Monday, January 2, 2017

Kit contacted me and asked me if I would like to participate in Project 365+1 for a month. I nominated a month and then contributed each day, no matter what was happening in my life. There was one night - when my horse became ill with colic - on which I did not post a poem, due to tending my horse all through the night in order to prevent her death. The following night I wrote a poem about this experience and made friends with Anne Walsh who loved the poem I wrote.

For me best part about the project was the connections I made with other writers. I also loved the fact that I was able to read the works of other poets and to be able to have a conversation with them about their poems.

At the end of the year I nominated to make a return to postings of poems to the site for the month of December. This month proved to be far harder for me to participate in due to having two jobs, as well as moving between living in my shed and my home, and as a result enduring internet issues.

I am used to the daily discipline of writing as I write prose novels. When I am working on these novels I commit myself to writing a five hundred words each day. The difference with producing work each day for Project 365+1 was that I was writing posts for the project during times when I was working as a teacher in the day. When I write my prose novels I only write during the school holidays. It was interesting to see that although I was often very tired when I composed my daily poem for the project that this had very little impact on the piece of writing itself, although when I was posting the work I feared I was contributing a piece I would later regret publishing.

I published a collection of the poems I wrote for the project in a book titled 'Somewhere Milk and Sugar' and launched this at the Cairns Writers Festival.

I wish there had been more time in my life to read and comment on the work of the other poets on the site. I am happy that the project is still open and look forward to reading and commenting on the works of others over the next month.

Thanks to Kit and all of the other poets who contributed to the project. I am grateful that I was invited to participate.

Claine Keily

1 comment:

  1. And, Claine, what a gift your poem was and your work and friendship are! You up all night with your sick horse a metaphor, on this metablog. Of how 365+1 accompanied lovesick me through mornings I might not have otherwise woken to see.

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