Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer has written a poem every day since 2006. Her new book, The Wonderment, gathers poems that invite us to meet our human experience tenderly, and with wonder.
I sat down with my dear friend on Instagram Live to celebrate its release. Rosemerry has had so many beautiful conversations about this book that I wanted to try something different. I imagined The Wonderment as an album, like a well-loved vinyl, and chose five poems as our tracks. We listened our way through them one at a time, allowing each one to carry us into the next.
Rosemerry opened by sharing that she had pulled an angel card just before we went live. It read contentment. It felt like the right way to arrive.
Poetry as a practice of paying attention
What I feel most sisterly with Rosemerry about is our shared love of paying attention and listening. So I asked her: did poetry grow that capacity in her, or did she come to poetry because she already loved to pay attention?
Poetry grew it, she said. She laughed about the gorgeous ponderosa pine at the top of her driveway, which she can go a week or more without truly seeing. That, she said, is the big invitation.
In the early years of her daily practice, the search felt frantic: where's the poem? Over time it relaxed. She became a better listener because she deeply wanted to be one, and because she had a practice that asked it of her every day.
"There's so many kinds of practices, but all of them are the same thing really, which is, can I show up and be present to what is here?"
That is exactly what my yoga and somatic meditation practice asks of me. Rosemerry's language meets me in the same place. Her craft is words, which can feel cerebral, and yet her poems land in the body.
Watch our conversation
I invite you to settle in and listen to the whole album. Find a comfortable seat, maybe a warm cup of tea, and allow these poems to meet you wherever you are. You'll hear Rosemerry read all five, and yes, you're welcome to join the choir.
Listen, read, and gather with Rosemerry
Watch the full conversation: [ADD LINK TO IG LIVE REPLAY]
Get The Wonderment: The Wonderment on Bookshop.org
Receive Rosemerry's daily poem: wordwoman.com
Rosemerry's upcoming offerings:
You First: a half-day retreat with Jules Blaine Davis, just before the holidays, on ways to care for and nourish ourselves
Doubt and Delight: a two-day retreat, December 3 and 4
The Big Reframe: an online program on how we receive the world, using poetry to meet our stories in a fresh way. Tuesday nights, 7 to 9 pm Eastern. Registration is still open, and sessions are recorded.
Find details for all of these at wordwoman.com.