Embolden is ONE!
Embolden, the third and final book in my Soul-Seeker Collection, is ONE year old.
It launched at Crom Castle, where this photo was taken.
In honor of this Book Birthday, I’m sharing part of the journey I took when writing these poems, as the collection reflects my personal experiences.
Embody, book one, was about exploring my feelings and allowing poetry to come to me. I hadn’t been a poet prior to writing the collection. Embody captured my internal journey, particularly my emotions and their physicality, and thus, it’s about chakras.
Embrace, book two, was about accepting where I was in life, including accepting I am a poet. I was going through a lot of life changes at the time, and in that stage of flux, I recognized nothing lasts forever. Embrace is about cycles.
By the time I wrote Embolden, I had consciously decided to bring poetry into my writing. The poems in Embolden are about honoring my creativity and letting it flow.
Embolden is about signs and our place in the universe. The poetry has a lot of symbolism because at the time, I felt nature, objects, numbers, and other items were communicating with me, and it inspired me. Embolden is about moving beyond what we’ve experienced. If we allow ourselves to see we are connected, we realize everything happens in support of us. Negative and positive experiences are part and parcel of our journey. We realize our experiences are connected to the universe. In winter, we tend to be introspective. In spring, we work on new projects. Summers are active and falls are about preparing for change.
Many poems in Embolden focus on numbers, which carry meaning. For instance, palindromes are dates or words that are read the same backward and forward. Palindrome dates present opportunities for us to overcome or transcend emotions. Five is about shift and change. When I see 5:55, I know it’s a sign there's a shift in the world, change is coming, and I’m in the process of evolving.
Through writing the Soul-Seeker collection, I learned to welcome poetry into my life, and I write it when it comes to me. It’s not the same with novels. I can write fiction at set times. But with poetry, I can go days or even weeks without writing a poem. But once I get hit with a spark of creativity, I have to write it down. I don’t know when that will happen, so I’m always ready to give it time and energy, and allow it to flow.
I carry a notebook with me most of the time, and if I don't have a notebook, I'll use any piece of paper I can find. I've written poems on brochures, ticket stubs, napkins, and coasters. As a last resort, I use my phone, although I prefer to write poems by hand, and only type them when I edit. Poems have come to me while I'm driving or when I'm in the shower. I can't write them at that time, but I keep the seed with me until I have the chance to write it down.
There are no tables of contents in the Soul-Seeker Collection. You can read any book in one sitting. You can read it sequentially over a period of time. You can also open any book to any page, and have that be your poem for the moment. The poem will speak to your soul, like a message for the day.