VOICES UP! WRITING OUR GRIT AND SILK.

During the Seattle City Hall art & social change exhibit, The Incredible Intensity of Just Being Human, poet, writer, and poetry curator Ann Teplick hosted a two-hour poetry workshop, whose focus is struggle and resilience, It began with a short reading from Ann Teplick’s manuscript-in-progress, Snapped into Fractions—a collection that explores her fifteen years writing poetry with youth who suffer from mental illness.

Participants then explored their own lives—what is broken and what is in working order; the art of being lost and then found; the advice we give ourselves and others; what we know and what we would like to better understand.

Below are some selected poems that resulted from the workshop.

Driftwood

Driftwood still usable for right purposes

Sapling shivers as forest floor sinks

Cold ice frozen core alone shaking

It’s OK-I’m with you always.

Morning and evening wind through trees

Not merely deadwood, firewood, or fencing

Decay leads the way to life.

-by A.L. Finden

Where’s Mom?

She’s gone looking for her Self,

the one she lost at thirteen.

Kids know where to find her.

At midlife, still looking, for what?

Gone to write, back before dinner.

Once again, words help her remember

to be rather than to do.

- by Cora Goss-Grubbs

Repair Work

Sway back, all tender places wrapped;

Fabric rent, torn warp from weft.

Packed pen, thread; back when whole.

But love is tiny daily stitches,

The resonance of two sisters laughing,

An open heart no matter what enters.

The voice must speak, then persevere.

-by Kelly Martineau

All poems have been reprinted with permission from the respective authors.