Daisy Chain Poetry Gang --> Focus on Laurita Miller

Lovely Laurita. An unassuming writer whose words pack a quiet punch. Laurita is new to poetry -- or so she says -- but the daily poems she dropped this past April during National Poetry Month bespoke someone wih a natural ease around meter, rhythm, rhyme, and song. Her daisy chain poem IMPETUS is no exception.

I traveled North to Newfoundland to visit Laurita. We walked along the coast, kicking at ocean foam, then went inside for tea and scones, chatting all the time of words, wonderful words...

You write poetry and prose - which calls to you more, and why? I’m not sure if either calls to me more. I write what inspires me at the moment. Sometimes that’s poetry, sometimes prose. I never really thought about my poetry writing until this past April when I wrote one poem a day that month. I really enjoyed experimenting.

How would you characterize your poetry voice? your prose voice? I’ve been accused, for lack of a better word, of being poetic even in my prose. Mark said something in his post about my short fiction being unassuming. I think he was exactly right. Most of my fiction, perhaps excluding some of the horror pieces, are rather quiet little things. I tend to write about things under the surface.

Wooden floor

Cool against my skin

There is no motivation

To move from this place

What inspired these first few lines? Honestly, I was a little intimidated when starting my poem. I had already received several beginnings and additions and I felt they were way beyond my capabilities. I wanted something that had a distinct feel, yet could go in several directions. I was kind of afraid to start, yet I knew that I had to get going. These lines just came to me one night just before bed. They described how I felt about starting my poem, and I liked the literal thought of lying on a cool floor, knowing Ihad to get up but wanting to just stay there.

When you wrote the first line(s), did you have a preconceived idea of how your poem would shape and form? If yes, what was that vision? I didn’t have any visions of the end result. I was just happy to have something to send along. My whole focus was creating a few lines that could be taken in any direction.

What surprised you about the final version? What surprised me most about the final version was how well I related to most of it. It became a poem about a woman, a mother, needing to find her place. Robin’s verse was really the turning point there and one word brought it into focus for me – guilt.

What are you working on now? I’m trying to get back into my writing groove after a couple of weeks spent volunteering with the Show Choir. I have a long list of fiction pieces that I’m hoping to work my way through in the next little while. I’ll be jetting off again soon so there will probably be a couple of travel pieces in my future.

Bio: Laurita Miller lives and loves in Newfoundland. Her writings range from horror to literary to slice of life to poetry to... name it, she writes it. She blogs at Brain Droppings.


Peace, Linda