Lightning in a Bottle

The idea behind the phrase “capturing lightning in a bottle” came from Benjamin Franklin’s famous experiment in which he flew a kite during a thunderstorm, leading to electricity shooting down the kite string and into a waiting glass jar. It came to mean something spectacular and unexpected. In my mind, it meant something good.

That’s exactly how it feels right now because I have two poetry chapbooks accepted for publication this summer. Widow Maker (Finishing Line Press) is my response and reactions to my husband’s 2015 sudden cardiac arrest and our journey through his recovery process. The Galloping Garbage Truck (Kelsay Books/Daffydown Dilly Press) is a collection of 24 poems for children. These two books follow on the heels of my 2020 chapbook Just the Girls: A Kaleidoscope of Butterflies; A Drift of Honeybees (The Poetry Box), which itself felt like winning the big prize at a county fair.

All three of these books are arriving (or have arrived) in the hands and minds of readers after many decades of writing. Since I held full-time jobs most of my adult life, my writing consisted less of publishing and more of writing and then shelving my work. Yes, I have had a number of individual poems published by literary magazines—some in print and some online. And I certainly have had my share of rejections from publishers, including for the books that now have been accepted. I also juggled my full- time work while pursuing my Master of Arts in English Literature (Kent State University, ‘94) and my Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing, Poetry Concentration (NEOMFA Program, ‘12), but seeing my books in print was never my primary focus.

Now retired, I can finally to stretch out and create while also working to convincing others that my poems are worth publishing. I finally have captured lightning in a bottle.

My next challenge is to capture more lightning—but this time with my memoir, which now is in a hefty 250-page draft form. I’m rolling up my sleeves and sharpening my pencil...