creative process

To a Late Winter Morning

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Morning Herd, 1 May 2018. Copyright 2018 Forgotten Fields. All rights reserved.
Thanks to the liberty of poetic licence, this scene appears in “A Late Winter Morning”, though it was taken in mid-autumn 2018. (Facebook 360 Photo)

“A Pear Tree” is complete, and I have moved to the next sketch, “A Late Winter Morning” (originally “A Partly Cloudy Morning”). Outlined in a rough stanza eleven days after the original “A Pear Tree” sketch, it describes the countryside at sunrise as it appeared to me upon an August morning in 2018.

Incidentally, I have reverted the titles of two finished poems to my original choices: “A Walk II” (wherein I remember my first Great Dane) is once again “You and I, My Hound!”, which necessitated the removal of the Roman numeral from “A Walk I” (wherein I remember my late friend, Jacques F. Visser).

Poetry Publication Progress (2020-07-30)

Launching the Anthology

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A Dam in the Still, 25 July 2020. Copyright 2020 Forgotten Fields. All rights reserved.
I took this photograph today on a perfect late-winter morning in South Africa.

A Late Winter Launch

Today was another winter idyll. It convinced me that late winter is the ideal time to launch this anthology: the days are crisp and clear, flocks bleat on the hills, and the pear tree blooms in the valley.

There are fourteen sketches left to develop. It takes me around four weeks to transform drafts into complete poems. Therefore, I project the compositions will be finished next year, about this time.

Protracted, but Appropriate

That would mean two more years before I publish them, if I were to commit to this late-winter launch date. This suits the project, since some time must be spent on producing the handmade books.

Moreover, I intend to devote a considerable amount of time to the creation of items supplementary to the anthology—a year to attend to these suits me well—wherefore I anticipate a launch only in 2022.

A Radiant Road in the Rain

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A Radiant Road in the Rain, 13 July 2020. Copyright 2020 Forgotten Fields. All rights reserved.

It is winter in my country, South Africa, and one of my favourite sights is the radiance of this road in the rain. When the clouds part, it shines silver in the sunlight—a simple occurrence that is an integral part of my sense of place1.

In the original 2012 version of the poem “Autumn” (my first Romantic work), this scene appeared; but, in the revised 2020 version, instead of the road, it became the river reflecting the sun (to preserve the concept of the stanza).

  1. By “sense of place”, I mean one’s conception of “home”, as shaped by environmental components, such as topography, architectural style, rhythms, rituals, sights and sounds.