In turbulent times like these, what’s a girl to do to get through the day? Well, if you ask poet and yogi Sarah Herrington, she might just tell you to stand on your head!

Sure, there are protesters occupying the streets, writers having their civil liberties stripped away, writers having award nominations stripped away, Republicans spewing vitriol, and wild animals on the prowl, but we could all stand to take a moment and try and find our way toward calm. Breathing helps. For real. Sit up straight, close your eyes (well, when you’ve finished this sentence, of course), then fill yourself up with some air and slowly let it all out. Do that a few more times. No, seriously.

Now fill yourself up with some of Herrington’s words, like this poem from her first book of poetry, Always Moving.   

electric 

 

girls like us

live inside livewires

current close

pole to pole

across states of america

 

run

city subterranean

the third rail

boys make signs about

red warnings and lightening bolts

and no no no

 

jolt up against each other

encyclopedia of fast magnetism

zipping blue

 

we carry a charge

 

protons trapped in the nucleus

can’t escape

become moving electrons

 

electricity!

 

a small spark an area

cloud to cloud

wires

birds rest on

 

if you miss us

scuff your feet 

touch a doorknob

 

hold your umbrella

in a thunderstorm

Sarah, who has a new poem in our very own Issue Two, was gracious enough to answer some of my questions about her work and the intersection of her writing and yoga practice. 

Elizabeth Dunn-Ruiz: When did you start writing poetry? How did you find your way to it?   

Sarah Herrington: Well, I’ve written all my life, starting with stories and making books when I was a kid. When I was a teenager I began writing poetry.  I began reading more poetry, too, and felt a deep resonance and wanted to engage in that conversation of poems. I found in poems I could express myself both in words and the spaces between words, I could engage with rhythm and experimentation with language that really served what I wanted to say. I published my first poem in high school with the encouragement of my cool English teacher.

EDR:  What poets were you reading as a teenager? Or that you WISH you were reading at that time in your life?   

SH: I randomly found my way to the Transcendentalist writers (Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau) when I was in 9^th grade and they really resonated with me. They are very spiritual writers. I remember not liking my English class that year but we were given great anthologies of American poets and I found myself reading on my own when I was supposed to be reading other things.   

I like to think you find and read who you’re supposed to at certain times of life. I didn’t discover other poets I now love, people like Roethke, Allen Ginsberg, Anne Sexton, Marie Ponsot, Walt Whitman, e.e.cummings, etc, until later in life, but I think I found them when I was most ready to take in what they offer. (Though I think I would’ve really liked e.e. cummings as a teenager since he plays with language so much!) I read a lot of Francesca Lia Block’s work, too, when I was younger and still do…she’s a favorite author of mine and now one of my teachers in real life which is stranger than fiction. Everyone should read “Dangerous Angels.”  One of my short stories is going to be in her upcoming anthology, Love Magick.  

EDR: Congratulations, that is fantastic! So, I’m curious, how does your yoga practice influence your writing? And vice versa?   

SH: Yoga and meditation practice have become integral parts of my life and now are in active conversation with my writing. First of all, thanks to yoga, I now experience writing as a practice, too. I approach the page much in the same way as I approach the mat. It’s a new day, and in practicing I try to be as present as possible and then I leave it when practice time is done.  Its ok to fall over or use an eraser…in fact, you have to make mistakes and a mess to learn sometimes. Before, I used to carry my writing around with me all day in worry and thinking “I should be working” and I actually got less done. 

Both yoga and writing are practices of honesty to me. You are seeking in both and can’t lie to yourself in either. For example, if you can’t stand on your head yet, you can’t, and you have to deal with that and look at how you show up with that. Same with writing. If you write something that doesn’t feel authentic you really can’t fool yourself, and I think the best writing, no matter the genre or style, is the writing that’s the most authentic and from the heart and guts.  

Yoga has also changed what I feel is the intention behind my writing. Before yoga, I wrote a lot from my own confession, now I’m writing more in offering.  Yes, I want to write to express myself, but I want to inspire others too and connect. 

EDR: When does Om Schooled come out? Did that experience contrast with writing and publishing poetry?  

SH: Om Schooled is my book about how to teach yoga to kids and it comes out this winter.  Its part teachers-guide and part a true story from my years of teaching kids yoga in an inner-city public school environment. Again I’m hoping this writing will help others, specifically other teachers (classroom or yoga) who want to share yoga with youth in the most effective way. 

I learned a lot about the publishing process through Om Schooled, from finding a publisher to the editing process to galleys and fonts and book covers. That feeling of offering and the sense of release in finishing a project is similar no matter what the genre. I felt a similar way when I published Always Moving, my book of poetry. It was like I was holding all these words and experiences inside for so long and in publishing it and sending it out into the world, I felt space was made for the new. 

I do use a different part of my writer brain when writing nonfiction, though. I have to tighten up, reign in, some of my poetic brain. When I write poems I try to ease myself out of confines. In poetry, you can break rules if you break them well. In nonfiction it’s more linear. I do feel my poetic background influences all my writing, though. I tend to be a visual writer who is aware of the rhythm of a sentence no matter what I’m writing. 

I hope as I continue to grow as a writer I grow in a well-rounded way that allows me to write well in many forms.

EDR: Well, thank you so much for talking with me, and know that I am certainly looking forward to reading your new work, no matter the form! And I’m sure our readers will be glad to check out your new poem, psychic, in Issue Two. 

Woot!