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After many careers, she finds that poetry fits

By JORGE SANCHEZ
Published April 18, 2006

INVERNESS - Susan Elaine Graves has worn a lot of hats, professionally speaking. She's been a police officer, a firefighter, a corrections officer, a karate instructor, a medical assistant and an office manager.

All these professions led her along a path to discover her creative, artistic side.

First she started painting. That led to writing poetry. Recently, she secured a book deal and published her first book of verse, On Clouds of White Horses, this year.

The poems dig deep into her experiences in law enforcement. In The Puppy Crawl, for instance, a firefighter rescues a child trapped in a burning building. The puppy crawl is a technique for escaping a fire, below the deadly fumes.

"Firefighters are my heroes," said Graves, 57.

Graves has been reading her poetry at coffeehouses such as Woodview Coffee House, held at the Unitarian Church in Beverly Hills. She reads her poems between folk singing acts, which lend a Bohemian ambience to the sessions.

"I'm normally pretty shy, so it's a learning experience for me to get up and read," she said.

Law enforcement is a career filled with pressure and tragedy, some of which serve as inspiration for her poems.

"But they're not what you might think," she said. "I take those bad moments, bad memories and turn them into something positive, something good."

Her poetic muse most frequently appears in her dreams. She keeps a tape recorder by her bed to transcribe her dreams.

"I've trained myself so that if I wake up from a dream that is fruitful, I can go back to sleep and sort of pick up where I left off," she said.

On Clouds of White Horses ($12.95, Publish America) is available online from most major bookstores, including Barnes & Nobles, Amazon, Borders and Chapters. It is not self-published.

"They pay me royalties," she tells people at her readings.

White Horses also examines her American Indian heritage, which she inherited from her grandfather, a Blackfoot. Her first poem, Night Roamers, was written at the request of her daughter, Misty, 36. Graves had painted an American Indian scene with braves and buffalo against a stunning sunset. It was a birthday present for her daughter.

"She asked me to write a poem to go with it, and I came up with Night Roamers," Graves said.

It is a lament to the tragedy endured by Americans Indians.

... Rare in form, facing extinction

A sixth-degree black belt in karate, she was the leader, or sensei, of a karate tournament group while married to her second husband in Germany. The group was based at Armstrong Barracks Army base.

"The commander provided us with a van and training facilities and we just toured all of Germany and other countries, participating in karate tournaments," she said.

During that time, she also had her dream car: a 1971 Super Beetle Volkswagen. It saved her life. She had just pulled out of a parking space when an explosion, probably a terrorist bomb, blew up the car next to her, she said.

"It really was a cool car, and everyone in the village knew it by sight," she said.

The Super Beetle has its place in White Horses. Baby Blue Volkswagen describes the Beetle's final days, abandoned for scrap along a Georgia highway.

Married and divorced twice to soldiers, Graves also writes about the military life. In God's Hands tells of the terror and confusion of a night patrol that starts taking casualties.

"That one came in a dream as well," she said. "I've dreamed it often, and I can sort of walk up to the soldier, but can't get close enough to see his name on the uniform. It was very real."

The title of the book is a line from the poem The Passing of an Angel, dedicated to the memory of Jessica Marie Lunsford.

Jorge Sanchez covers arts and entertainment in Citrus County. Contact him at 860-7313 or e-mail at sanchez@sptimes.com

[Last modified April 18, 2006, 01:49:20]