Nature Writer Comes to Inkberry

Nature writer Tammis Coffin offered resources for nature writers at a lecture last Friday evening at Inkberry.

Tammis’ style was informal and intimate. The lecture had the warm feeling of a discussion forum. Tammis offered suggestions from her own teaching and writing practices, including how to discover and share with others the joys of nature in each moment.

Tammis’ gift is to offer not just resources but also inspiration. She opens up possibilities for nature writing as a dreamy, spiritual practice. Tammis reveals ways to be present, joyful and alive in each moment. It is from this unique perspective that she reveals the delights of nature to her students. From this place of delight, true creativity can emerge and play.

The discussion began with Tammis sharing some of her favorite collections of nature writing. Her favorite book is The Alphabet of the Trees: A Guide to Nature Writing, an anthology of nature writing for educators, edited by Christian McEwan and Mark Statman. The following is one of her favorite passages, from Kim Stafford’s essay entitled “Wild Child Words”:

“Dad! I came to this earth on a rocket and you walked. Look! There are blueberries on this earth. And look, a house! Let’s go in it and see if there’s a bed for me.”

Tammis also shared the poem “An Expedition to the Pole” from The Annie Dillard Reader. Dillard describes experiencing the Arctic landscape before her as though she is newly born:

“If I loosed my eyes from my shoes, the gravel at my feet, or the chaos of ice at the shore, I saw what newborn babies must see: nothing but senseless variations of light on the retinas. The world was a color-field painting wrapped around me at an unknown distance; I hesitated to take a step.”

It is this spirit of joyful wonder and curiosty — of seeing the world with new eyes — that enables Tammis to invite her students into a profound spiritual experience. Tammis has a book of her own in progress, entitled The Nature Writer: Four Paths in Place. Her main reason for reading and writing nature is for inspiration, she said. “I like the idea of weaving ecological, artistic, literary, and spiritual possibilities. I view it as harvesting waterfalls, tasting clouds, connecting, reflecting, and finding belonging in place.”

According to Tammis, there are four organizational paths of nature writing: intellectual, emotional, curiosity, and detailed sensory observation. Tammis’ own practice is a blend of all of them, emphasizing a technique she describes as “observation taking a few steps off the edge into the imagination.” Her motivation for teaching is learning how to organize awareness in new ways and teaching others to do the same.

Her techniques are playful, dreamy embraces of the natural landscape in view. They resemble contemplative, spiritual practices of becoming present in the moment. This is exemplified in her use of the breath. She says, “The breath is a beautiful way to organize our impressions. The breath is a natural timer. We can choose to focus on one thing for one full breath. It holds the gaze.”

Another breath technique she describes uses three breaths. On the first breath, one lingers with one observation. On the second breath, one goes deeper into the observation. On the third, one shifts the gaze to something else. For Tammis, those three observations then become a poem.

Walking can also be an organizer for awareness. Tammis says she will “stop, freeze on a breath, pause, skip, or lie down” as ways to jolt her awareness. The emphasis is on breaking out of one’s inner thoughts and shifting one’s attention to the sensory experiences of nature.

Tammis is inclined towards movement as a way to experience nature, but notes that everyone is different. Her students are encouraged to use movement to “echo a leaf, imitate a stone, find where the joy is, and stay there.” The idea is to honor the spirit of the leaf or the stone, acknowledging its contribution to the world and engaging with its energy.

She uses words as well. She said, “I am — I am the vine, I am the leaf, I am the bug.”

Tammis calls the spirit of her practice “letting the world sing its way into me and letting me sing my way into the world.” This spirit can be seen in the work of her students.

This lecture and a weekend workshop on nature writing will be offered again by Inkberry in September. The lecture will be offered September 12, followed by the workshop on September 13 and 14. The workshop will take students to places — such as Sheep Hill, Field Farm, and Stony Ledge on Mount Greylock — to write outdoors and seek inspiration. Each session will include a silent walk and time for writing and sharing. Those interested in attending the lecture or workshop can contact Inkberry at 664-0775.

Those interested in immediately participating in an ecological, spiritual community are welcome to join Tammis’ meetings at the Sirius conference center in the Pioneer valley. Her group occasionally meets on Sundays for writing and ecological experiences. For more information, Tammis can be directly contacted at asktammis@yahoo.com or by phone at 259-1254.