Setting a Personal StandardKay DayEach poet determines his or her own path towards developing a personal standard. Some develop poetry by means of an advanced degree. Others go the workshop route. And there are those poets who chart a personal path that is quite out of the ordinary. Ruth Daigon came to poetry from a close sister of verse. Ms. Daigon had a thriving career as a classical concert singer. "My life as a singer, and the disciplines imposed on me were invaluable," she recalls. "The fact that I sang in six languages, and my repertoire covered three or four centuries, meant that I had to understand whatever song I was singing in whatever language in whatever century." Because she didn't come to poetry by way of an English department, she never attached herself to a school of poetry. She says that once she plunged into the genre, she read voraciously. "I consumed whatever my library or bookstore had on the shelves," she notes. "I was open to everything." She describes her approach as composing her own music in a different key. Her path eventually led her to become an editor, and says she still had much to learn. She asked herself, "Why did I accept some poems, and reject others?" She explains that it wasn't enough to say she liked a poem. She always asked herself, "Why, why, why?" Ms. Daigon says she keeps a very open mind about the diversification in contemporary poetry. "I salute the editors and publishers who are willing to take a chance on something new, something different, and something challenging," she says. Daigon's own work offers life experiences with a lyrical background. On the back cover of Handfuls of Time, Vivian Shipley, Editor of Connecticut Review, says of the poems, "I thought again and again of the photographer Dorothea Lange, who like Daigon does not crop the ragged edge off of truth." The poem, "Our Town," offers a great deal of visual imagery that culminates in a snapshot in words, with lines like, "...small enough to fill/a single snapshot/with its failing mill/church and bar/We Accept Food Stamps/posted in the corner store..." In today's literary climate, much poetry in magazines wanders off on its own, with nary a thought for the reader. Daigon's poetry, while rich in imagery and sound, allows the reader to accompany the poet on a verbal journey. Indeed, she says the reader is important to the poet. "Without him or her, we are sitting quietly on the page and no one knows of our existence," she remarks. "However, I do not write to please a reader who has a closed mind, and who is hooked on a particular kind of poetry. Not at all. When I write a poem, I hope that it is read by someone who is receptive to extended metaphors, figurative language, and a rhythm that sings, which is the way I write. " She says she's been fortunate to find readers receptive to her work. "Publishing a poem is like singing a recital," she muses. "Merely sitting at the piano and memorizing Mozart is never enough for me. It needs to be performed, and you can apply the same need and desire to poetry." Currently the poet is doing the book tour routine for Handfuls of Time, which is her eighth published book of poetry. Despite the challenge, she says she still writes a poem a day, because it, "keeps me disciplined, so there are many poems floating around my study." She believes there is a great deal of opportunity for publishing individual poems, but that a book of poetry is more difficult to get into print, "almost impossible," she notes. Unlike many well-known poets, Ms. Daigon doesn't view self-publishing as a negative. She adds, "Many excellent poets who cannot find acceptance with the large publishing houses are doing it themselves." When asked to offer advice to poets, she says, "I would bury myself in poetry. Read, read, read! Find people you trust and get their opinions, but don't be dependent on their opinions." And, with the sensitivity that more than likely grew from her music, she suggests, "Listen carefully." You get the feeling that Ms. Daigon's poems sing to her, and that's why her poetry sings to the reader as well.
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Kay Day