By A Firefly’s Glow

With Guest Writer Trent Clifford

Greetings from Tacoma, Washington, where I am nearing the end of an incredible writing retreat. I’ll share more about this soon. But for now, I am excited to introduce you to my friend Trent Clifford. We met through Tehom Center Publishing, where we are both now on our second books. Trent’s courage and creativity are an inspiration. When I received a copy of his first book Reclaiming Faith, I couldn’t put it down as I found so much of my story in his. We are gearing up for some poetic collaborations and bringing him to Wednesdays at the Well today is a real joy. I know you’ll love what he has to share. ~ Rebecca & 10CAMELS

*Photo from a morning walk at Cape Disappointment State Park on Washington’s coast, where the Pacific Ocean and Columbia River meet.

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By A Firefly’s Glow, Trent Clifford

This week, as opposed to turning words into water, as Rebecca so skillfully does, I’ve uprooted words from the garden to set them free. Sometimes growth occurs by allowing roots to dig down into the soil, while other times that results in stagnation. Wisdom, I think, is learning when to water the ground you dwell within and when to seek out the moisture clinging to the clouds.

We writers love nothing more than a good metaphor, and in many ways, my latest book, By a Firefly’s Glow, is an exercise in stretching out an extended metaphor as far as it will go. But metaphors don’t simply spring into being, at least not the good ones, or at least not in my experience.

No, this book started almost two years ago. It didn’t even actually start out as a book. You see, I’m a playwright first. I write scripts for the stage. And it was as a playwright that I first had a conversation that then led to a script that then contained a poem that then spawned an idea. A metaphor that latched hold of my imagination and bloomed into something wild and unwieldy until it became the book that now exists within the world.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s take a step back. Or a great many steps back, however many steps it takes to walk backwards two years.

I’m sitting in a coffeeshop with one of my dear friends. We meet together once a week to write, and on this particular fall day, she says, “I have a proposal for you.”

She had recently won a grant to research resiliency amongst survivors of domestic violence. With this particular grant, however, the funding organization encouraged their researchers to present their information in creative and engaging ways. How could they offer their research findings to the public, rather than keep it locked behind the ivory tower doors of academia?

“I want you to write a play.”

I looked at her in shock. She smiled. We probably hugged. It was an unforgettable moment, the start of something really special.

Of course I immediately said yes, and we set to talking about the ways I could creatively use her interview transcripts — conversations with more than 20 survivors of domestic violence — to tell a story of hope and healing.

Trent on Stage.

The story that came from that experience was Living in Light, a play that weaves together the stories of the brave truth tellers who participated in my friend’s research project. The play centers the resiliency of survivors rather than the trauma, not shying away from the horrors of abuse while simultaneously refusing to actually depict that horror on stage.

One of my favorite areas of exploration, however, was the various ways that these survivors had found healing. So many of them talked about art in various capacities: music, theatre, writing, gardening.

In light of this, one of the characters in the play actually performs a poem he’s written at an open mic night.

That poem uses a butterfly as a metaphor for his experience of healing and wholeness. And I can already hear you saying, but your book is about a firefly, not a butterfly. And that is true. However, one insect led to another, as the saying goes, and I found myself captured by this idea of a firefly and all the metaphors that could be entangled in its glow.

This book is the culmination of my imagination inhabiting a pin-sized exoskeleton, looking at the world through a firefly’s eyes. I’ve always loved fairytales, and perhaps this is my offering to adults who love them too and who understand that we still need those stories to help us grow.

The butterfly poem from the play actually made it into the collection, which feels really special. And in honor of publication and the inspiration that poem offered me, I’ve decided to share it with you today. Consider it your sneak peek at my latest book as well as the entry point into an entire imagined world.

Butterfly’s Ballad

You, in all of your vastness, made me so small.

I tucked in my limbs, practiced vanishing.

How small could I become?

I hid myself, bound myself, tied the knots tighter.

And still you asked for less—

You wanted the whole garden to yourself,

Unwilling to share a single petal or stem.

You wrapped me like a present,

My disappearing a gift to yourself.

You thought the confinement would be my end.

But butterflies have secrets, my dear.

You didn’t imprison me, no.

You unknowingly sent me deeper inward,

Where I rediscovered my dormant dignity.

I hid myself, but I didn’t hide from myself.

Face to face with my truth, inside a cramped cocoon,

I recognized my own infinitude within the smallness.

And now at long last, I burst from behind barriers.

I stretch my wings in all of their beautiful bigness.

I regret the lies I endured at your abusive hand,

But I do not regret who I have become.

I leave the garden to you, as I have no need of it.

For I not only outgrew my cocoon. I outgrew you.

The sky is now my home, the only thing capable

Of containing the vastness that has become me,

Finally free to be all you kept me from being.

I flutter, I rise, I soar, I am.

Being a writer has taught me to take notice, perhaps more than anything. When ideas burrow inside my brain, I give them space to breathe. When moments strike me as something worth paying attention to, I do my best to listen to what that moment contains.

Sometimes, it’s simply something that brings a smile to my face and brings me into a brief but meaningful encounter with the Divine. Other times, it results in an entire book of poetry that someone believes is worthy of sharing with the world.

Thank you for being a corner of the world with whom I can share this collection of poems. They’ve lived inside of me for so long, it’s in many ways odd that they now exist outside the walls that my rib cage has so long enclosed them within.

Subscribe to Rewriting Faith, Trent’s Substack.

Order your copy of By A Firefly’s Glow on Amazon or Ingramspark.

Save the Date: Tuesday, December 9th for a night of Advent poetry with Trent and Rebecca on Zoom. Details coming soon.