Comments on: Confessions of a Tattooed Mennonite http://young.anabaptistradicals.org/2006/09/15/confessions-of-a-tattooed-mennonite/ let's activate something Thu, 20 Nov 2008 10:07:10 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5 By: jdaniel http://young.anabaptistradicals.org/2006/09/15/confessions-of-a-tattooed-mennonite/#comment-840 jdaniel Mon, 12 Mar 2007 17:07:43 +0000 http://young.anabaptistradicals.org/2006/09/15/confessions-of-a-tattooed-mennonite/#comment-840 i hadn't noticed this post before (or forgot about it). <i>My Father Eats McDonalds</i> is profound. i like your poetry, becca. i hadn’t noticed this post before (or forgot about it). My Father Eats McDonalds is profound. i like your poetry, becca.

]]> By: BeccaJayne http://young.anabaptistradicals.org/2006/09/15/confessions-of-a-tattooed-mennonite/#comment-12 BeccaJayne Mon, 18 Sep 2006 00:34:37 +0000 http://young.anabaptistradicals.org/2006/09/15/confessions-of-a-tattooed-mennonite/#comment-12 Hi, Tim--thanks for the reply. "Confessional" lit. is anything that brings deep personal emotions or stories to the surface (if you've ever heard of Sharon Olds, she is the perfect example. A lot of Julia Kasdorf is also confessional). It's kind of a "dirty word" in the poetry realm nowadays--it's much cooler to be a post-confessionalist, where perhaps an "I" never makes it into a poem. This is what I've experienced at grad school thus far, anyway. I also find it interesting (and I've talked to Lora about this one!:) how in many institutions of higher learning outside of "church schools," it seems the underlying message is that one can't be spiritual and intellectual at the same tme. I tend to ignore this bias in the work that I present! You asked for some poems. I'm working on a book centered around my parents' experiences with MNN in Liberia from '04-'06. Here's a couple examples of my stuff, though the lines don't really line up as they should! Oh, well--(notice the "stolen" story from the Extending the Table cookbook at the end of the 1st. It's the only thing I've ever read that puts into print so perfectly the feeling of experiencing something you could never explain to someone who was not there. The only difference in Liberia is that often times a child wll be chosen to pose as an orphan for Western adoption...) MY FATHER EATS MCDONALDS Again and again the hand (gold-banded) dips into perfectly salted fries. The other grasps vanilla shake like it’s all that is left in the world. This happy meal, this reunion with sweet catsup often filled your Ohio-dreaming-into-humid-West-African-waking (the dogs and roosters fight early.) How tender! your wife whispers, holding up the half-moon of a burger like it’s a secret you mustn’t let on that you know. There is silent, worshipful swallowing. Nodding. The rescue of more fries. On long trips into the bush, your team of medics would have no choice but to buy dinner from the side of the road. Personally, you’d hope for pineapple eaten like candy, or peanut bread and roasted corn, hot pepper sauce to burn down louder hunger. But now (even now) you cannot forget a certain future dinner sitting with you in the back seat for hours of smelly meditation. “Bush meat” means any number of things, and the monkey stills stares at you, even here in your red plastic booth. Its hand refuses to stay at the bottom of the soup bowl. And yet, a careful swig of strawberry shake can wash the memory cold and fictional. Laugh-worthy. After the stomach finally settles (two Big Macs and shakes in one sitting), you remember where you’ve been. How will you show your family a photograph, say This is a woman we met only once. She has five children. She made us rice. “What’s wrong with her baby?” you know they will ask. This one— you’ll tell them, pointing to the blank-eyed girl perched upon hip, hair white, mouth open— this one has been chosen by her parents. “Chosen for what?” (You cannot stop this question) To die, you will say after swallowing, fidgeting with the long crease in your shirt, so the others live. You have taught it all your life, this clunking guilt; to your own little girls, you have stressed that it’s the way we starve ourselves that is important. ---------------------------------- MENNONITE SERMON (#1): Those who are not among us bring their cameras and their children. They leave what’s heavy on their hearts for a morning, a day. Those who are not among us bring ready billfolds, pay for bentwood rockers and log cabin quilts. So easy to buy an hour of quiet. It is not surprising on Sunday mornings to see a car with windows open stopped where the road dips between Salem and Sonnenberg. God is a cappella on the seventh day of the week; hymn crosses hymn between these two churches, and music carries off their centuries of feuding (this the visitors don’t know; it is rarely talked of now). What does our martyr family think as we sit back, barter our quiet to the world, pretend that we are holy, different? "Six friends ended their lives in great joy, and those that saw them burn went and penned a hymn, the first letter of each verse replacing the names of the dead." Do we ever feel warm when breathing deep to offer up our harmony? Do we think of them as verses change? And what would they say, after watching us join the frontlines, deadlines? Burn us, bake us, drown us, World, and in the end, make us yours? Hi, Tim–thanks for the reply. “Confessional” lit. is anything that brings deep personal emotions or stories to the surface (if you’ve ever heard of Sharon Olds, she is the perfect example. A lot of Julia Kasdorf is also confessional). It’s kind of a “dirty word” in the poetry realm nowadays–it’s much cooler to be a post-confessionalist, where perhaps an “I” never makes it into a poem. This is what I’ve experienced at grad school thus far, anyway. I also find it interesting (and I’ve talked to Lora about this one!:) how in many institutions of higher learning outside of “church schools,” it seems the underlying message is that one can’t be spiritual and intellectual at the same tme. I tend to ignore this bias in the work that I present! You asked for some poems. I’m working on a book centered around my parents’ experiences with MNN in Liberia from ‘04-’06. Here’s a couple examples of my stuff, though the lines don’t really line up as they should! Oh, well–(notice the “stolen” story from the Extending the Table cookbook at the end of the 1st. It’s the only thing I’ve ever read that puts into print so perfectly the feeling of experiencing something you could never explain to someone who was not there. The only difference in Liberia is that often times a child wll be chosen to pose as an orphan for Western adoption…)

MY FATHER EATS MCDONALDS

Again and again the hand (gold-banded) dips into perfectly
salted fries. The other grasps vanilla shake like it’s all that is
left in the world. This happy meal, this reunion with sweet
catsup often filled your Ohio-dreaming-into-humid-West-African-waking (the dogs and roosters fight early.) How
tender! your wife whispers, holding up the half-moon of a burger like it’s a secret you mustn’t let on that you know. There is silent,
worshipful swallowing. Nodding. The rescue of more fries.

On long trips into the bush, your team of medics would have no choice but to buy dinner from the side of the road. Personally, you’d hope
for pineapple eaten like candy, or peanut bread and roasted corn, hot
pepper sauce to burn down louder hunger. But now (even now)
you cannot forget a certain future dinner sitting with you
in the back seat for hours of smelly meditation. “Bush meat” means
any number of things, and the monkey stills stares at you, even here
in your red plastic booth. Its hand refuses to stay at the bottom
of the soup bowl. And yet, a careful swig of strawberry shake can wash
the memory cold and fictional. Laugh-worthy.

After the stomach finally settles (two Big Macs and shakes in one sitting),
you remember where you’ve been. How will you show your family a photograph, say This is a woman we met only once. She has five children. She made us
rice. “What’s wrong with her baby?” you know they will ask. This one— you’ll
tell them, pointing to the blank-eyed girl perched upon hip, hair white, mouth open— this one has been chosen by her parents. “Chosen for what?” (You cannot stop
this question) To die, you will say after swallowing, fidgeting with the long crease in your shirt, so the others live. You have taught it all your life, this clunking guilt; to your own little girls, you have stressed that it’s the way we starve ourselves that is important.

———————————-
MENNONITE SERMON (#1):

Those who are not among us bring
their cameras and their children. They leave
what’s heavy on their hearts for a morning, a day.

Those who are not among us bring ready
billfolds, pay for bentwood rockers and log cabin
quilts. So easy to buy
an hour of quiet. It is not surprising
on Sunday mornings to see a car with windows

open stopped where the road dips between Salem and
Sonnenberg. God is a cappella
on the seventh day of the week; hymn crosses
hymn between these two churches, and music carries
off their centuries of feuding (this the visitors
don’t know; it is rarely talked of now).

What does our martyr family think as we
sit back, barter our quiet to the world, pretend
that we are holy, different? “Six friends ended their lives in
great joy, and those that saw them burn went and
penned a hymn, the first letter of each verse
replacing the names of the dead.”

Do we ever feel warm when breathing deep to offer up
our harmony? Do we think of them
as verses change? And what would they say, after
watching us join the frontlines, deadlines?

Burn us, bake us, drown us,
World, and in the end, make us yours?

]]> By: TimN http://young.anabaptistradicals.org/2006/09/15/confessions-of-a-tattooed-mennonite/#comment-9 TimN Sat, 16 Sep 2006 23:33:59 +0000 http://young.anabaptistradicals.org/2006/09/15/confessions-of-a-tattooed-mennonite/#comment-9 Welcome to YAR, Becca! Will we have the privilege of having some of your poetry posted here? The themes your talking about sounds like ones that a lot of us could connect with. Also, can you describe more what you mean by "confessional" literature? Can you give some examples? Welcome to YAR, Becca! Will we have the privilege of having some of your poetry posted here? The themes your talking about sounds like ones that a lot of us could connect with. Also, can you describe more what you mean by “confessional” literature? Can you give some examples?

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