Sherry Grant

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Sherry Grant is a Taiwan-born NZ concert pianist, cellist, poet and translator. She is the author of ‘Bat Girl’ and the inventor of ‘nonaku’ poetry form. Sherry organised and performed 12 concerts in 2019, mostly with viola. Her youngest daughter, 7-year-old Zoe Grant, writes with her frequently. Sherry is the national/international outreach officer at NZPS since 2021. Apart from music, she also has a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science.

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Books:
– Bat Girl
– Speed Rengay (anthology)
– Rooster & Dragon
– Rengay Edge

Websites:
– www.batgirlbook.com
– www.artsinfinitypress.com
– www.nonaku.org

Facebook Groups:
– Chalk on the Walk Haiku
– Chalk on the Walk Monoku
– 2021 Hindemith & Copland Music Festival

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I live in a faraway country called New Zealand, where more sheep than people reside. By profession, I am a performing classical pianist and cellist, collaborative pianist and my four children currently attend 4 different schools. In June 2020 (near the end of the first NZ Covid lockdown) I wrote my very first poem and haven’t stopped writing poetry since. 15 months on, I’ve written well over 2600 poems in both long and short forms, got around 300 poems published at over 40 journals or anthologies. My poem Combat Ready was shortlisted at the 2020 NZ Heritage Literary Awards and I published my first book of poetry Bat Girl with my youngest daughter Zoe Grant, who was 6 years old when we wrote the book together. Zoe is the co-author and illustrator of Bat Girl.

murmuration —
long forgotten 
words return

I was born in Taiwan. When I was little, I’ve always loved world literature, poetry and philosophy. I was quiet yet curious. Having attended a special music academy since when I was 6 years old, I have remained in the exact same class with most of my classmates throughout primary and high schools (10 years). My friends nowadays could hardly imagine me as a shy person, but I spent most of my childhood in the company of books. In high school, I fell in love with the English language, and started devouring novels in English. At school I had the nickname of a walking dictionary when it came to English and my classmates would always come to ask me for help whenever they got stuck. I find English very intuitive, and feel thankful that I spent enough school years in Taiwan, which made it possible for me to translate my own poems into Chinese now, particularly my rengay. I have recently also started translating contemporary Taiwanese poetry as well as ancient Chinese poems into lyrical or haiku-like English poems.

the crows here
speak another tongue
feathery snow

After immigrating to New Zealand with my parents and sister, we started a new journey. We didn’t know anyone in this new home, but I was able to attend Auckland University, majoring in cello performance. The kiwi accent took a little getting used to, but after a while we found NZ to have a very welcoming mixed culture, although at the time of arrival most shops closed at 5pm sharp which was a big shock! We missed the busy lives, friends and food in Taiwan, yet we love the blue sky, green grass and way less population or pollution in New Zealand. Besides studying for my cello performance degree, I took language papers for fun and learned some German, French and Japanese. Now I am also learning Russian.

all the nights
merge into one
a silhouette 

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Every time I tried to go a different way, I got drawn back to music. I guess that is my calling and destiny. After studying post-graduate cello performance at Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, UK on a scholarship, I thought it was time again to come off music and do something else. I took up computer science and did a degree at the Auckland University, during which time I also became the president of a computer programming club (SDK) and did all sorts of event organising including inviting experts working in the industry in for monthly seminars, and holiday computing programme for kids. I co-organised the first Auckland Linux Installfest with the Engineering Department at Auckland University and made the club a chapter of an international computing group (ACM). I think a bit of leadership skills showed through at the time.

statues
bow their heads
scurrying mice

After graduation from the computer science degree, I got married and had 4 children and that was the start of another adventure that put an end to my glamorous days. It was a period of lots of running around, with very little sleep or reading opportunities, or indeed any time for myself. So as soon as my youngest daughter Zoe turned 5 and started school in 2019, I organised 14 concerts in the “War and Peace” arts & music festival to celebrate the 100th year milestone since the year after WWI, as well as a memorial NZ concert tour “100 Years Journey”, in which I performed as collaborative pianist in 12 of the concerts. I was joined by marvellous musicians, particularly violists (Milan Milisavljević and Robert Ashworth) and commissioned 5 new viola pieces (music by Chris Artley, David Hamilton, Ben Fernandez, Carvin Knowles and Mathias Hutton) for premiere. I love the viola! We had a lot of fun onstage and I found this is what I truly love, to show my audience a glimpse of beauty from deep in my heart.

years later
these ripples
echo back

Then Covid hit. The arts and music industry took a major hit. We don’t know if we’ll ever safely return to the concert halls for performances again. Many of my planned concerts and festivals were either postponed indefinitely or cancelled. That was a dark time, but I think poetry gave me the light and helped me come out of it. All the lockdowns are hard on the children too, not having been able to go to school and meet their friends. I started writing poetry all of a sudden. One night at the start of June I got up to write what was to be my first poem after having gone to bed but not fallen asleep. I felt compelled to write it down and my poet friend told me it read really well. That gave me a bit of confidence. I didn’t think much of it, since I’ve never written poetry before. A few more days passed, then I felt inspired to write another five poems on the same day. That was when I decided this is fun, I should do more! And then I kept on writing poetry every since and never thought of stopping, even if people around me told me it’s not profitable and a bit useless — it made me feel better and later I found out my friends really love them too. That kept me going. My kids and I also started lockdown project Chalk on the Walk Haiku and Chalk on the Walk Monoku, to share haiku in our own way and introduce our haijin friends to one another.

slipping
into shadows
my soul

Poetry is such a divine way of expressing oneself, and I am a very fast writer. Whereas countless hours of music practice boils down to performances of an hour or two onstage, once a poem is written, it is to be read over and over again. My original goal was to reach 100 poems and gradually it grew into 500 poems, eventually I was able to write over 2000 poems in my first year. It is amazing where determination takes us. I have to juggle writing with housework so there are many poems written while cooking, doing laundry or dishes. Sometimes in the middle of driving I had to pull over to park and write down new lines of poetry. I have also written many rengay collaboratively with friends all over the world. We are gifted with a welcoming short form poetry community, to both new comers and seasoned poets. I am blessed with the support of my poet friends, the artist friends I continue to write poems for, and having composer friends who set my poems to music. I feel I have finally found my true calling, which is not only in music but in poetry. I wish to create the next Golden Age with my vision.

I scoop up
every birdsong
in mermaid tears

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For more, please visit my Drifting Sands Poet’s Hub Blog.

Last update: 2021-10-23