Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EDT June 30th 2025

25 Comments

Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we took a close look at the painting “Woman in Blue” by Chaim Soutine, posted below.

Our prompt was: “Write about something untold.”

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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Please join us for our next session Friday July 11th at 12pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions.

Woman in Blue by Chaim Soutine

Credit: Chaim Soutine. barnesfoundation.org

25 thoughts on “Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EDT June 30th 2025”

  1. Stef's avatar Stef

    Come closer

    I have a secret

    Closer

    If you dare

    Promise me

    Promise you won’t laugh

    Promise

    If you can

    She didn’t choose me

    She chose herself

    Herself

    If I dare

    I can see why

    I can understand her truth

    Why

    Did she not know that finding hers

    Would make me live mine

    Come closer

    I have a secret

    Can you bear it

    Please bear it

    I cannot do this alone

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    • michele348's avatar michele348

      The writer is trying to make sense of something that is causing trauma and unhappiness, yearning for understanding and assistance, but unsure if she will receive it.

      A very emotional piece, Stef!

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Stef, your rendering of the narrative gave voice to your speaker and the voice came to life. I felt like I was in the painting with the woman in blue wanting to know more. Thank you.

      Like

      Reply
  2. T's avatar T

    Write about something untold:

    I never told her how angry she made me- mostly because she wouldn’t understand. She would try to see, try to empathize, but she wouldn’t leave my apartment and let the words travel into hers, and let them sulk the way she had sulked in everything else in her life. The perfect outline of her body on the memory foam mattress, always on the left side. The same on-demand movies she could recite. A Marlboro cigarette between her fingers. Her fast-food uniform folded over a lopsided chair—one of the legs replaced with a shorter one, the whole thing propped up in a corner so it could stand. Its identity, lost, it wasn’t really for sitting anyway, right? 

    Her sulking in all that’s not human, and I yearned to be one of these objects, to be kissed like her cigarettes, understood like the movies with bad jokes, wore like the uniform she has become, and helped like the chair that received another leg. 

    People often complain about lack of receptiveness, about others refusing to understand or talk, but my issue wasn’t her receptiveness, it was that she was at reach, but I wasn’t an object. 

    I will die human, without her sulk. 

    • T

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    • michele348's avatar michele348

      A yearning to be acknowledged, to be viewed as human with needs and desires, but forever deemed invisible. Self- preservation is the antidote. A powerful piece, T.

      Like

      Reply
    • Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

      T-you have painted a picture of 2 people in a relationship. You write about unrequited desires in a way that we get it.Thanks for sharing.

      Like

      Reply
    • al3793's avatar al3793

      T,

      The memory of the memory foam mattress speaks to me of indelible memories and remind me of the common humanity shared. When the relationship becomes lopsided (like the chair that lost its identity) a retreat to harness one’s humanity is necessary. To be human means to be heard, to be seen, to be received. A compelling narrative. Thank you.

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  3. michele348's avatar michele348

    About something untold~~~

    I am living, existing, in this world…
    a world filled with noise, anger, and death.
    I am bewildered by what its citizens accept as normal…
    as events and words fly at us
    like sharpened knives aimed
    at our hearts and minds.

    Do we continue to tolerate this behavior forever,
    or do we rise in protest
    and voice our discontent?

    Will we surrender our souls
    to the evil one,
    or stand up
    for goodness and justice for all?

    There is a hidden pain inside of me
    that, for now, remains silent and untold,
    heard only in whispers.

    But I cannot contain it forever.
    It needs escape… it needs a voice,
    and the world needs to listen.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Michele,

      Some of us are hearing the whispers loud and clear! Your speaker challenges the reader – do we exist, or do we live? I suspect that your speaker will never surrender. Thank you. Andre

      Like

      Reply
    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Your words brought a smile to my face, Elizabeth, on this very murky weather day in July. You have a way of “cutting through all the red tape” and getting simply to the heart of the matter.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Elizabeth,

      I must try this parsimony someday. In the meantime, I will seek the untold as in the telling the story of life unfolds and can move onto the next untold story. Thanks, Andre

      Like

      Reply
  6. al3793's avatar al3793

    Something Untold

    Tell me the story that your hands hold.

    You sat here quietly for half an hour

    Listening to us and

    We want to know more.

    These are the hands that

    Reached for my mother’s face,

    A diamond jewel trickling down her cheek

    The day I was born.

    They are the hands that

    Pushed me back up

    When I fell and

    Skinned my knee.

    They are the hands that

    Overjoyed my parents

    When they drew my first

    Stick-figure person

    And wrote the first letter of

    My first name

    And

    Colored the page blue.

    They are the hands

    That squeezed so tight

    When I first kissed

    A boy.

    They are the hands

    That held my first lover

    Tight not wanting

    To let go.

    They are the hands

    That lightly stroked my baby’s cheek

    When I gave birth to her

    As she reached for my cheek and

    A diamond jewel trickled down my cheek.

    Like

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    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Your description so beautifully describes this woman who goes about her life unpretentiously but is an integral part of the lives she touches. I long to call her my friend. Well done!

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
  7. Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

    Andre, this is so touching… Love is oozing from this piece. You remind us that there are stories in every part of our body for us to share when we are ready.

    Like

    Reply
  8. J's avatar brieflyd83e681b69

    No one talks about the moment you stop asking to be saved

    Not because you don’t want saving but because the asking has become more violent than the silence. More humiliating than the fall. There’s a place between survival and surrender that doesn’t have language. It just hums in your bones and makes your hands shake.

    You learn to stop reaching

    Stop hoping someone will see it

    The ache behind your cleverness

    The story behind your sharp edges

    You become fluent in omission

    Masterful at smiling with shards in your throat

    There are things I’ve lived that will never land in anyone else’s nervous system

    It’s what keeps me alone.

    This isn’t a call for pity

    It’s a recoiling.

    A reminder from the quiet place I built inside myself

    when the world proved it was never safe to tell the truth

    Like

    Reply
    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Your speaker’s voice says that “There are things I’ve lived that will never land in anyone else’s nervous system.” And I agree, some of us have had to confront intolerable life situations that grip us and never seem to let go. That they are ours and ours alone. But that is not the case. And based on your previous experience, trust has been lost or, at best, diminished. But the courage of the speaker sharing the distress here is a sign that all hope has not been lost. That the entire world is not to be considered as an enemy, simply because of the actions of a few. So please, continue to respond here… you will find comfort and support here, and continue to share your thoughts. There is help to be found if you are willing to search.

      Like

      Reply
  9. J's avatar J

    You heard me say

    “There are things I’ve lived that will never land in anyone else’s nervous system.”

    “you said,

    “that’s not the case”

    You mean well….

    The one line tho, that one part you should have paused on,

    Not corrected

    Not softened

    Not rewritten for hope

    What I wrote was not a request for reassurance

    It was a truth I had the nerve to speak out loud

    I live in every day

    One that does not need to be debated, edited or rescued

    There is a difference between:

    Being with and reframing

    Bearing witness and lifting someone out of their body before they’re ready to leave it

    You say I’m not alone

    I know that sentiment makes people feel better

    That doesn’t make it real in my bones

    Not yet

    Not ever

    Here’s the thing:

    That doesn’t mean I’ve lost hope

    It means I’m not lying to myself about what it costs to stay here

    Please don’t turn my testimony into optimism

    Don’t turn my solitude into a misunderstanding

    Don’t ask me to believe in your comfort before you’ve earned the right to sit with my pain

    I’m not here for pity or promises

    I’m here to speak plainly

    If you can’t hear it without needing to fix it 

    That’s fine

    Please don’t mistake my expression for a wound that wants a bandage

    Sometimes the most loving thing you can do is

    Say nothing

    Stay still

    Let what was untold remain sacred

    Like

    Reply
    • michele348's avatar michele348

      You are entitled to state your feelings. I am entitled to state mine on this public site for comment. I wish you well, whether you believe that statement or not.

      Like

      Reply
  10. J's avatar brieflyd83e681b69

    hmm… let me try again. Ambiguity is difficult.

    I was merely trying to clarify- not diminish your response.

    I understand people are naturally empathetic, read something like that and lean towards “fix” “hope”

    writing at least for me has never been a call for help, but an act of witness. What I need most is not for it to be reinterpreted, but for someone to stand still with.

    I hope that makes sense?

    Like

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