A Now & Then Series For Spring

March is a good month to begin anew. It’s been a long time since I’ve interviewed other poets and writers, and I’m kicking off the season with today’s interview below, with a prolific writer. There’s an American is saying that suits her well: Margaret Kiernan has her fingers in many pies.

Margaret Kiernan is an Irish author and a Best of The Net Nominee for Creative Non-Fiction Award, 2021 and, 2022, and Poetry and Essay, 2023. She writes fiction, essays, memoirs, flash, and poetry. She has had poetry and prose published in hardback, in e-books, online, and in literary journals and magazines, on four continents. She also has multiple short stories and poems in anthology collections and cultural publications. Margaret has four grown-up children and lives in Westmeath with her dog Molly. She paints in watercolors and acrylics and has the following interests: democracy, nature and wildlife, philosophy, astrology, gardening, music, spirituality, reading, archaeology, and historical heritage. In 2024, she was awarded the Ambassadors role for Westmeath Libraries at Creative Ireland.

Red-Orange Gauge

Today I spooned jam from a jar,

amber liquid crab-apple 

autumn crossed my eye,

touched my arm in grassy dust

I felt the heat

                     drop down

light painted in golden brown

eking  into corners

slipping onto a road

going out.

Photo by Anna Pyshniuk on Pexels.com

What gave you the idea for this poem?

“Red-hot Gauge”, published by Mary Jane Grandinetti, editor at Muse-Pie Press and the Shot Glass Journal. USA. http://www.musepiepress.com

I was driving back from a poetry workshop in Carrick on Shannon on a gorgeous autumn afternoon, in October 2023. It was unseasonably sunny and warm. I pulled off the road onto a layby, and got out of the car to walk amongst heather and wild grasses. There were crabapple trees in the landscape. It reminded me of a time when I regularly cooked with those apples, and stored jam and jelly in mason jars.

What got you into writing in this genre?

Initially, I wrote short stories. I arrived at poetry when I reached for something between emotions and thoughts. It was a surprise to me when I wrote poetry but not to others who knew me. They stated that I spoke in poetry.

How long have you been writing?  Do you do something else for work?

I can remember writing at age eleven in the attic of my home. I wrote a book of sorts which got lost after I moved away to the city. I went up to the attic for space to be with myself, I was one of a large family. The attic had only gable windows to see from. I took the family transistor radio up there too; it was a blue color and was a Bush brand. I listened to Eartha Kitt; I remember hearing her speak about growing up in mud-filled places, and how she played in mud, stuck straws into her bellybutton. I listened to Daniel Barenboim, pianist, and conductor, who was then at the start of his career as a conductor with the orchestra of St Martin in The Fields, England. Later, he was based in Berlin, at The State Opera. He was a peace activist and had been born in Israel. 

I was deeply affected by the world economic downturn in 2009 when my job was made redundant. I was a professional advocate for social inclusion and diversity. It was then that I made up my mind to allow myself the time to write creatively, to stop resisting the pull. I have the role of being an ambassador for literature and reading with two organizations. I continue to be involved in public policy and social justice at county level and in a pro bono capacity.

What is the writing process like for you? What is your writing day like? 

I am disciplined with my writing life. I start at seven am, and it ends when I stop for lunch at one o’clock, Monday to Friday. Unless I’ve meetings I rarely adjust this schedule. I read a lot at weekends. In the afternoon, I take my dog Molly out to walk in the countryside.

What have been the biggest influences on your writing?

I find that hard to answer. I have been a keen reader since early childhood. My mother enrolled me in the adult sector in the library at eight years old, I had read the entire children’s section. I wish I had recorded all the titles of books read; it would be an amazing tally. Ireland has a strong standing in literature, and, I would have benefited from that. I also love American literature. Hemmingway, Williams, Bishop, et al.

What is one of your favorite books (other than your own book, and why? 

There are many to mention but I will settle for “A Thousand Splendid Suns” by Khaled Hosseini, published by http://www.bloomsbury.com. It is a book about many things but in the end, it is about endurance, in a country, in family and friendships, in women’s strength to endure, and in love and heroism to survive. A great storytelling by the author. 

How do you think your writing has evolved?

I believe that if you keep doing something, stick at it, you get better at it. I hope I do.

It is always a fine line to believe in one’s own writing. Objectivity can be lost. The pull to keep doing it is what matters

What supports your writing, and how do you come to your final product?

Having work accepted and published by editors in literary magazines and journals is helpful. Being in a poetry group or collective is helpful too for feedback and support. I miss that with my prose. The final product arrives at an end after much reviewing and editing. Sometimes, I am pleased that it is done enough and, other pieces I think are never in that place. 

How do you market your work?

Not at all. I am trying to find help to make a book of my poems. I have approximately two hundred and fifty of which one hundred and forty have been published.

My short stories are piling up, I write flash too, and I seem to have moved into a futuristic/ space with eco vibes, perhaps it is the times I live in.

What piece of your own work are you most pleased with”?

I couldn’t say at all. Every word, perhaps. That it exists at all is my blessing.

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