We know from the poets that memory is often attached to singular artifacts, emblems, or events imbued with significant feeling and meaning and self-knowledge. How can we prompt these recollections, and compose the song lines that cohere around them?
Todd R. Nelson is an educator and writer who has worked in schools in five states. He has lived on the Blue Hill peninsula since 1998—not far from the “headwaters” of his Colby ancestors. His writing has appeared in Maine and national publications including Taproot, Education Week, The Christian Science Monitor, Bangor Daily News, Portland Press Herald, The Ellsworth American and Maine Public Radio, and he has written a monthly column for Penobscot Bay Press since 2015. His books of personal essays, Cold Spell (2022) and The Land Between the Rivers (2024), are published by Down East Books. He lives in Penobscot.
I have some thoughts to share! You do too. Let’s consider the inspiring sounds, objects, and places we’ve stored away, the texts and techniques, the words and phrases, for making them vivid and enduring.
A few prompts should elicit the raw materials. And let’s talk about what I call “The finger exercises of style”: syntax that helps generate pleasing sounds, rhythms, and details. Limited enrollment