It pains me every time I read about a writer who died leaving unfinished work, a novel in progress or unpublished poems. Sure, if they are important enough, someone may complete the novel or gather up the poems for a final “complete works,” but it’s not the same.
In contrast, there’s my first and favorite writing workshop leader who said that she had decided to write no more poetry after publishing her latest collection. I was shocked. Does a poet just do that? Shirley Cochrane was in her early 60s. She lived to be 90. I’ve just laid my hands on a copy of her last book, long out of print. Turns out it was published when she was 73 and it contained some new poems. This matters to me…
…because here I am, ready to publish a late-life collection. Is now the time to stop writing poems and focus on other interests? It’s hard to imagine making such a calculation. In this life, you do the work you’re given to do. Everyone leaves something unfinished when they die—a woodworking project in the basement, a packet of seeds never planted, final goodbyes unspoken.
It was different when I left my last nursing job. This was a difficult decision and, yes, I had regrets. But deep inside I knew it was time. Like writing, the nursing profession was a calling. Could it be that nursing was something I did and a poet is something I am? Not quite. I believe that I’m called to healing. Nursing was one way to manifest this. Poetry is another. In one of his plays, Alan Bennett has the poet Auden speak about “the habit of art.” (I wrote about this in my notebook entry of September 2015.) Whether or not I publish poems, I’ll always read, write and observe what’s around me with the sensibility of an artist and compassion of a nurse. I’ll keep the habit of art.