Category Archives: Thoughts

Fortune Cookie Poetry

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Almost every night I have a fortune cookie with a cup of tea. It’s become my ritual. They are sometimes funny, sometimes uplifting, sometimes philosophical, sometimes almost a little spooky in the way they apply to my life.

I’ve been doing this for a couple of years now. I try never to throw them away. It seems sacrilegious. I do lose them sometimes, but I try to take a picture if it’s something I want to remember.

Here are a few I memorialized:

This one came along when I was floundering, trying to convince myself I could still write:

And then there was the time my fortune seemed to be hitting on me:

And finally, there was this one. It struck enough of a chord to inspire a poem. I thought it was a riddle, but when I did some research, I found it’s more of a philosophical conundrum. Fun stuff.

I have no idea what wisdom you can actually find in fortune cookies. Though Chinese restaurants adopted the cookie to appease Americans who wanted something sweet to finish off their meal with, no one actually believes they’re Chinese. In fact, though I did find some evidence in a quick Google search that fortune cookies originated in Japan, I’m pretty sure my fortune cookies are very American. And yet, I’ve found that the Universe can speak in many different languages, and English is definitely one of them.

WHAT HIDES IN AN EMPTY BOX?

We puzzled over the fortune cookie
long after dinner was done 
and the dishes taken away;
the check was paid 
and you and I were on the way home.
Darkness, you said, that’s what hides there
and I figured you were right
because if you open the box
and let the light in,
the darkness can’t be seen.
But later still, lying awake
with darkness pressing on my face
smothering me
like your apologies
I wondered if we had been wrong.
Maybe the darkness didn’t hide
when you opened the empty box.
Maybe when the light chased it out
it roared and screamed
and lashed about.
Maybe what hid there in its place
was my heart.

It’s kinda funny, actually.

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Yesterday I saw a sign that said “Live like someone left the gate open.” It summoned to mind a dog running like crazy, sniffing everything he’d never been allowed to sniff, peeing freely wherever he wanted. Yeah, it’d be nice to live life that way.

Today, I saw a meme of a sign that read “Whatever you do today, do it with the confidence of a 4 year old in a batman t-shirt.” And I thought, yes. That’s what I need to do.

I’m a writer.

That does not mean I’m famous.

The publishing world is not designed for people like me. I know this. I am nothing but a middle-class white woman who hasn’t had any real hardship in her life. There’s nothing remarkable about me to make me stand out from the crowd.

I am everywoman.

I can string words together, sometimes even brilliantly. I know the basic rules of grammar (don’t ask me about who/whom though) so I can edit my own work and there won’t be any egregious errors. I also have a pretty decent vocabulary—hence egregious.

I’m a good writer, but I’m still everywoman.

I remember how excited I was when my first book was published. It was a good little romance. I still think it is. I’ve gone back and re-read it without flinching. Much. It was traditionally published by an ebook publisher. In fact, it came out in July 2010. It’s been out for thirteen years.

I’m still not famous.

Since 2010, I’ve had two more traditionally published ebooks (both romance). But I have self-published ten romances, a romantic fantasy trilogy, two children’s books, a young adult book, a comic book, and most recently, seven books of poetry.

Somebody left the gate open.

So here I am, a self-published, relatively unknown writer, frolicking along on the roadside where I’m not supposed to be, publishing books like I’m a 4-year-old who believes fiercely that I can become a superhero—or at least pee anywhere I want to. To make it even better, I now own a bookstore and I try my best to encourage people to try other writers than those embraced by the publishing world.

Because there are more stars out there than those you see at first glance. Some of us just aren’t given the opportunity to shine.

Are you sure you wish to hear my tale? It’s really only about me.

From “Han River” by Michelle Garren-Flye
Just a dandelion, really. Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye. Copyright 2023

It’s…scary.

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I won’t lie. Instagram Lives are not my thing. It’s disquieting thinking strangers could be listening to me. It’s even more nerve-wracking thinking one of my friends could be on there. In fact, if I’m looking at the screen, I’ll see who’s watching.

It’s very different from recording myself reading poetry and putting it up. That live feedback is sort of shocking.

Why is it different from a live audience? I mean, I’m terrified of those, too, but somehow the online lives are worse. I guess it’s the faceless aspect of it. I have no idea if you’re laughing or crying or bored or even sleeping. Whatever’s going on on the other end of the Instagram line is a mystery to me.

All I can do is present the poetry I wrote as best I can and hope you like it.

At 11 a.m. Sunday.

Today I’m drawing yellow. Is it love or just spring?

From “Today I’m Drawing Yellow” by Michelle Garren-Flye
Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye. Copyright 2023

It’s Free!

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Forget my complicated relationship with Amazon for a bit. Right now, as we speak, my new book of love poetry, Where the Sidewalk Begins, is totally free for your Kindle. It’ll be that way until Sunday, and on Sunday at 11 a.m. I’m going to go live on Instagram and read parts of my book.

Which means if you want to read the book and request a poem to be read, you can do it.

Or you can read the book and ask me questions about it.

So you got some homework to do, and actually, so do I. Because I have a mind like a steel…tablespoon. It fills up quickly and stuff sloshes out. So the poetry I wrote and carefully selected and formatted and made into a book might have been forgotten by now, lol. And definitely any inspiration behind it. l

Tomorrow I’ll talk a little about why I’m a bit scared of the idea of going live. And why I’m going to do it anyway.

Dare I take that first step, feel heel strike hard stone, face the rest of my life…alone?

From “Where the Sidewalk Begins” by Michelle Garren-Flye
Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye Copyright 2023

It’s Complicated…

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Last year one of the local bars held a singles meet-and-greet where people were given their choices of cups. Red for in a committed relationship, green for available and yellow for “It’s complicated.”

I was interviewed for a local television news story last week. If you’d like to watch it, you can here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5Rr4vjwxjk&t=15s. The reporter was young, enthusiastic and very, very capable. I admired her. She asked me a lot of insightful questions about bookselling. One of those questions was something like how did I feel about Amazon.

I’m not sure I answered her question very well, because, to be honest, my relationship with Amazon requires a yellow cup.

It’s complicated.

As a bookseller, do I resent Amazon? Not really, honestly. Amazon fulfills an entirely different purpose from what I do. I order supplies for my store from Amazon because I can find good deals, compare products easily and, quite honestly, it makes my life easier. At the end of the year, for instance, when I need to find receipts, it’s much easier if everything is on Amazon instead of a few here and a few there.

Does Amazon affect my business? Again, that’s complicated. I mean, yeah, probably. I don’t know what it was like being a bookseller before Amazon, though. And I don’t sell new books, at least not new bestsellers. I sell used books and local authors. And no, Nicholas Sparks isn’t one of “my” authors lol. My authors sell their books here at the store on consignment, which means if the books sell, they get a check.

Now, that brings me to a more interesting question. As a local author who publishes her books and sells them on Amazon’s self-publishing platform KDP, how do I feel about Amazon?

If I cared enough to dig into my true feelings about it, I’d probably resent them more. Their algorithms often hide independent authors like myself. The pitiful amount of royalty I receive from each sale on Amazon takes a while to add up to a measurable sum. I have tried their “marketing”, but it amounts to giving away books or paying more for each purchase due to empty “clicks” than I get from the sale.

Still, Amazon is exceedingly fair in their pricing for author copies and their system is incredibly easy to use. I currently have twenty-six personal titles on my KDP Bookshelf, and I have also used KDP to publish all the literary magazines for my store. When I am asked for advice on how to self-publish, I send authors to Amazon without a single qualm.

I got a little sidetracked with this post. I started out to tell you Where the Sidewalk Begins, my book of love poems, is now available on Amazon in Kindle, paperback and hardcover. But I got distracted thinking about my feelings. Anyway, starting tomorrow and running through Sunday, Where the Sidewalk Begins is FREE on Kindle. And on Sunday at 11 a.m., I’m going to do another live poetry reading from the book.

I dreamed I fell in love with none other than the moon…

from “Wow” by Michelle Garren-Flye
Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye Copyright 2023

Are We Afraid of New Stories?

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J.K. Rowling said, “There’s always room for a story that can transport people to another place.”

But is there? J.K. Rowling herself has become an icon of what I think of as “Cancelhood” by expressing an opinion that was not popular among…who? Twitterers? Gen Z? I don’t even know. But they “canceled” her so they have as much power as the men in black, the alternative state, the dark government.

The Cancelers.

I’m digressing a bit. I’m worried about storytelling. I’m worried we are no longer open to new ideas. Are there any new ideas?

It’s not a totally new thing that we are more comfortable with the stories we know. Look at how old Cinderella is. Is there anyone who doesn’t know that story in one iteration or another? We may all think of the Disney version, or the more educated may even know Charles Perrault’s version, but the story goes back much further in Greece and Asia.

Women have been losing shoes for freaking forever, man.

And bored royal men have been fetching them for us.

I’d never thought of Cinderella as a women’s empowerment tale until just now.

But again, I digress. I saw a news report today about the spectacular failure of Pixar’s latest movie (probably only spectacular failure because it was Pixar and Pixar is supposed to not fail). The report went on to examine the current hits, all of which are sequels, remakes and adaptations featuring familiar characters.

I’ve been watching a lot of Korean television recently. “K-dramas” as we Americans call them, aren’t necessarily new stories (they’re mostly soapy love stories or about lawyers or doctors—very familiar territory), but they are told from a different point of view in a different setting, sometimes in very unique ways. (I’m looking at you, “Extraordinary Attorney Woo”!)

The art of storytelling is reaching its end because the epic slice of truth, wisdom, is dying out.

Walter Benjamin

I hope that’s not true. It’s definitely getting harder to tell new stories as the routes of communication are closing in on themselves. Disney owns Pixar and ABC, FOX owns CNN, let’s not even get started on the lack of publishing houses. It’s easier for the megacorporations to churn out more and more of the same stuff the public has consumed for years. But in doing so, they’re taking away the superpower of communication, stripping away mankind’s ability to see beyond what is to what could be.

As storytellers, maybe it’s up to us? Find a way to make stories that are new but introduced in a familiar way. Or a way to tell old stories in a very new way. Maybe we have to risk being canceled to break through walls now. Maybe we have to tell stories that aren’t comfortable to hear or read.

Maybe we need to lose a shoe and see who brings it back to us?

Stories have to be told or they die, and when they die, we can’t remember who we are or why we’re here.

Sue Monk Kidd
My book of “love poems” will be available soon. Copyright 2023 Michelle Garren-Flye

For Mama

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I didn’t post yesterday for Mother’s Day. The reasons for this were numerous. For one, I was extremely busy. For another, I was torn between being happy my kids were all home and spending time with me and sad that for the first time in my life, I didn’t have a mother to call.

I used to write poetry for my mother. When I was a little girl, she was, in my eyes, the most beautiful woman in the world. She later became my best friend, my sounding board for life decisions. When I was in college, “long distance” fees on phone calls were still a thing, so we limited ourselves to one call a week to catch up. It became a tradition that lasted well into my married life when the children were small and past the point where “long distance” wasn’t a problem anymore. I continued to make those calls even when she began refusing to speak on the phone, always hoping to hear her voice, just for a moment.

I found a voicemail on my phone. It’s about three years old from the time before she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. I’ve listened to it once and saved it on my phone and sent it to my brothers. That voicemail is precious to me even though I can’t bear to listen to it. The guilt is real, still. What was I doing that I couldn’t answer the phone? Did I call her back?

Didn’t I realize I wouldn’t have her forever?

And because this is my first Mother’s Day without my mother, yesterday was, I guess, a sort of poet’s moment of silence. But now I want to share. Here’s my beautiful Mama, probably taken on a past Mother’s Day.

Hello

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I won’t lie. That’s a hard word to say sometimes.

I wish I lived in a culture that used the same word to mean both hello and goodbye. It’d make it easier, wouldn’t it?

I’m saying hello now because the last post I made was Goodbye. And it was me saying goodbye to my mother. More than a month ago. Saying goodbye sucks. When my kids leave to go back to their own lives. When I hang up the phone with my father now. When a friend I’ve waited a long time to see leaves again. I hate that word. That strangely cheerful sounding, heart-wrenching, chillingly lonely word.

Goodbye.

And yet, having said goodbye to the woman I loved most in this world, somehow it’s been even harder to say hello again to all of you. Maybe it’s because it feels like everything I say echoes in a hollow space. (As a poet, I appreciate that hello and hollow rhyme so well…) But I’m saying hello now because I know there is more to be done here. I have plans for National Poetry Month in April that include this blog. So I will say the word that, strangely, begins with a syllable that describes where I sometimes feel I am stuck.

Hello.

Two words, so very different in construction, not at all alike in sound,

So very difficult to say.

Hello

By Michelle Garren Flye

A whisper of a word over an abandoned grave—

soft breezes blow spring grasses around

and I am searching for redemption.

Courage, the wind whispers, try to be brave,

don’t hesitate, reach for the crown

and your place in life with strengthen.

But in the end, I am naught but a slave,

helpless and a bit of a letdown—

even if I have your attention.

Hello is too much, I can’t do it, I say,

my face marked by an anguished frown,

Goodbye hurt too much; hello is no fun.

Hello, from me. Sometimes I forget to smile. 🙂 Selfie by Michelle Garren-Flye.

Goodbye

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This is my mother. It was taken not long ago by my brother. He often took her and my father out to lunch since he lived nearby. My mother had Alzheimer’s. She was diagnosed in February 2020. She passed away on February 21 this year. I like this picture because her smile is bright and though the disease she fought had taken so much of her by this point, you can still see her intelligence and humor. And there’s a bit of innocence there, too. Like maybe she was already becoming an angel.

I saw her a month ago. She was still awake and still knew me, though communication was difficult by that point. But I could see she knew who I was, and I am grateful for that. I got to hold her hand and even felt her squeeze it a little. I know this is not always the case. I miss her. I’ve missed her for a long time, but now, knowing she won’t wake up and talk to me again one day, it’s different.

My mother taught me to laugh whenever I could, to curse when I had to, to enjoy music and reading, how to clean toilets (although I don’t use that much), that you always vacuum before you dust (again, not something I use much), to clean as you cook, that the beach is a bit of heaven on earth, that fried potatoes and country-style steak are the best food you’ll ever have on this earthly plane, to apologize when you’re wrong, and that loving and protecting your children takes precedence over everything else and doesn’t end just because they’re adults.

Among many other things.

I remember hearing that you’re not truly dead until no one is left to remember you. That’s part of why I’m putting this out there. Tomorrow is her funeral, and I will say goodbye to my mother. But I don’t believe she will truly be gone. Because I will always remember her. And maybe now some of you will, too.

Goodbye

By Michelle Garren-Flye

Let’s say goodbye as many times as you like:

once when I’m lying in bed unable to face the day,

and again when I’m packing my bags,

when you refold my underwear unnecessarily.

We can say goodbye over breakfast toast,

lingering until our coffee turns cold.

Say goodbye to me later

when I get in my car and wait

an extra moment to close the door

so I can see you standing on the front porch

without the glass and metal between us.

Call me later and say it again and again

over the too far away phone line.

Just say it

again

and again

with tears

and anger

and finality

and reluctance.

Don’t stop…

Don’t ever stop.

Just say

goodbye

one more time.

Poem: Today I’m Drawing Yellow

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I’m writing another poetry book. It’s a book of love poems.

No. I’m not in love. Not even close.

But I do have love. I have love for a lot of things and people and places, and if I concentrate on that love, I’m never lonely. If I let it fill me up, it lights up all the dark spaces so even when I’m scared, I know I’ll find my way.

If you think I’m lucky, you’re right. If you think it’s easy, you’re wrong. The worries of the world, mean people, personal problems, Chinese spy balloons…I could go on but I won’t because those things sneak in too easily. Instead, I will make the decision to live my life in love because it will make me stronger. I will draw my life the way I want it to be.

And I will not wait to be in love to write my love poems.