{"id":13408,"date":"2023-04-11T23:15:05","date_gmt":"2023-04-12T03:15:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thealfam.com\/evermore\/public\/?p=13408"},"modified":"2026-07-28T13:18:32","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T17:18:32","slug":"renowned-poet-rosemerry-wahtola-trommer-honors-the-nuances-of-grief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thealfam.com\/evermore\/renowned-poet-rosemerry-wahtola-trommer-honors-the-nuances-of-grief\/","title":{"rendered":"Renowned Poet Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer Honors the Nuances of Grief In Her Poem, \u201cI Want to Listen to Your Absence\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"[vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” column_margin=”default” column_direction=”default” column_direction_tablet=”default” column_direction_phone=”default” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” row_border_radius=”none” row_border_radius_applies=”bg” row_position_desktop=”default” row_position_tablet=”inherit” row_position_phone=”inherit” overflow=”visible” overlay_strength=”0.3″ gradient_direction=”left_to_right” shape_divider_position=”bottom” bg_image_animation=”none”][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_tablet=”inherit” column_padding_phone=”inherit” column_padding_position=”all” flex_gap_desktop=”10px” column_element_direction_desktop=”default” column_element_spacing=”default” desktop_text_alignment=”default” tablet_text_alignment=”default” phone_text_alignment=”default” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_backdrop_filter=”none” column_shadow=”none” column_border_radius=”none” column_link_target=”_self” column_position=”default” gradient_direction=”left_to_right” overlay_strength=”0.3″ width=”1\/1″ tablet_width_inherit=”default” animation_type=”default” bg_image_animation=”none” border_type=”simple” column_border_width=”none” column_border_style=”solid”][vc_column_text]Before my son Finn died, I already had a daily writing practice in place. The day he died was the first night I hadn\u2019t written a poem in over thirteen years. And then I didn\u2019t write at all for the first seven weeks after his death. I suppose on the surface then it would look as if it shut the writing down, but in fact, I believe that this break opened me up. I wanted to be (really more like <\/span>had<\/span><\/i> to be) open to the pure experience of the wide spectrum of feelings I was having\u2014such devastation, so much love. I found myself meeting life in a porous way\u2014a way beyond understanding or framing. I remember feeling as if my daily writing practice had prepared me to stay curious and attentive during that time, and I needed to simply feel. And then, when the day came when it rose up in me to write again, I remember being so grateful to be able to explore all the nuances of grief through language. Over a year later, I find that writing helps honor all the shades of loss\u2014sorrow, gratefulness, horror, hope, suffering, connection, love, pain, communion. Writing helps me feel more connected to my son through memory, and it helps me explore this new ethereal relationship with him. For the first many months of writing, I could only write about loss (and the love that saturates it)\u2014all writing was through this lens. It almost felt like a betrayal at first to write about anything else. Now I am more at home with the paradox of being full of great grief and great gratitude at the same time\u2014and the poems certainly reflect that. That was the long answer. The short answer: I feel as if meeting Finn\u2019s death has made me a more compassionate, spacious human, and I imagine this comes through in the writing.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There have been several poems that saved me during this time, most importantly this partial poem from Gregory Orr: \u201cNot to make loss beautiful, but to make loss the place where beauty starts. Where the heart understands for the first time the nature of its journey.\u201d The moment I read these lines, I felt so known, so companioned, so guided, so seen, so met. I knew that someone else truly understood what I was going through. This is, of course, one of the great gifts of poetry\u2014it is a language of connection. But it is also, I believe, a language of paradox, mystery, a willingness to engage with uncertainty, to \u201clive into the questions,\u201d as Rainer Maria Rilke said. And that is what meeting the death of a beloved has asked me to do again and again. Poetry doesn\u2019t solve or fix anything, but it does offer open arms to cradle us as we grieve. <\/span><\/p>\n

About Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rosemerry<\/span>\u00a0lives with her husband and daughter in Placerville, Colorado, on the banks of the wild and undammed San Miguel River. Devoted to helping others explore their creative potential, Rosemerry is the co-host of <\/span>Emerging Form<\/span><\/i>, a podcast on the creative process. She also directed the Telluride Writers Guild for ten years. She has 12 collections of poetry, and her work has appeared in O Magazine, A Prairie Home Companion, PBS NewsHour, American Life in Poetry, on fences, in back alleys, on Carnegie Hall Stage, and on hundreds of river rocks she leaves around town. <\/span>Beneath All Appearances<\/span><\/i> is a new, collective work of collages and poems by bereaved mothers Rashani R\u00e9a, Damascena Tanis, and Trommer; it has been called \u201ca pole star for those who grieve.\u201d This month, Samara Press will release her next collection, <\/span>All the Honey<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/i> She\u2019s won the Fischer Prize, <\/span>Rattle\u2019<\/span><\/i>s Ekphrastic Challenge (thrice), the Dwell Press Solstice Prize, the Writer\u2019s Studio Literary Contest (twice), and The Blackberry Peach Prize.<\/span><\/p>\n

Resources:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer<\/span><\/a> website<\/p>\n

Emerging Form<\/span><\/i><\/a>, a podcast on the creative process<\/span><\/p>\n

Beneath All Appearances<\/span><\/i><\/a> by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer<\/p>\n

All the Honey<\/span><\/i><\/a> by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer<\/p>\n

Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer’s photo was taken by Joanie Schwarz<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Read other acclaimed poets reflections on grief<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Old Friend”\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/h4>\n

“Nevertheless, It Moves”<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/h4>\n

“Letter to My Father”<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/h4>\n

“LESS HEAVY THINGS”<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/h4>\n

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