A lot of authors write to background music. Not me. I like it quiet, my concentration entirely on the page. That is, until I began writing tic tic tic in January 2024, a poetry collection about time—the urgent and chaotic times we live in, history’s expanse and the moments of my own life.
The book started with a single long poem, “Continuum” that begins in the ashes of 2019—a roaring ‘20s New Year’s Eve party gives way to a pandemic, an insurrection, war after war, the possibility of tyranny and the mounting climate crisis. It was winter, cold and dreary where I live. And I was writing a hard and very present history, so I turned to music as creative companion and muse. That I chose Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” a classical piece that I had learned as a kid playing flute surprised me as my musical tastes lean far afield from the classical. But somehow, I knew that by beginning with the “Winter” concerto then accelerating through the seasons, I had found the soundtrack for my poetic sequence.
I listened to Vivaldi’s concerti over and over, shuffling through various recordings from Baroque quartets to a modern celloist, letting the composition set the pace for my poem “Continuum.” Then as I wrote more poems, each relating to time, seasons, years, moments, seconds, history, the future, I invited a multitude of musical influences in as collaborators.
Once I finished writing tic tic tic, I organized it into four sections: Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall, in a nod to my inspirational music partner.
Winter:
TWO CELLOS: “Vivaldi Storm”
While I can go all Baroque, I found TWO CELLOs’ (Luka Šuliċ and Hauser) mad take on the ‘Winter’ concerto electric. As if the tempo has been ratcheted up. This is no peaceful snowy winter landscape, it is a brutal ice storm, blinding, stripping trees from their roots. I think to take shelter but there is something about this interpretation that sends me out to howl into the winds. My poem “Continuum” is a long howl into the winds of our time.
Jean-Laurent Ducroiset: “Vivaldi Summer”
Gone are the lazy days of summer, the way I remember them—now the hazy days of summer are the norm as the season’s interrupted by flood, wildfire smoke and news of war and destruction. Again, I turn to a contemporary artist to interpret Vivaldi. A classical and jazz-trained pianist who ventured into rock then heavy metal before returning, Ducroiset in his take invites the listener to a summer picnic by the lake. The music is a drowsy feast of afternoon sun and a bottle of Sancerre until Ducroiset unleashes a swarm of hornets. The decade we are living in is like that, moments of complacency and respite only for the hornets of our political reality to descend.
Iron Maiden: “The Wicker Man”
The leap from Vivaldi to Iron Maiden wasn’t suggested by Spotify’s algorithm. But for me, it’s a straight line to “The Wicker Man” written 25 years ago and yet, of this moment.
“You watch the world exploding every single night
Dancing in the sun, a newborn in the light
Say goodbye to gravity and say goodbye to death
Hello to eternity and live for every breath”
The song’s chorus line: “Your time will come” appears in the ‘Spring 2024’ section of my poem “Continuum.” It’s not a song I want to listen to all the time. But it is perfect to crank up when the news is giving you the blues. Which maybe is all the time?
Spring:
Talking Heads: “Once in a Lifetime”
When crafting “Time Capsule,” a series of 28 small prose poems about my life, the music from various memories surfaced, I played Carol King, the Band, Three Dog Night, Elton John, etc. Yet, Talking Heads kept popping into my brain. I’ve always loved the Talking Heads. It’s impossible to not dance whenever one of their songs comes up in my shuffle, especially “Burning Down the House.” But “Once in a Lifetime” is not just a tune to move to, it questions how a life is being spent: How did I get here? The exercise of writing “Time Capsule” served both as self-examination and a realization of the beauty and intention of living my messy, full life. I think it’s a powerful question to ask of oneself—how did I get here? And then what the hell am I going to do from here?
Lennon Stella: “Time After Time” (Cyndi Lauper)
I was in my early twenties, hustling a living in Silicon Valley, when Lauper’s debut album came out. When I think of the ‘80s, I think of Lauper and Madonna, the women I danced to in San Francisco or whenever I was in New York City. But “Time After Time” was the song I listened to as I moved through a series of relationships, each a “Suitcase of memories”. Recently, I discovered Lennon Stella’s cover of “Time After Time”. Maybe it’s my age now, but the tempo, lilt of Stella’s voice brings a whole different emotional well for me. As if that song serves as a reservoir for my memories and untold stories, just as the “Time Capsule” sequence does—”Secrets stolen from deep inside/The drum beats out of time.”
Summer:
Marvin Gaye: “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)”
It was this soulful lament for the earth we occupy that I turned to when I began to craft the third movement of my book, ‘Summer’. Where the previous two sections feature long poetic sequences, here there are poems of sorrow for our natural world including “Lookout” “Unending” and “Fishing.” It was 1971 when Gaye recorded this searing song, before the full catastrophe we have wrecked on our planet was known. Not many were thinking about the environment then. My mother was one of the few who did, taking us door to door to raise money for Greenpeace and march for Earth Day. “Where did all the blue skies go?” Gaye asks decades before wildfire smoke became a seasonal expectation. To me, Gaye’s refrain “Whoa, mercy mercy me” is mother earth begging humanity to stop and have mercy. “How much more abuse from man can she stand?” In “Fishing” I write that there have six extinctions and the shark has survived five. Perhaps we will not survive—but I’m hopeful that mother earth and her sharks will.
Lady Gaga, Bradley Cooper: “Shallow”
For me, nature has been my source of faith. Intertwined in my poems about our fragile world is a reach toward faith. To me “Shallow” is a song about seeking something larger to believe in. “Are you happy in this modern world? Or do you need more? Is there something else you’re searchin’ for?” I watched the film A Star is Born again the other day, Lady Gaga’s character transforming into her fullest self in the midst of singing this song for the first time. “Shallow” advocates for taking a ‘leap of faith’ “off the deep end” as do my poems—to fill “the void of living in this modern world” with faith, hope and love.
Teddy Swims: “Lose Control”
That leap continues in Teddy Swims’ song about love and loss. My poem “Even After All These Years” describes the tenuous state of loving. There is always doubt. Especially when we love madly the way Swims describes it, as “taking the skin off my bones.” Even when we are breathing the same air, bodies entwined with a beloved, there is separation—the mind on its singular journey as I recount in my poem “Split Second.” I believe that a gentle untethering from my comfort zone brings me closer to my spiritual self, to a place where I can love more fully.
Aretha Franklin: “Say a Little Prayer”
The penultimate poem in tic tic tic is “Perhaps This is a Prayer” which I wrote while visiting friends in the English countryside on one of the hottest days ever. Despite the heat, nature was doing her thing—the Avon River winding along, a kingfisher rising above its eddies, the garden offering our lunch. I felt such grace, and like Aretha, I said my little prayer to ‘you’—the gods of nature for the blessing of hope.
Autumn:
Dave Brubeck: “Take Five”
When I was a teen, I listened to rock and roll and jazz. Dave Brubeck’s seminal “Take Five” was a favorite—I bought a cassette tape of it to play whenever I had use of my family car. Leading up to the 2024 election, I turned to “Take Five” again. I was holding onto hope like it was my child in a crowd. Brubeck’s music inspired the poem “Take Five” that is optimistic, trusting in the power of love to triumph. After the election, I thought to replace the poem, with another, more somber poem to end the book. But I couldn’t. Instead, I let Brubeck’s “brush over drum/shuffle, shuffle over cymbal” linger in the ear of my reader. Trusting that when we break tempo, anything can happen.
Bonus Tracks:
In addition, to the composers and musicians I’ve already mentioned. Many of the poems in tic tic tic are threaded with lyrics from the following artists, my fellow travelers on this poetic quest:
Art Garfunkel: “Bright Eyes”
Antonello Venditti: “Grazie Roma”
Bing Crosby: “Good King Wenceslas”
James Taylor: “Something’s Wrong”
Toad the Wet Sprocket: “Something’s Always Wrong”
Pearl Jam: “Buckle Up”
David Bowie: “Where Are We Now”
Peter Allen: “Everything Old is New Again”
Bob Dylan: “It’s Alright, Ma”
also at Largehearted Boy:
Heidi Seaborn’s playlist for her poetry collection An Insomniac’s Slumber Party with Marilyn Monroe