Live Virtual Group Session: 12PM EST February 2nd 2024

20 Comments

Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we read a poem “Destruction” by Joanne Kyger from A Book of Luminous Things, Czeslaw Milosz, Editor, posted below.

Our prompt was: “Write about going through it.”

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.

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Please join us for our next session Monday February 5th at 6pm EST, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions.

"Destruction" by Joanne Kyger from A Book of Luminous Things, Czeslaw Milosz, Editor

First of all do you remember the way a bear goes through 
a cabin when nobody is home? He goes through 
the front door. I mean he really goes through it. Then 
he takes the cupboard off the wall and eats a can of lard.

He eats all the apples, limes, dates, bottled decaffeinated 
coffee, and 35 pounds of granola. The asparagus soup cans 
fall to the floor. Yum! He chomps up Norwegian crackers 
stashed for the winter. And the bouillon, salt, pepper, 
paprika, garlic, onions, potatoes.

		                   He rips the Green Tara
poster from the wall. Tries the Coleman Mustard. Spills 
the ink, tracks in the flour. Goes up stairs and takes 
a shit. Rips open the water bed, eats the incense and 
drinks the perfume. Knocks over the Japanese tansu 
and the Persian miniature of a man on horseback watching 
a woman bathing.

	               Knocks Shelter, Whole Earth Catalouge, 
Planet Drum, Northern Mists, Truck Tracks, and 
Women’s Sports into the oozing water bed mess.
			                      He goes
down stairs and out the back wall. He keeps on going 
for a long way and finds a good cave to sleep it all off.
Luckily he ate the whole medicine cabinet, including stash 
of LSD, Peyote, Psilocybin, Amanita, Benzedrine, Valium 
and aspirin. 

Credit: Milosz, Czeslaw, ed. A Book of Luminous Things (1997). Harcourt, Brace & Company.

20 thoughts on “Live Virtual Group Session: 12PM EST February 2nd 2024”

  1. Rita B's avatar Rita B

    Going Through it –

    Rita Basuray

    Going through it, I didn’t realize the pace with which it happened. “It” here of course, is time. How did my time from age 25 to 70 rush forward so fast? I remember snippets, but big chunks? When did I stop to appreciate what was happening around us?

    Are these thoughts of regret? No. Just a realization of the passage of time and a gentle reminder to stop and

    Like

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    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Totally agree with you, Rita! Youth is so fleeting and “maturity” seems to all of a sudden face you head on. My motto now is to squeeze as much joy as you can from each day!

      Like

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    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Rita,

      Your speaker resonates with me as I journey my 70th trip around the sun. I ask myself, “how did I travel so fast”? But no regrets being immersed in every minute. Now I follow the admonition of John O’Donohue to,

      “Become inclined to watch the way of rain
      When it falls slow and free.” m(For One Who is Exhausted)

      Andre

      Like

      Reply
  3. michele348's avatar michele348

    About going through it~~~

    A brick wall of anger lies before me.

    I’m disgusted by the lack of courage, lack of compassion

    from those who call themselves

    leaders of the countries of the world.

    Don’t they have enough on their plates to worry about

    like poverty, racism, and homelessness in their own countries,

    then to go hunting after the next biggest war to get involved in…

    like little boys scrapping with each other over a game of marbles.

    To get through it… this mess…

    I go outside and breathe in the fresh February air

    and pull some weeds from last Summer’s flower beds.

    Somehow, getting dirty is a balm to my soul.

    It helps deaden the loud screaming of a world that is so lost.

    Where’s my stash? Oh, right… I don’t have one. Shit!

    Like

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  4. michele348's avatar michele348

    About getting through it~~~

    A brick wall of anger lies before me.

    I’m disgusted by the lack of courage, lack of compassion

    from those who call themselves

    leaders of the countries of the world.

    Don’t they have enough on their plates to worry about

    like poverty, racism, and homelessness in their own countries,

    then to go hunting after the next biggest war to get involved in…

    like little boys scrapping with each other over a game of marbles.

    To get through it… this mess…

    I go outside and breathe in the fresh February air

    and pull some weeds from last Summer’s flower beds.

    Somehow, getting dirty is a balm to my soul.

    It helps deaden the loud screaming of the world that is so lost.

    Where’s my stash? Oh, right… I don’t have one. Shit!

    Like

    Reply
    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Michele,

      One wonders if the world’s leaders have lost their marbles? Your speaker says to me that the answer to getting through the mess by getting into the mess and embracing the moments of each day applies a balm, even if messy. I was thinking to myself during my morning walk how much I like being out in the fresh air whether cold or damp, but appreciate most sun shining down froma Giotto blue sky especially when the air is crisp and frosts the cheek. It helps offset the disappointment of being stash-less.

      Andre

      Like

      Reply
  5. Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

    One foot in front of the other

    We go through it

    Whatever “it “ is

    We can do it sideways or backwards

    We can cha-cha-cha it

    Taking two steps forward one step back

    Or we can go bravely headfirst

    Like diving off of a cliff

    We cannot and should not avoid it

    To do so is giving in

    Letting “it “ fester

    Letting “it “ grow

    Only by going through it

    Can we get to the other side

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Elizabeth… words of wisdom! Usually, I go “head first”, sometimes with a little regret, but it usually works out the way it’s suppose to. But boy, getting through it, can certainly be a chore at times!

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      • Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

        Michele, sometimes it’s really challenging going through it, whatever it is , so that’s why sometimes we need to go sideways or backwards or two steps forward and one step back….whatever it takes.

        Like

    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Elizabeth,

      There is such a simple linearity in your speaker’s comments unlike the bear’s scramble through the house, doors and walls and all. Careful foot placement will get us through. “We [get] through it, whatever it is, only by going through it.”

      Thanks,

      Andre

      Like

      Reply
  6. al3793's avatar al3793

    Do you remember how he went through that office,

    forty-four years of artifact

    most went right into a trash bin

    brought specifically for this task by housekeeping.

    Medical books, research papers, overhead presentations, credentialling letters,

    malpractice documents, messages, and cards

    from colleagues, students and patients that meant something, and

    he had a portfolio of his children’s art that

    collaged his door

    not another one like it.             

    It reminded him of home and

    the warmth and love that awaited him

    that he tried to cultivate and grow making ready for harvest.

    People stopped by the door to find he’s not home.

    He’s at home, now.

    The effort was a necessity

    the office, facing demolition, had to be emptied.

    Yet it was also and excavation

    ensuring that an important shard was not missed

    to be curated into a boxed museum of hard earned memories

    crafted by the habit of showing up

    for whatever adventure awaited the day.

    Like

    Reply
    • Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

      Andre, I didn’t see you today because I was on the phone instead of my iPad for zoom. I don’t know if you were there, but glad you wrote. I particularly liked your last lines—

      -to be curated into a boxed museum of hard earned memories— isn’t that what much of our stuff is…like museum pieces filled with those hard earned memories… it takes lots of work to live the life to earn those memories

      -showing up takes practice— interesting! It really involves working at it much of the time until it becomes habit and not work anymore. Although, sometimes it feels like work forever.

      — I like the approach of curiosity, and not dread or fear, to face the day… very mindful.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
      • al3793's avatar al3793

        Elizabeth, I was on the session but could tune into the shared writing as we were getting into Philadelphia and the traffic was a challenge. I was amazed by the discussion this poem generated but we had an A-1 group logged in. I hope you are well. Andre

        Like

    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Within those four walls,how does one clear out 40 years of lived experiences from a profession that you have given so much to? Things come and go, people come and go, but memories tend to linger within the heart. Hopefully, the good ones outnumber the less than optimum by a large margin. I’m pretty sure they do.

      Like

      Reply

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