Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EST December 20th 2021

12 Comments

Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we close-read the poem Winter Solstice by Hilda Morley, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “Write about something that crossed your path.” 

More details on this session will be posted, so check back!

Participants are warmly encouraged to share what you wrote below (“Leave a Reply”), to keep the conversation going here, bearing in mind that the blog of course is a public space where confidentiality is not assured.

Also, we would love to learn more about your experience of these sessions, so if you’re able, please take the time to fill out a follow-up survey of one to two quick questions!

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This will be our last virtual group session of 2021! We will be taking a holiday break to give our volunteer facilitators time off for celebration, rest and time with family. Please join us for our next session on January 10th, 2022 at 6pm EST, with more times to be listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

Winter Solstice by Hilda Morley

A cold night crosses
our path
                  The world appears
very large, very
round now       extending
far as the moon does
                                        It is from
the moon this cold travels
                                        It is
the light of the moon that causes
this night reflecting distance in its own
light so coldly
                                          (from one side of
the earth to the other)
                                        It is the length of this coldness
It is the long distance
between two points which are
not in a line        now
                                       not a
straightness       (however
straight) but a curve only,
silver that is a rock reflecting
                                                      not metal
but a rock accepting
distance
                     (a scream in silence
where between the two
points what touches
is a curve around the world
                                                      (the dance unmoving).

12 thoughts on “Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EST December 20th 2021”

  1. Tony Errichetti

    As a bike bears down on me on West End Avenue
    I calculate its velocity and distance between me and it
    to determine if me crossing the street will result in my death by delivery bike
    triggering a common wonder about how my life will end.

    a life and delivery interrupted,
    two bodies colliding

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
  2. michele348

    About something that crossed my path~~~

    He stood there on a mound of grass,
    elevated above the running track.
    It was a hot, humid day in September…
    I was tired,
    legs feeling like clay,
    sweat running into my eyes,
    but still, I pushed myself on.
    I am not a quitter, I keep repeating to myself,
    but I was beginning to question that principle.

    As I passed that nondescript man standing above me to my left,
    he called out to me by my first name,
    “Keep going, you can do this, you can finish this race!”
    And so I did.

    His voice still remains within my mind.
    To this day, he is still unknown to me, but on that day,
    that moment,
    his words inspired me to finish the race, to believe in myself.

    A visit from a heavenly voice, maybe?

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
  3. al3793

    It stopped me almost immediately
    shining above the rooftops
    hovering above the horizon longer than usual
    its sight was breathtaking
    it wasn’t blue, a bright amber orb it was
    so clear in the sky like a planetarium photo
    that does not look real.
    It left me feeling cold.
    It was the cold moon of the solstice.
    And upon us now is an also cold submicronic unthinking intruder
    that wreaks its scourge across the face of the earth.
    Its alien scream is silent, there is no sound in space.
    But here voices and groans and screams are uttered clearly and well heard.
    Screams of suffering, sadness, grief, exhaustion.
    Can it be real and for how long?

    Andre

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply
    • michele348

      Isn’t it puzzling that some of us can hear the groans and screams of suffering, grief and exhaustion while others are impervious to these piercing sounds? What will it take for those individuals to hear these sounds…will it be when they, themselves, scream out in pain and suffering?

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
      • Scarlet Kinney

        I ask myself the same question, over and over again. It feels like there’s also a pandemic of mass psychosis happening in tandem with Covid. ‘

        Like

  4. Elizabeth

    Thank You

    In this clearing,
    a group of us come together,
    on a weekly basis.
    We started off as strangers,
    and now I don’t even know how to describe us.
    (Which is OK because
    as I learned in these sessions,
    it’s OK not to know.)
    All I know
    is that we have crossed each other’s paths,
    influencing each others lives,
    through our virtual connection.
    For this I have
    much gratitude.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply
  5. Scarlet Kinney

    The Cougar

    it crossed my path
    After I had walked it,
    Perhaps attracted to the scent of my steps,
    The cougar that stalked me that day
    When I was alone, deep in the forest.
    What instinct made me turn
    To see it leaping across the path behind me?
    What instinct kept me calm
    As, having no alternative,
    I walked on through miles of forest
    Knowing it walked behind me?

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • Scarlet Kinney

      Yes, we certainly are! I’m very grateful that I stumbled upon it on Facebook and decided to explore it. And thanks to you for sharing as you do.

      Like

      Reply

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