Mary Kathryn Jablonski will draw on poems created while she watched her first marriage dissolve when she presents two poetry readings, the first on Nov. 16 at the Old Forge Library and the second on Dec. 10 at the Woodstock Poetry Society and Festival.
“I’m going to be reading about marriage … interestingly enough, and I didn’t plan this, the reading in November would have been the 25th anniversary of my wedding,” said Jablonski, of Saratoga Springs. “I started to look through the hundreds of poems I have and I found there are a lot of poems that are on the theme of marriage.”
She’ll also be reading selections from her 2008 chapbook, “To the Husband I have Not Yet Met,” which includes poems cloaked in humor or other unconventional styles.
“They’re my response or observation to human nature or to nature,” said Jablonski.
Nature and human nature are the two driving forces behind every poem she writes.
“I realized how common or similar nature and human nature actually are,” said Jablonski.
There are poems like “Marriage as Death” and “UG2BKM,” meaning “You’ve Got to be Kidding Me” in text message language.
“I was at an open mic and a guy proposed to his girlfriend,” said Jablonski.
There’s also one called “To a Runaway Bride on the Anniversary of Your Escape” that’s inspired by the 2006 story of a bride who had 14 bridesmaids and groomsmen lined up and 600 wedding invitations sent out, who disappeared four days before her wedding.
Poems and visual art has always been the center of her life.
“I’ve always written poems. I’m a visual artist as well as a poet and both have been part of my life since childhood,” said Jablonski.
She doesn’t remember what her first poem was about but in elementary school she said she unknowingly imitated Longfellow’s style.
“We studied Longfellow and before I knew what meter was I remember writing a poem in the same meter as Longfellow poems,” said Jablonski. “They were ballads.”
She’d also use poetry to cope with life’s little hurdles.
“I used to hide in my closet when I was mad or upset and I would write on the inside of my closet door,” said Jablonski.
In addition to poetry, she’s also taken up a new task. Twice a week, she visits a blind 98-year-old resident at Wesley Health Care Center and transcribes her memories.
“She shares with me these life stories that are so vivid and some of them are hilarious that we lose track of the story we get laughing so hard,” said Jablonski.
She met the woman after organizing a poetry program to fulfill her volunteering desires.
“I met an elderly woman … who unfortunately had lung cancer and I had the great pleasure of caretaking her as she was passing from this world,” said Jablonski. “She volunteered every day of her life and was such a mentor to me that after she was gone I decided I could take her legacy and learn from it.”
Poetry readings or other opportunities to interact with readers of her poems are a valuable part of being a poet.
“I can very easily fall into being a hermit so this is very good practice for me being in the world,” said Jablonski. “If I didn’t perform them … it would be wasteful. It would be a shame.”
Finding ways to get her poems published is an important step of the process, she said.
“I realize it would be a shameful waste if I only created poems and put them all in boxes and stored them under my bed,” said Jablonski. “I don’t have children so these are the children I set forth out into the world.”
Jablonski has had poems appear in literary journals like “Beloit Poetry Journal,” “Chronogram” and “Blueline,” has two chapbook manuscripts and one book-length collection of published poems.
The Nov. 16 reading is at 7 p.m. at the Old Forge Library at 220 Crosby Blvd. In Old Forge and the Dec. 10 reading is at 2 p.m. at the Woodstock Poetry Society and Festival at Colony Café at 22 Rock City Road.
Her visual art will be exhibited in November and December at Riverfront Studios in Schuylerville and the Arts Center Gallery in Saratoga Springs.
