Martha Dolben / Poet & Essayist, Creative Collaborator, Non-Profit Leader
We asked Martha if she would tell us a bit about her creativity. How has it inspired you and your work these past 50 years? How does your creativity come to you? How has it impacted your life?
This is what she shared:
“I surprised myself when I chose Music as my major at Middlebury. I had a belief that I was not musical (or, for that matter, creative). Thanks to Emory Fanning and my own doggedness, my senior organ recital was my most significant academic achievement at Middlebury. In 1981, I encountered the musician Robert Fritz’s work on the creative process and structural dynamics (www.robertfritz.com). This vitalized my life enormously. I taught his courses for seven years to small groups in my home. This helped me reinforce my creative orientation to life. In 1989, I began my collaboration with poet and physicist Hadi Madjid, working to develop the consequences for the creative spirit of his work with physicist and mathematician John Myers. (See Madjid and Myers papers online.) Their work departs from the traditional materialism of physics by establishing the physical reality of the Unknowable. Surprises from the Unknowable speak in all our creative moments, whether in science or art, or in intimacy, friendship, and fellowship. The scientific and artistic temperaments are natural to us all, along with the relational temperament. The relational temperament, often considered a hallmark of the Feminine, links science and art, humanity and nature, you and me. By this linkage, all our creating becomes more grounded in reality, thus more able to serve life.
Developing the relational temperament is my calling, which I have consciously pursued over the last 35 years. My partnerships with Hadi, with development colleagues in Uganda, and with Ingrid Miller are devoted to bringing the gifts for the creative spirit of the science of Madjid and Myers to light and good use. Small women’s circles are one important means for our discoveries and inventions on this path. My story is long, but poetry compacts. Hopefully, a few poems of mine that I share here will give you more of a feel for my work.”
Contact & Inquiries:
Reach out to Martha for more about her poetry, her books, her programs, or just to catch up. You can reach her at:
email: mpdolben@comcast.net
Here are three audio recordings of me reciting one poem each. I recommend listening in the order presented: 1) Partnering with Transcendence, 2) Clarion Call, 3) Touchstone. That said, the last recording might be the most fun because, if you listen carefully, you will hear a wood thrush calling while I recorded this piece outdoors.
The Clarion Call piece is longest because it includes some commentary to provide context for the poem.
▼Click on photos to enlarge
The top photo was taken in Concord, MA, at our Guesswork Partners Women’s Studio, where the red book (On Behalf of Joy, The Women’s Studio Handbook, by Martha Dolben with Ingrid Miller, Hadi Madjid and John Myers) and the green book (Forms of Life’s Desires, Collected Poems and Essays, by Hadi Madjid) are some of our reference materials.
These photos were taken in Kagadi, Uganda, at The Women’s Studio on the campus of Uganda Rural Development and Training Programme (www.urdt.net). I was giving a poetry reading to a group of colleagues when Alida Bakema Boon took these photos and then compiled them as a gift to me.