Author: Jennifer Hambrick

Beautifully Broken

~ Jennifer Hambrick ~ 2 Comments
Jack
Photo: Jennifer Hambrick

Many thanks to editor Miriam C. Jacobs for publishing my poem “One-eyed” in the July 2016 issue of Eyedrum Periodically, the literary journal of Atlanta’s Eyedrum Art & Music Gallery. This issue of Eyedrum Periodically is on the theme “Broken,” a true goldmine for poets, who don’t miss a beat when it comes to the wrongness of the world.

“One-eyed” explores both the desperate reality and the exquisite beauty of our human brokenness. The poem was inspired by our dog, Jack, a one-eyed rescue pug who was starved to skin and bones during his first year of life, before we adopted him. We’re not certain what happened during that first year, but Jack might have been born in a puppy mill and, because of his noticeably defective left eye at birth (and since removed), shunted aside for the “reject” pile.

Whatever the reasons, Jack early on grew to fear strangers. But he is a pug and, by nature, a love muffin, and fell in love with us not long after we adopted him. He is extraordinarily protective. I am convinced that he would fight to the death were he to perceive any threat to us.

I am convinced of this because Jack has taken it upon himself to look out our front window now and then each day on what we call “neighborhood watch.” At most, he sees our neighbors across the street going into and out of their homes, working – or in the case of the kids, playing – in their yards, and just generally, as poet James Agee put it, “standing up into their sphere of possession.” And, as I wrote in “One-eyed,” Jack “barks and barks and barks” at our neighbors being neighbors because he’s afraid.

And because he’s broken.

But lest I leave you on a down note, I must also say that, as broken as Jack’s little soul might remain, there is no creature more joyous, more beautiful, more fully himself than One-Eyed Jack. Daily he teaches me that it is possible to live and love through one’s brokenness, that, in fact, one’s brokenness is where we are who we really are, under the wrappers we try to hide behind. Jack’s brokenness reminds me of the world’s need for love.

In that sense, we are all one-eyed. We are all beautifully broken.

Meet My Inner Voices

~ Jennifer Hambrick ~ Leave a comment
cover
Photo: Jennifer Hambrick

There are a lot of voices out there. The voices of Madison Avenue hucksters hawking the Next Big Thing. The voices of politicians doling out demagoguery left, right, and (rarely) center. The voice of your mother. Your father. Your older brother, who once shaved your eyebrows off while you were asleep. Sister Mary Margaret, your fourth grade math teacher, who, because of your lousy recitation of the multiplication tables, told you you’d never amount to much. Your boss. Your yoga instructor. Your spouse.

Some of these voices are for the helpful (imagine the vocal effervescence of Glenda the Good witch), but some are not. The sum total of all of them is a certain cacophony that threatens to paint over your own voice, to mow down what you think you need to say.

As a musician, poet, and broadcaster, my own voice – metaphorically and literally understood – has found many ways to make its presence known. Like all writers, I am sensitive to the figurative notion of authorial “voice,” the special way a writer makes words foxtrot across the page or screen. As a singer and broadcaster, I pay great attention to the voice as a literal thing – a body part to take care of an instrument to master – in my daily work.

In naming this blog Inner Voices, I am honoring the special resonance of voice broadly construed and borrowing from musical lingo, which is so beguilingly expressive. In musical parlance, an inner voice is a line of music that is neither the melody line nor the bass line, but rather a line buried, as it were, in the middle of the texture.

Far from serving as merely a supporting actor, an inner voice gives a musical work depth, richness, and texture. Good performers will always know when and how much to bring an inner voice to the fore. And when an inner voice has its moment in the sun, magic can happen.

Here, on this website, I bring forth the inner voices of my own life as a poet, writer, singer, broadcaster, and voice talent to share with you. I hope you will feel free to make your voice heard, too, and drop me a line now and then. But please be sure to speak up, so we all can hear you above the din.