Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we listened to the spoken word performance of the poem Forsaken Sea by Sekou Sundiata, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “We do not believe…”

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!

Please join us for our next session Monday November 22nd at 6pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

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Forsaken Sea by Sekou Sundiata

            Always go in low tide, high tide comes
            Always go in low tide, high tide comes
 
We always go it seems, we always go to the ocean
We always go to the ocean at low tide
 
We could walk, we could walk deep 
We could walk deep into the sea and never be
     in over our heads
 
We do not believe, we do not believe, we do not believe that 
drowning is for us
 
High tide comes out of the water the same way
     for the last billion years.
There is nothing new
We know when to swim, and when to wait
We know when to swim, and when to wait

           The waves come in and go back out
           For the last billion years
          The ocean still emotional, singing in our ears

          Always go in, always go in low tide, high tide comes
         Always go in low tide, high tide comes

High tide comes out of the water the same way for the     
 last billion years. There is nothing new
 We know when to swim and when to wait
 
In the car, in the car the road 
In the car the road murmurs beneath the wheels     
The ocean, so emotional, in our ears

We seek without looking
The smallest token, passes and settles
 into what music is about, music is about
 
You could say
You could say we are dancing
And from this one thing we know 10 things
From this one thing we know 10 things
 
We always go in low tide when high tide comes
We always go to the ocean
We always go to the ocean at low tide

         We see without looking at the music the water makes
         We know when to swim and we know when to wait
         We always go in low tide, high tide comes
         Always go at low tide, high tide comes

We do not believe
We do not believe
We do not believe
That drowning is for us
 
High tide comes out of the water
The same way for the last billion years
 
Yes, you could say, you could say we are dancing
And from this one thing, we know 10 things
 
We always go in low tide
High tide comes

Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we close-read the poem Study the Masters by Lucille Clifton, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “Write about dreams.”

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!

Please join us for our next session Friday November 19th at 12pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

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Study the Masters by Lucille Clifton

like my aunt timmie.
it was her iron,
or one like hers,
that smoothed the sheets
the master poet slept on.
home or hotel, what matters is
he lay himself down on her handiwork
and dreamed. she dreamed too, words:
some cherokee, some masai and some
huge and particular as hope.
if you had heard her
chanting as she ironed
you would understand form and line
and discipline and order and
america.

Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we close read an excerpt from the novel Bewilderment by Richard Powers, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “Write about what was enough because you saw it.”

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!

Please join us for our next session, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

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Powers, Richard. Bewilderment. (2021) (p.183) New York: W.W. Norton.

I TOLD HIM ABOUT THE PLANET MIOS, how it had flourished for a billion years before we came along. The people of Mios built a ship for long-distance, long duration discovery, filled with intelligent machines. That ship traveled hundreds of parsecs until it found a planet full of raw materials where it landed, set up shop, repaired and copied itself and all its crew. Then two identical ships set off in different directions for hundreds more parsecs, until they found new planets, where they repeated that whole process again.

       For how long? My son asked.

       I shrugged. “There was nothing to stop them.”

       Were they scouting out places to invade or something?

       “Maybe.”

       And they kept dividing? There must have been a million of them.

       “Yes,” I told him. “Then two million. Then four.”

       Holy crow! They’d be all over the place.

       “Space is big,” I said.

       Did the ships report back to Mios?

       “Yes, even though the messages took longer and longer to arrive. And the ships went on reporting, even after Mios stopped responding.”

       What happened to Mios?

       “The ships never learned.”

       They kept going, even though Mios was gone?

       “They were programmed to.”

       That gave my son pause. That’s pretty sad. He sat up in bed and pushed at the air with his hand. But it still might be okay for them, Dad. Think of what they saw.

       “They saw hydrogen planets and oxygen planets, neon and nitrogen planets, water worlds, silicate, iron, and globes of liquid helium wrapped around trillion-carat diamonds. There were always more planets. Always different ones. For a billion years.”

Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we close-read the poem Deer Dance Exhibition by Ofelia Zepeda, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “Question…”

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!

Please join us for our next session Monday November 15th at 6pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

Deer Dance Exhibition by Ofelia Zepeda

Question: Can you tell us about what he is wearing?
Well, the hooves represent the deer’s hooves,
the red scarf represents the flowers from which he ate,
the shawl is for skin.
The cocoons make the sound of the deer walking on leaves and grass.
Listen.
Question: What is that he is beating on?
It’s a gourd drum. The drum represents the heartbeat of the deer.
Listen.
When the drum beats, it brings the deer to life.
We believe the water the drum sits in is holy. It is life.
Go ahead, touch it.
Bless yourself with it.
It is holy. You are safe now.
Question: How does the boy become a dancer?
He just knows. His mother said he had dreams when he was just a little boy.
You know how that happens. He just had it in him.
Then he started working with older men who taught him how to dance.
He has made many sacrifices for his dancing even for just a young boy.
The people concur, “Yes, you can see it in his face.”
Question: What do they do with the money we throw them?
Oh, they just split it among the singers and dancer.
They will probably take the boy to McDonald’s for a burger and fries.
The men will probably have a cold one.
It’s hot today, you know.


Ofelia Zepeda, “Deer Dance Exhibiton” from Ocean Power. 
Copyright © 1995 by Ofelia Zepeda.

Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we closely looked at two photos Knowing the Way to Tomorrow and Who Knows Tomorrow by Aida Muluneh, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “Write about the possibility of tomorrow.”

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!

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

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Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we close-read the poem Baruch Spinoza by Jorge Luis Borges, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “In the margins of the manuscript, leave a message for the philosopher.”

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!

Please join us for our next session Wednesday November 10th at 5pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

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Baruch Spinoza by Jorge Luis Borges

Bruma de oro, el occidente alumbra
la ventana. El asiduo manuscrito
aguarda, ya cargado de infinito.
Alguien construye a Dios en la penumbra.
Un hombre engendra a Dios. Es un judío
de tristes ojos y de piel cetrina;
lo lleva el tiempo como lleva el río
una hoja en el agua que declina.
No importa. El hechicero insiste y labra
a Dios con geometría delicada;
desde su enfermedad, desde su nada,
Sigue erigiendo a Dios con la palabra.
El más pródigo amor le fue otorgado,
el amor que no espera ser amado.

Baruch Spinoza by Jorge Luis Borges

A haze of gold, the Occident lights up
The window. Now, the assiduous manuscript
Is waiting, weighed down with the infinite.
Someone is building God in a dark cup.
A man engenders God. He is a Jew
With saddened eyes and lemon-colored skin;
Time carries him the way a leaf, dropped in
A river, is borne off by waters to
Its end. No matter. The magician moved
Carves out his God with fine geometry;
From his disease, from nothing, he's begun
To construct God, using the word. No one
Is granted such prodigious love as he;
The love that has no hope of being loved.
         


Spanish; trans. Willis Barnstone

Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we close-read the poem  “For Calling the Spirit Back from Wandering the Earth in Its Human Feet” by Joy Harjo, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “Write about wandering in your human feet.”

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!

Please join us for our next session Monday November 8th at 6pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

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“For Calling the Spirit Back from Wandering the Earth in Its Human Feet” by Joy Harjo

Put down that bag of potato chips, that white bread, that bottle of pop.

Turn off that cellphone, computer, and remote control.

Open the door, then close it behind you.

Take a breath offered by friendly winds. They travel the earth gathering essences of plants to clean.

Give it back with gratitude.

If you sing it will give your spirit lift to fly to the stars’ ears and back.

Acknowledge this earth who has cared for you since you were a dream planting itself precisely within your parents’ desire.

Let your moccasin feet take you to the encampment of the guardians who have known you before time, who will be there after time. They sit before the fire that has been there without time.

Let the earth stabilize your postcolonial insecure jitters.

Be respectful of the small insects, birds and animal people who accompany you.
Ask their forgiveness for the harm we humans have brought down upon them.

Don’t worry.
The heart knows the way though there may be high-rises, interstates, checkpoints, armed soldiers, massacres, wars, and those who will despise you because they despise themselves.

The journey might take you a few hours, a day, a year, a few years, a hundred, a thousand or even more.

Watch your mind. Without training it might run away and leave your heart for the immense human feast set by the thieves of time.

Do not hold regrets.

When you find your way to the circle, to the fire kept burning by the keepers of your soul, you will be welcomed.

You must clean yourself with cedar, sage, or other healing plant.

Cut the ties you have to failure and shame.

Let go the pain you are holding in your mind, your shoulders, your heart, all the way to your feet. Let go the pain of your ancestors to make way for those who are heading in our direction.

Ask for forgiveness.

Call upon the help of those who love you. These helpers take many forms: animal, element, bird, angel, saint, stone, or ancestor.

Call your spirit back. It may be caught in corners and creases of shame, judgment, and human abuse.

You must call in a way that your spirit will want to return.

Speak to it as you would to a beloved child.

Welcome your spirit back from its wandering. It may return in pieces, in tatters. Gather them together. They will be happy to be found after being lost for so long.

Your spirit will need to sleep awhile after it is bathed and given clean clothes.

Now you can have a party. Invite everyone you know who loves and supports you. Keep room for those who have no place else to go.

Make a giveaway, and remember, keep the speeches short.

Then, you must do this: help the next person find their way through the dark.


Reprinted from Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings by Joy Harjo. 
Copyright © 2015 by Joy Harjo.

Thank you to everyone who joined for this session!

For this session we watched the music video for the song  “Remember Me” by Miguel featuring Natalia Lafourcade, posted below.

Our prompt for this session was: “Write about honoring the ancestors.”

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!

Please join us for our next session Friday November 5th at 12pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

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