Brave New World (with apologies to Aldous Huxley)

Posts have been few and far between recently. I have been writing – ‘You Leave Again’ has been extensively edited and a new poem called ‘Mathematical Relationship’ with references to simultaneous equations, trigonometry and calculus. I haven’t posted these since I am considering submitting them for publication or competition – who knows what chance I may have? Probably slim but no harm trying. Part of the ‘Brave New World’ – not as Huxley envisaged, but rather part of this journey of reinvention I am undertaking. It is four months now since I started writing. I am writing less, but hopefully improving. I am beginning to see myself as a writer. Even a poet. Today I had to confront my ‘impostor syndrome’. With the support of a dear friend I read three poems at an ‘open mic’ at the Dan O’Connell. I chose a bushfire theme but did not want to be too bleak and so read ‘Red Band’, ‘Snow Weather’ and ‘Wind’. I am pleased with how I read (despite my tremor and palpitations) and the audience were attentive – one chap even came up to me later and told me he had liked ‘Snow Weather’. He said that he could really see the snow. I enjoyed the reading – even (especially?) the adrenaline buzz. I have no doubt I’ll go back for more. What of the therapeutic nature of reading? Is it different from writing and blogging? On his blog, Andy Jackson described the reading of a poem as creating a room into which others can enter. I understand now what he means. As I read ‘Wind’ one of the women in the audience smiled as I read the line ‘ and with it tug a thousand tiny balloons’. At that moment I thought – ‘you get it, you know exactly what I am saying’ – and felt joyous exhilaration. I could get used to that. So this Brave New World – this new identity. Who am I now? Mother, daughter, sister, friend, doctor, student, and poet. I am all of those things and more.