My Writing Journey: Life began at Forty-Four

I’ve always been a late starter in my life. I was twenty before I had my first alcoholic drink, twenty-five when I lost my virginity to a man, thirty-six when I got my driving license and fifty when I first had sex with a woman. And so it was with writing, I didn’t start until I was forty-four.

My daughter was the catalyst. When she was eight, she used to write poems and give them to family members on their birthdays and other important events. I thought it was a lovely idea, to gift someone a poem.  At the time I was seeing a therapist, to cope with the fallout of my marital separation. I wanted to thank her for all the support she had given me so I decided to write her a poem. I really enjoyed the process of trying to express in words what I was feeling. When I gave the finished piece to my therapist, she smiled and said “You have to continue to write.”

That was all the encouragement I needed. The words tumbled out onto the page. Once I started I couldn’t stop. Writing took me to another place, away from the stresses of work, of dealing with an ex-husband and raising my two children single-handedly. Nothing else mattered, when I put pen to paper to form words, sentences, and shape them into poems and stories. I discovered that writing is hard work but I’ve also found that writing, particularly when writing the first draft, can be a mystical experience. It transcends the ordinary.   

Initially I mainly wrote short fiction. I loved getting immersed in my character’s lives. They told me their stories and I felt like I was just their typist putting their words on the page. Then I began to submit my fiction to journals, and writing competitions. To my delight, editors accepted some of them for publication.  Not only did I enjoy writing, but now I discovered that it was publishable and people enjoyed reading my work.

In 2016, I hit a major speed bump. I suffered from chronic pain which led to depression. All the goodness went out of life and I stopped writing. I only had enough energy to get out of bed in the morning, look after my children and go to work. For three months I lost all motivation to write. However during this time and not long after I had been suicidal, words started to pop into my head. A poem emerged. I had to write it down. This poem played a significant part in saving my life. The narrator in the poem was a daughter talking about her mother’s suicide. Writing that poem made me realise the impact, committing suicide would have on my children. I had to stay alive for them.

2017 was a year of recovery and healing. I put aside my short stories and started to write poetry. It was as if I had taken a laxative. All the words and emotions that had lodged in my gut came flowing out. It was a tremendously liberating experience. I censored nothing. I joined an online poetry workshop to learn more about writing poetry.

At first I didn’t believe what I was writing were “real poems”. They were nothing like what I had studied at school. The facilitator of the group, (Irish poet, Kevin Higgins), and my workshop peers were very encouraging. They praised the bravery and honesty in my writing. The toddler poet in me began to walk, then run. I started submitting my poetry and to my amazement, editors of various literary magazines published them. I also started reading my work at literary events, which I really enjoyed. One of the biggest kicks I get is when someone comes up to me after hearing me read to tell me my poems resonated with them.

In the past two years I’ve written over one hundred and fifty poems on various topics. Some of them personal. Others based on characters that pop into my head and demand their story be written. During this time I began to explore my sexuality and what it meant to be attracted to women in mid-life. Of course these explorations began to manifest themselves in my poems.

Late in 2018, I gathered about thirty of these poems into a small collection. They documented my journey of self-discovery in an intimate and open way. I submitted the collection to Fly On The Wall poetry press. The editor, Isabelle Kenyon loved it and will publish my first poetry chapbook “The Woman with an Owl Tattoo” in May, 2019.

Subsequently I revisited the short stories I had written and sent a collection of the best of them to The Blue Nib publishing press. They will publish the collection in September 2019.

I came across a quote recently by A.S. Byatt. She says

“I think of writing simply in terms of pleasure. It’s the most important thing in my life, making things. Much as I love my husband and my children, I can love them only because I am the person who makes these things”

This sums up what writing means to me (without the husband). It nourishes me in a way that nothing else can. Writing is a compulsion. Just as I have to breathe, I have to write. If I don’t get at least one new piece, written every week, I get cranky. I often wonder how I survived forty-four years on this planet without writing creatively.  I hope, in the words of Van Morrison, “the best is yet to come.”

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You can read Anne’s poem, “Guide to Becoming a Writer” at this link: https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/hennessy-new-irish-writing-july-s-winning-poems-1.3568189

Author Biography

Anne Walsh Donnelly lives in Mayo in the west of Ireland with her two teenage children. She works as a Student Services and Careers Officer in a third-level college and writes in her spare time.

Her writing has been published in several literary outlets such as The Irish Times, Crannog, Boyne Berries, Dodging the Rain, Ariel Chart and The Blue Nib.

Her work has been shortlisted in several competitions including the OTE New Writer of the Year Award, Fish International Short Story Prize and the RTE Radio One Frances Mac Manus competition. Anne won the Blue Nib Winter 2017/Spring 2018 Chapbook poetry completion. She also won the Over The Edge 2018 Fiction Slam.

Her debut poetry chapbook “The Woman with an Owl Tattoo” will be published in May 2019. Her debut short story collection will be published in September 2019.

Social Media Links

Twitter: @AnneWDonnelly

Facebook: AnneWalshDonnelly

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Category: Contemporary Women Writers, On Writing