Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EST January 8th 2024

5 Comments

Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we read a poem “Variation on the Word Sleep” by Margaret Atwood, posted below.

Our prompt was: “When I/you sleep…”

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Please join us for our next session Friday January 12th at 12pm EST, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions.

“Variation on the Word Sleep” by Margaret Atwood

I would like to watch you sleeping, 
which may not happen.
I would like to watch you, 
sleeping. I would like to sleep 
with you, to enter 
your sleep as its smooth dark wave 
slides over my head

and walk with you through that lucent 
wavering forest of bluegreen leaves 
with its watery sun & three moons 
towards the cave where you must descend, 
towards your worst fear

I would like to give you the silver 
branch, the small white flower, the one 
word that will protect you 
from the grief at the center 
of your dream, from the grief 
at the center. I would like to follow 
you up the long stairway 
again & become
the boat that would row you back
carefully, a flame
in two cupped hands 
to where your body lies 
beside me, and you enter 
it as easily as breathing in

I would like to be the air
that inhabits you for a moment
only. I would like to be that unnoticed
& that necessary.

From Selected Poems II: 1976-1986 by Margaret Atwood. Copyright © 1987 by Margaret Atwood.

5 thoughts on “Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EST January 8th 2024”

  1. michele348's avatar michele348

    When I sleep~~~

    When I sleep, I run to the peaceful green fields
    surrounded by the whistling white pines
    and the sweet, soothing song of the meadowlark.

    It is a refuge from the loud screams and cries of the world
    so inundated by war and hatred.
    The world makes my breathing difficult…
    to inhale and then exhale…
    it is a laborious act rather than an automatic reflex.

    When I sleep, when I dream,
    the atmosphere is of meditation,
    is of living in that moment
    and only that moment,
    of having complete gratitude for existence.

    But then, comes the moment of awakening
    and the cycle repeats.

    Like

    Reply
    • Andre Lijoi's avatar Andre Lijoi

      Michele,
      In your speaker I see green fields and ever-green white pines. I hear songs in dreams and at the window. Loud screams in response to the world saps breath. Yet sleep is a refuge where one can persist in the moment and be grateful.

      Lovely word craft that challenges the reader.

      Thanks
      Andre

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
  2. al3793's avatar al3793

    When I/You Sleep

    A long deep exhalation is hypnotic,
    without warning subconscious thought
    interrupts conscious thought
    the beads come loose from fingers and
    fall to the bed.

    With the next breath, unnoticed, sleep ensues
    dreams that have not emerged upon awakening
    dance urging the conscious mind to
    awaken the sleeper.

    A long uphill road of bright blue pavers
    contrasts the dark of space
    pedaling while weightless seems
    impossible, exhausting
    a motorcade of stars lighting the way to morning
    that comes too soon.

    afl 01.08.24

    Like

    Reply
    • michele348's avatar michele348

      The magical time… the time between consciousness and entrance into the dream world where our strengths and weaknesses are set free to roam about. Sometimes we want to linger there among those unfinished dreams, but we are summoned back to reality by the sunlight coming through the blinds or the Carolina wren perched outside on a branch giving us our wake-up call. Sometimes, I try to lay there, hoping to fall back to sleep…occasionally it works…usually not.

      Your words are beautiful, capturing the special time when the body is at rest but the mind is spinning its magic with the what-ifs.

      Like

      Reply
  3. rehavia6's avatar rehavia6

    When I Sleep

    In sleep I sort out solutions to quandaries that trouble me during the day.
    I use the best words to hash it out with those who vex me
    At times, fearful events fill my dreams and interrupt my slumber.
    Upon occasion, my father has been known to talk to me in my sleep and offer comfort
    When I awaken I sometimes believe that what I dreamt really did occur.

    Like

    Reply

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