Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we read an excerpt from the book “Misinterpretation” by Ledia Xhoga, posted below.

Our prompt was: “Write about the life behind the walls.”

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!

Please join us for our next session Wednesday March 11th at 6pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions.

An excerpt from Misinterpretation by Ledia Xhoga, (pp. 258-259)

Zani turned to his wife. They smiled at each other again. Arranged marriage or not, they seemed in love.
“So many people in New York City,” Lëndina said, noticing the lights turning on outside. “Like ants. Eating and making nests.” But we could only see buildings. It was hard for me to imagine bodies behind the walls, breathing, worrying, laughing, milling about the dinner table, conversing, obsessing. The spectacle inside my own apartment took all my attention. 
I glimpsed at Zani, munching on bread, cheese, and salami, eating them separately, a bite each time, the Albanian way, not the sandwiched American way. A simple man, an open book, nothing to hide. But was he? He hadn’t batted an eye at paying $50,000 to the lawyer. If he had money, he didn’t show it. Zani wasn’t the type to brag about money, I realized. But he did enjoy an aura of mystique and danger about him. Maybe there was no crime at the root of his opacity, only conceit. Despite his rough appearance, I suspected Zani was a bit vain. 
“Way too many people,” he said. “But the most important thing in the world is not to drink alone. To have someone to clink a glass with. Why did God create so many different kinds of people, do you know? To share love, and everything else.” 
“Gëzuar,” said Lëndina. 
“Gëzuar,” I said. 
“To friends. You are no longer alone,” Zani said. “You have us.” A blinding light from a nearby balcony turned on. Our image on the glass died, replaced by that of the gray buildings. 

Credit: Ledia Xhoga

Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we read a poem “After the Movie” by Marie Howe, posted below.

Our prompt was: “Take another little piece of my heart.”

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!

Please join us for our next session Friday February 27th at 12pm EST, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions.

After the Movie  by Marie Howe

My friend Michael and I are walking home arguing about the movie.
He says that he believes a person can love someone
and still be able to murder that person.

I say, No, that’s not love. That’s attachment.
Michael says, No, that’s love. You can love someone, then come to a day

when you’re forced to think “it’s him or me”
think “me” and kill him.

I say, Then it’s not love anymore.
Michael says, It was love up to then though.

I say, Maybe we mean different things by the same word.
Michael says, Humans are complicated: love can exist even in the
     murderous heart.

I say that what he might mean by love is desire.
Love is not a feeling, I say. And Michael says, Then what is it?

We’re walking along West 16th Street—a clear unclouded night—and I hear my voice
repeating what I used to say to my husband: Love is action, I used to say
     to him.

Simone Weil says that when you really love you are able to look at
     someone you want to eat and not eat them.

Janis Joplin says, take another little piece of my heart now baby.

Meister Eckhardt says that as long as we love images we are doomed to
     live in purgatory.

Michael and I stand on the corner of 6th Avenue saying goodnight.
I can’t drink enough of the tangerine spritzer I’ve just bought—

again and again I bring the cold can to my mouth and suck the stuff from
the hole the flip top made.

What are you doing tomorrow? Michael says.
But what I think he’s saying is “You are too strict. You are
     a nun.”

Then I think, Do I love Michael enough to allow him to think these things
     of me even if he’s not thinking them?

Above Manhattan, the moon wanes, and the sky turns clearer and colder.
Although the days, after the solstice, have started to lengthen,

we both know the winter has only begun.
From The Kingdom of Ordinary Time by Marie Howe. Copyright © 2008 by Marie Howe. Used by permission of W. W. Norton. All rights reserved.