apprentice i.

there is something to be said for intrigue. there is something to be said for mystery.

i am better able this residency to pace myself, socially, emotionally, artistically, physically for the rigors, the strength trials if you will that are presented. i understand more about the process now and have come to set my grievances aside. not forego them, they are my struggle, my personal battle, but to get the education i am paying for. to ask for the help i need. to be vulnerable and allow myself to be the student.

i am no master here. i am apprentice.

while i do what i do with my own solid flourish, i am not the published author with a list of credits as long as my arm. i keep turning over the question, do i want that? is it what i desire? publication.

i keep answering no.

the rub is, credentialed poets, as part and parcel of their chosen fields must publish.

i told a poet dearest to my heart of my plan to found a small self-sustaining arts cafe where i will host workshops and give readings. is this the highest use of my gift. is my lack of personal drive toward publication blinding?

are there not those stories of writers whom publication finds? the sought out.

as my best friend contemplates a master's program i made this confession in response to her barrage of questions.

i did not find my master's program, my master's program found me.

by following the course directions of those i trust, i am given just the next piece of the puzzle. i set it in place and the image begins to form. do i know what the image is, no, but i can follow the contour of the back, the windswept mane, and know i can see more clearly now than i could. that is progress.

so it is with my life, so it is with my works. i was told by my current workshop leader that my poems have a strong i. this strong i is the center of a book, the connective tissue i would call it.

yes, i said. acknowledging what i knew to be true.

workshop progresses much the same as before, i know my work is solid. the reasons i do what i do may not be understood by all, but they are, in the end, understood by those who matter. this workshop leader gets my works, and that is something. i did not know coming in if she would.

i am playing it humble this time around. the poet i love best said,

there is no drama this time, it's almost boring.

and i laughed.

we are all at ease with one another. no one is out for blood, there is no reason to be. the critique is much improved. and i am grateful.

as we filed out of the welcome session, by graduating semesters, i realized, i am the only poet in my class and the last of the new poets. what will happen when this latest batch goes, three gone after next residency. then three more. i got sad. one is leaving this time.

i will be alone.

but a fellow poet whom i adore said,

i will be skipping a semester and graduating with you.

this pleased me. i will not be alone then, and, i will have a companion for the journey as those i love best are leaving next residency, i will have two remaining residencies without them.

but i try not to let that taint now. they are here with me. and i, them.

we are artists together. and have one week to savor it.