for overcoming loss. How can a war memorial captivate me for so long? In my reflections from December 9 through the present, I am continuing to write about my Gettysburg as a Pennsylvanian who created a set of books called Pennsylvania Voices which portrays my poetry as a function of narrative of the main characters. 

     Poetry about battles is unique and carries great emotion. For example, Herman Melville’s work about Gettysburg “are eminences illuminated by lightning strokes (Untermeyer Ed. 918).” Melville who lived from 1819 to 1891, was born and raised in New York City. He left school at age fifteen to help support his family. IN 1841, he sailed on a whaler…was captured by cannibalistic natives,…but escaped and went to Tahiti where he worked as a field laborer and Honolulu where he enlisted as a seaman. In 1843, he returned home and began writing romantic novels based on his exotic adventures. His masterpieces include Moby Dick (1851) which were a commercial and critical failure and his poems which he began writing in the 1870’s were largely ignored. In 1866, Melville went to work as a customs inspector in New York City and he died in near obscurity and dire poverty. The Civil War had made Melville a poet in that it gave him a subject of magnitude and complexity (Robert Penn Warren). In his war poems (Battle Pieces 1866) Melville explores the equivocal nature of experience (Ferguson, Salter, Stallworthy, The Norton Anthology of Poetry, 1917).

     The passion for writing about war also intrigued Carl Sandburg. The poet had experiences writing about war early in his career. Born in Galesburg, Illinois, the poet lived from 1878-1967.  He left school after the eighth grade to support his family,  but later attended Lombard College. Afterwards, he travelled the country in search of folks songs and wrote his immensely popular volumes called Cornhuskers (1918) document his war experiences. In the 1930’s, Sandburg became active in the Socialist Movement and devoted study to Abraham Lincoln. ballads which he collected in The American Songbag (1927). Carl Sandburg’s poem “Grass” alludes to Gettysburg. Carl Sandburg was an American writer and editor, best known for his poetry. He won three Pulitzer Prizes, two for his poetry and another for a biography of Abraham Lincoln. H. L. Mencken called Carl Sandburg "indubitably an American in every pulse-beat."

     In the Book of Job, the plot centers on a devout spirit shaken by personal suffering and universal distress. A patient tortured by misfortune and his friends, who is answered by God. Its date and authorship, its purpose and relationship to other writings are controversial. Some critics find a resemblance between the Book of Job and the Greek Philosophical Dialogues; others claim it resembles a Greek tragedy; most importantly, is the blend of philosophy and poetry, a fusion never surpassed in literature.

Works Cited

Ferguson, Salter, Stallworthy. The Norton Anthology of Poetry, fourth edition.  New York: Norton, 1996.

Untermeyer, Ed. A Treasury of Great Poems. New York: Galahad, 1992.

     

Title: The Poetry of Landscape after War and Death
A Chapbook
by Maryann DiEdwardo

Contents
1. The Poetry of Landscape after War and Death
2. From Gettysburg
3. Haiku
4. In the Mist
5. Snow and Graves
6. Past Present Future in Gettysburg
7. Day is Night and Night is Day

8. Overcoming Poverty

9. Eating Roots

10. Discussions

11. Writing between Rivers

12. Myth

13. Themes

14. Ending

The Poetry of Landscape after War and Death

by Maryann DiEdwardo



Weeks of camping,

biking through rolling frivolous lightly windy grassy fields

and walking through the battlefields



I search for words to recreate my reflections;

poetic insights about the aftermath of war and death from the perspective of landscape.



With the eye of an artist, I view the landscape of the Pennsylvania hills

with the glory and trepidation. For the seasons touch the land softly as the

truths bite us, capture us, imprison us with horrific memories of loss

From Gettysburg



By

Maryann DiEdwardo





From Sandburg’s “Grass” in 1918

The piles of bodies at Gettysburg

Enter our minds



From my reflections of the aftermath

of war and death

I watch myself as I react



I can not help but weep

inside so I do not despair

sons whom they loved



fought and died for freedom

as we still fight today

war does not cease

Haiku



By

Maryann DiEdwardo



Sitting still I wait

Wait…hush…the sound of battle

Awakens me now

In the Mist by Maryann DiEdwardo



Quietly, I lie

The hush pushed my mind to the present

White mist surrounding me



Suddenly, I am aware of the presence in the far right space over the hill

Knowingness, otherworldliness, prompts me to be wary of my judgments

Of course, memory haunts me, places, presences



Yet,  I hear sounds that are under and over my consciousness

Softly, I observe my observances to acknowledge presences as substance

But not of present space.



Presence is past events muted.

Softly, my awareness becomes keen.

I awake fully.



Sounds utter in the dark of night in the natural spaces of war…catbirds in the bush

Sounds form from the mist anoint me with spiritual presence.



My days are changing after these moments with the night, the mist, the sound of Gettysburg.

Change as awe. Changes of knowingness.





Otherworldliness inside. Landscapes as a guest to find lives, remembrances, truths, remember, plants, remember grass. Remember blood,

remember death.



I still wait.

A shout.

Another.

Still more.

And more.

Then the mist. Sleep again. But remember.



























Snow and Graves by Maryann DiEdwardo







Lightly the flakes land.

As they accumulate, my sadness widens.



Residence of death, memories of people,

events of darkness now lightened by snow.

Past Present Future in Gettysburg



By Maryann DiEdwardo



I tell you that the spirituality of the past enlivens our hearts as we cherish the stories here at the place of our lives.



Hard to believe that death visited the holy ground with such magnitude.



Briefly, I gather the knowledge I have from my camping trips here. I await a glimmer of hope.



                                                           Winter



As the wind crawls then hovers, sounds of the felt waves of sorrow majestically beckon our hearts as we roll across snow laden trails of tears.

         

                                                          Spring



Upon the battlefield lies the soft cloud of remembrance. The touch of the pain dwells in the sounds of the wind.



                                                      Summer



Travel Gettysburg.

Flowers amidst sadness.

Crowds of those who try but fail to become like they were then.

They were only part of the whole war, the struggle, the strife.







                                                           Fall



Soothing colors amidst hills with only dark memories.



Such a place of sadness takes away the soul.



As the vanishing lives went away during war.

Day is Night and Night is Day



By Maryann DiEdwardo



Looking at the hills made me shiver.

How could I enjoy the biking around the stories of death?

Summer after summer we went to Gettysburg.

We spent time with history and death.



But the day was night as we saw dark times that ensued.



Night was day as the cat bird sang and I could feel the presence of ghosts.

overcoming poverty by maryann diedwardo 

poverty 

can be and shall be crushed 

by the Glory of God and those who love. 

Framed by an epic poem, our novel 

The Passing Light is based 

on our struggles as Judeo-Christian 

Women who survived 

the brutal violence akin 

to domestic strife of the twentieth 

century, a heritage of Judaism 

that was hidden for many years, 

and a life in Christ that they 

accept and lead as attending 

members of 

Trinity Episcopal Church 

in Bethlehem 

where they help feed the poor.

Writers Maryann and Patti 

are authors who create a

 main character based 

on a spirit they know 

dwells in their old art studio. 

Battling the natural world 

of early America as an

 immigrant from Ireland, 

a crusader for Christ, a 

Christian man who lives 

every day for God, 

on a quest to live as a 

free man in a different 

land, Jonathan 

endures the loss of his 

parents due to the 

potato famine in Ireland 

during his early years, 

the immigration to 

America with an abusive uncle,

escaping to freedom 

while protecting his only living relative, 

his sister Joan, 

her ultimate death in childbirth, 

his blindness and old age 

with his dog, his lovely wife 

Daighre and adopted African 

American son Elon by his side

The purpose of the poem 

is to reveal the narrative 

events of The Passing Light, 

a novel about faith 

and hope during despair 

based on the survival for 

life by authors as 

they find ways to 

fight abuse in the 

20th century and Maryann’s 

chronic illness called lupus 

and Patti’s cancer in the 21st century.

The action of the poem 

symbolizes human struggles 

spanning three centuries to 

communicate the 

hopes of the past that

 inspire those of us who are 

today living during economic hardships. 

The Muse of Calliope 

illustrates the pain and 

sorrow of Jonathan 

as he lost Joan to an early 

death but bears the pain 

only to become blind due 

to starvation when 

he was a child in 

Ireland during the 

Potato Famine of the 19th century.

Eighteen Forty-five, cries of fear of death

Real loss of life and loved ones as we lost 

our potato crop and kin, starvation 

came by day and night. Ireland lost one 

million of us. Famine did not care who we were. 

The fire held her hand tightly;

Guardian angels brought her light,

And made her future days bright ‘til

Her body failed to breathe during 

The childbirth that she prayed for but 

Such woes grieve Jonathan; his sword

Died with Joan on a blissful day 

yet the trees sway and the wind blows

She dies while the wind blows softly

Her death brings the ancestors

Who cry as well

We cry for all our loved ones

Death brings life again as renewed 

spirits walk the earth

Jonathan’s eyes stop working

His strife will end with death as well

But animals prevail on the earth as friends 

of humans who care

Deeply and who take care for the world

poverty 

can be and shall be crushed 

by the Glory of God and those who love. 

The Irish, Jonathan and his sister Joan 

who flee Ireland during the Potato Famine 

build a new life in America 

with the aid of Native Americans, 

African Americans, Latinos, Latinas, 

and other immigrants. 

Set in the twenty first century 

and told by a Polish Jewish Archeologist 

who finds a diary, 

The Passing Light tells the story of the 18th 19th and 20th 

century resilience, courage and faith. 

When Jonathan becomes blind, 

he learns to live again with the help of his companion dog, 

with the miracle of the first service dog as the 

guide to the human master. 

Eventually, Jonathan marries but his sister 

Joan dies in childbirth. As the baby grows, 

Lily as the adopted daughter of Jonathan will marry a former slave. 

Harshly bruised by the loss of his real family, 

through marriage to a white woman, 

an African American former slave heals a community 

and the immigrants who dwell with fear of poverty 

by his generosity and community spirit.  

poverty 

can be and shall be crushed 

by the Glory of God and those who love. 

Hear the sound of the whistle 

as the train passes by with

Social justice as a paradigm 

for the novel resounds 

with tension and resolution dependent 

upon the silent resilience of the individual. 

Equally, hopes and dreams of those 

who came to American save her from 

corruption and disruption 

by evil forces of humans 

who only seek materialism.  

But with the understanding of the pain 

of poverty and the building of 

community sharing and compassion, 

the face of poverty is finally crushed

by the love of members of communities 

who believe that life is life, 

love is all that truly exists, 

and service to others is the answer to life on earth. 

Love is the center of existence. 

Eating Roots

By Maryann DiEdwardo

                                                                                                                                               

                                                                                                                                                           

     Writing, an art, is a necessary endeavor natural for the growth of human intelligence. 

     The artistic creative part of each individual must be nurtured as a natural course of education. 

     Art can be taught to the young child as is reading and mathematics.  Ideally, art should be sighted as just as vital a subject for development of life skills. Poetry is art.

     I learned to create from the inspiration of my father who survived World War 2. In the March of Death, he ate the roots of trees to stay alive. And so I am.                                                                                                                                                                                      

Discussions            by Maryann                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

The difference is, however, that the poet's labor of the poem, has the power to restore us, to reset the balance.

Art is true to life.

                                                                                   

                                                                                                                                   

                                          Fine Art is a Doorway to Learning                                                                                                           

Writing between Rivers by Maryann DiEdwardo



Rivers. Peace, Inner silence. 
Rivers. Love.  Inner hope.  Echoes God. 
Rivers.  Faith.  Inner trust.  Echoes God. 
Rivers.  Let go of ego.  Come into God. 
Rivers.  Come to peace.  Welcome God.   
Rivers. Soften Hearts. Prepare for God.  Holy Rivers. 
Rivers flow. In my heart. In my soul.  God’s Rivers.

Rivers will be here long after I pass away.  Rivers are spiritual.  Work by rivers.  Write by rivers.

Myth

By Maryann DiEdwardo

 Utilize myth as literature. The quest myth translates to the definition of the quest of the artist within the reality of the creative process.

   

Poetry is where the definite and the indefinite become combined to create story based upon legend within the writer and the topic as well as myth as theoretical basis for writing and creative thought. 

The human community defines order with friendship and love as the story represents the reader’s dreams of perfect life dream. 

Themes by maryann

              

 The theme connection in the two works of art centers upon use of love as a   

          treasure for the writer to hold to but an item that can be lost.

art in this manner has purpose to show the

          reader the inner state of the lover.

Consequently, language means love and also acts

          as a clear metaphor

                   

Rob Thomas, a song writer and musician, and William Shakespeare, a

          literary figure of merit, both use language as metaphor to show the relationship of

          the lover and the loved.

They use rhymed and metered language to fit words into

          patterns to portray the longing and powerful inner state of the lover.

Ending

By Maryann

The land between rivers

emerged as a template

and voice to tell a story that carries hope.

I came to know poverty during the twentieth century.

My father experienced her during the Black March in Eastern Europe

and my mother found her in the confines of a childhood in the coal regions

Share your plenty with others so you engage in

peaceful acts to bridge poverty through contentedness

and art based upon the rivers