BCC Shines A Light On: Allen Helmstetter
Name of the piece published by BCC:
When/where was it originally published:
Summer 1999 issue of North Coast Review
What is the background of the piece? What led you to write it? What’s your process?
I wrote “Washing Windows” as part of a creative writing seminar in graduate school. I had always wanted to explore in writing some of my memories of growing up on a family farm. One of them was the spring/autumn ritual of washing the windows of our old farmhouse. Mother would wash the inside panes and I the outside. I wanted to please her by doing a good job. Seeing her smile as together our hands washed away the prairie dust made me happy.
How did you feel when it was first published and how have your thoughts or feelings on the piece changed from then to now?
It was the first time I submitted a poem to be published, and I only did it because the professor encouraged me to give it a try. When it was accepted, along with another poem about my father, I was overjoyed. When I read the poem now, even though I can sense a certain beginner’s stiffness in the lines, I believe the poem authentically conveys the essence of my relationship with my mother.
Is there a specific message you'd like readers to take away from reading this piece?
It probably would be the familiar poetic message of finding transcendence in something so common, and perhaps otherwise dull, as washing dirty windows. It’s also an encouragement to be aware and expectant of those special moments that can so easily slip past us in the busyness of life.
Where can readers find more of your work?
Unfortunately, after this seminar I did very little creative writing. Now that I’m retired, I have started writing again and have been published most recently online in the September 2022 issue of Ariel Chart and the Fall 2022 issue #15 of Willawaw Journal.
