Fierce self-compassion
navigating times of change.
Do the best I can.
Tag: writing
virtual retreat
The past four days
have been a gift.
Coming here,
to the office desk space
beneath the east-facing window
in the back bedroom of the house.
Here,
in a space both virtual and physical
I have reunited with her,
my creativity,
the part of me prone to playing
hide and seek
for now, has settled with me.
Notebook pages
have been filled with ink,
Word documents
have word counts spanning thousands
and all due
to my first-ever writing retreat.
Virtual connection
with writers ranging ages,
provinces and experience,
helped me feel safe
to feel, to release,
and to create,
with much more yet to come.
Deep and heartfelt appreciation to the Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild for creating this opportunity.
challenge the constructs
Sometimes
to find
authenticity
and embodiment
you must challenge
the constructs engrained
and choose
to build anew.
shifting
Periods of writing
have become few and far between.
Me,
settling into the slowness
of the lingering winter season
with her cool air and cloudy skies.
I grant permission
to embrace slowness.
This is a time to absorb
creativity around me,
to focus less on creating.
Shifting projects, priorities,
selecting new sources of inspiration.
Seasons shift,
evolve,
surprise and endure.
believing in my body
When my body talks to me, I listen to her. I listen to her, and I believe her.
When my body told me I was safe with him, I believed her.
When my body told me I was not safe, and I needed to get out of the situation, I believed her, and I ran.
When I received declarations of love that did not resonate with my body’s perception of truth, I believed her distrust.
When my body ached and longed and dreamed of the situation being just a little bit different, like how I had imagined it in my mind, she allowed me to play along for awhile, because she could see how much I wanted to believe, and how tightly I was holding on. But when she murmured over and over again that the situation would never change without me sacrificing my personal integrity, I believed her, and slowly, eventually, let it go.
When my body shows the beginnings of a sore throat and the quiet introduction of a cough, I believe her and I take care of her.
When my body initiates the slow and soft hum of building pain extending across my pelvic floor, I believe her message that my bleed is coming. She has never let me down before.
When, on the screen, my body showed an organism too small, with a heart beating too slow, I believed her message that she was doing everything she could, but it would not be enough.
When, after the second procedure, I felt like my complete, whole, ‘normal’ self, I believed my body was feeling that way for a reason; she doesn’t play mind games with me.
When my body expresses hunger, I believe her. When she requests movement, I believe her and get my heart and lungs working. When she experiences discomfort, I tune in and solve my way through the problem until I reach the heart of it.
When my body pushes me out beyond my comfort zone with insistence that I will grow if I do, I believe her, and do my best to push aside my anxiety.
When my body calls for artistic expression, I believe and honor her requests through writing, photography, vocal release, and decorating my skin with ink.
When my body knows there’s something worth fighting for, she stirs up the energy I need to speak my truth and advocate for others. I believe she knows, better than my mind does, what is important to me.
When my body whispers to me her need for rest, for stillness and quiet, I believe her, and give her what she needs.
When, over the last few months, I felt subtle shifts taking place in my body, I believed she was trying to tell me something, even if I couldn’t understand it.
When I learned I would need to undergo more testing before re-entering treatment, I heard my body say quietly, under her breath, that there’s no guarantee this test will have normal results. She told me to wait until I didn’t have other concurrent commitments, but at the same time, that I should have it done soon for there’s no point in unnecessary waiting. She reminded me of the futility in detailed planning for months in the future, because the first test needs to be clear before the other dominoes can fall into place, and I haven’t had that test yet. I believed her, but I still held on to hope that perhaps, she was worrying unnecessarily, like my mind tends to do. That for the first time, she might be wrong.
My body wasn’t worrying unnecessarily. She was right and proved, once again, how I can and must always believe her.
tap into darkness
Tap into darkness –
that’s where poetry can live.
Cast light upon it.
writing on weekends
Writing on weekends
words flowing from the stillness
my mind exploring.
letter(s) to you
I wonder if these poems
would count as letters
or fragments of a letter
to you
to help me process the mistakes
that led to losing you.
reclaiming the act of sharing art
For weeks and weeks
maybe even months
I have been writing
but it has been
a different kind of writing,
different than a pen and a notebook,
different than poetry.
I have been writing a kind of writing
that requires a computer
the ability to use both of my hands
to write faster
to keep up with the dialogue and the story
pouring down from my head,
the kind of writing
where you can see word counts
at the bottom of the screen,
and pages and paragraphs
and can easily go back and make changes
if, realizing after a while,
thoughts have run off-kilter.
These weeks and months
have kept me writing
nearly every day
in joy, in creativity,
in imagination
and the wonder of seeing
my mind’s movies begin a life
on paper.
The trouble, though,
if chosen to be seen in such a way,
is the lure of my computer
and open Word document
call out to me with urgency greater
than my pen and notebook.
The pen and notebook
have remained in their spot
on the living room coffee table
beside the plant
and below the window
ready on the side stage
for a call that has faded away,
pages left empty.
I find myself in a confusing place
because the desire to write
and share the words I do
remains
in fact,
the desire grows stronger every day.
The dissonance lies
in the difficulty of sharing words
from a novel in-progress
and yet
having no other words written
seemingly better suited
to be shared with the world.
I feel a pull to absolve the dissonance
between the words I write
and the words I share.
Break my self-imposed rules
of what type of art belongs where.
Dissolve the criteria
of where art must be born
and rather, shift focus
to capturing the magical moments
themselves, as they are,
no matter the medium
or method.
Sharing art for the
simple, generous, vulnerable, beautiful,
act of doing so –
this is what I have lost
and what I want to reclaim.
I can do it, too
If she can work part time
in a store
to pay the bills
and devote her afternoons
to writing her novel,
owning her dream to be a novelist
and tell world
she is a writer
then
I can work my part time job
to pay the bills
and devote my non-work time
to writing my novel
owning my dream of being a novelist
and tell the world
I am a writer.
I can do it, too.
Dawning Words 