With an afterword by Robert Creeley.
Privately printed, 2002. $25. Softbound. 98 pp.
When Daily Life was More Immediate
In her later years Helen Power belonged to a writing group in Waldoboro and shared her prose with the seven women to whom this book is dedicated. They must have looked forward to each new installment she produced: this gem of a memoir offers a bounty of engaging stories. Power brings her family and the past to life through recollection and anecdote, poetry recited in the kitchen, bits of New England linguistics and quilt patterns–and a memorable visit to Frenchboro Long Island.
My Grandmother, Carrie is about people and places from the time of the Civil War into the early 20th century. Power’s grandmother Caroline Elisabeth, called Carrie after she was grown and married, was born on the Fourth of July 1855. In her youth she witnessed a potato boat sink at the Winterport dock while she ate her lunch. “It seems extremely matter-of-fact, to be watching a serious, if relatively small, marine disaster and not to have the accident interfere with your appetite,” her granddaughter muses. “I think that daily life was more immediate for more people then.”
For a time Carrie lived with her Aunt Marietta Rice on Frenchboro Long Island. The descriptions of daily life on this outpost isle range from making a “Joseph’s Coat” quilt made of cloth scraps to the arrival of the “line gale” in late fall. When this storm threatens to blow the roof off the house, Carrie and her young son Will climb to the attic to chop a hole in the wall at the closed end of the room to “let the wind out.”
The book is filled with wonderful tidbits, from riffs on New England words, including “boughten” and “gormy,” to a bit of verse dedicated to Congressman James Blaine: “Blaine, Blaine, James G. Blaine/Continental liar from the state of Maine.” Portraits of kin are vivid, as are memories of loss and acts of goodness.
Power’s brother, the acclaimed poet Robert Creeley, makes a memorable cameo as a young boy attending a grandfather’s funeral. He also contributed an afterword, in which he outlined his sister’s life and ambitions. “I can only say that my big sister Helen opened the way to so much of the world,” he wrote. Reading this book is to share in that special experience. q
To purchase a copy of My Grandmother, Carrie, contact Penelope Creeley, P.O. Box 2584, Providence, RI 02906. Proceeds from sales of the book will go to the Sarah Power Scholarship Trust (Sarah was Helen Power’s youngest child, who was killed in a car accident in 1983 when she was a senior at the University of Maine at Orono). The scholarship supports a graduate of the high school Sarah attended in Waldoboro. The fund was started at a reading Robert Creeley arranged with Allen Ginsberg at the Waldo Theatre. Ginsberg donated all the door take to the scholarship.
Carl Little is with the Maine Community Foundation in Ellsworth.