Mary Medlicott, Storyteller and Author - Storyworks

Posts Tagged ‘Lauris Edmond’

Storytelling Starters ~ Small she-goat

Saturday, July 25th, 2015

P1060747Maybe you’ve experienced it too. You’re looking at something in the distance. You’re sure you know what it is – cat, man, rock or whatever – and then it suddenly dawns on you that it’s something entirely else. Well, that’s the subject of Biography, the poem which occupies this blog this week. To me, it’s very much a storytelling poem and it’s by the great New Zealand poet, Lauris Edmond, who died in the year 2000. 

Lauris Edmond had only become a published poet after raising her family, so quite late in her life. From the day I met her at the Bay of Islands Festival the first time I was a guest storyteller there, she began to become a very dear and important friend. Her fun, her charm, her absorbing love of talk, her zest for life – all were reasons why she was so loveable. Another thing I valued about her was her honesty. For instance, she was very clear about this:  “You don’t go into the arts for the money.” And the fact that she could say that so openly was something I found both reassuring and encouraging. It drew attention to the many good reasons why one does go into the arts.

So here’s the poem. As well as being full of Lauris’s imagination, perceptiveness and love of words, it also abundantly conveys her love of a good story. When one of Lauris’s daughters, Frances, wrote to me recently to ask for a contribution to  The Essential Lauris, a new book currently being put together in Lauris’s memory, I knew it would have to be the poem I chose.  (more…)