Poet finally found the time for her lifelong love
by Denise Kaspar
Winston-Salem Journal
Some people preserve their memories with photos; others fill scrapbooks with ticket stubs, printed restaurant napkins and other mementos.
Terri Kirby Erickson captures the moments of her life with words - woven into poems like the threads of a blanket to comfort her during times of nostalgia.
She aptly named the first compilation of her original works, Thread Count. A compilation of 102 poems, the book features a cover created by her uncle, famed N.C. artist Stephen White.
Erickson will sign copies of her book Saturday at Casanova's Coffees & Fudge.
Adele Casanova, the coffee shop's owner, said that Erickson is a regular customer.
"We like to feature local talent," Casanova said. "When we heard she wrote a book, we invited her to come in for a book signing."
Erickson was in the fifth grade when she wrote her first poem, inspired by a woman whom she calls "a really talented young teacher."
Taking time for poetry
It was a poem using a metaphor about snow looking like old newspapers. She can hardly recall it, but she remembers the experience and her teacher, Elizabeth Reynolds, as "one of those incredibly influential teachers you never forget."
Life seemed to get in the way of Erickson's quest for a poetry career. A bout with Crohn's disease delayed her eventual completion of college. Then her duties as a wife and mother put her poetry on the back burner.
She found her way as a technical and medical editor, applying her honed skills in English. She refines the written word for doctors and researchers.
"That appeals to my need for order and grammar," Erickson said.
Two years ago at age 45, she realized that she was not getting any younger, and it was time to make her passion a priority.
"It was like an epiphany," she said. "(Poetry) is something I've loved to do all my life and I hadn't been doing it seriously."
Encouragement from a friend
She got to work, diligently filling a desk drawer with her writings. Armed with 25 poems, she turned to a close friend for advice. His words of encouragement spurred her to write 77 more and self-publish her book.
Her poems are about moments in time, illustrating cross sections of life. Some are about growing up in the South, while others are about places that she has been during trips to different parts of the world.
She has a few favorites, such as the one about eating watermelon in her grandfather's back yard. And there is the one painting a picture of a different era when racial tensions defined roles, and how she longed to play with a black girl who lived across a street that marked a boundary as succinctly as barbed wire.
Like a time capsule, her poetry draws in a reader as vividly as a snapshot or a painting, but with descriptions of emotions and environments that are lost in translation with film or paint.
"(My poetry) is not an exercise to show off my linguistic ability," Erickson said. "It's real poetry for real people. We really are all the same at heart no matter where we live or where we are from. I want to keep it real. I loved doing this book."
Her book is available locally at Borders, Pink Mink, Casanova's and online at www.amazon.com.
• Denise Kasper can be reached at 775-5653 or at clemmons.wsjournal.com
WHISPERS OF THE HEART is artist and author J. Allen Wilson's second book of poetry.It can be autographed and shipped within 48 hours of order. NO LONGER AVAILABLE.
BEFORE DARKNESS FALLS Retails for 14.95 / but you can have it now for only 11.95 This is a book of poetry and prose that deals with real life issues that all of mankind comes to face. Some of the poems deal with the tenderness of love, while others s
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