I watch my breath, my frame.
I think worldwide of
people hungry in the mud
faces in cages
heartbeats dead 
families capsizing in escape.

​When I was young,
hearing my first tragic events,
my response was massive guilt and shame.
I had it okay while lives cracked apart across the world,
in my neighborhood.

And then I hurt myself.
And got addicted to hurting myself.

Now, here, globally, in this country,
cruelty happens daily.

I am healthy. I have enough. More than enough.
I want to help.

Instead of saying,
they suffer so I must suffer,
I want to say
I am at peace, how can they be at peace?

Instead of my limbs paralyzed,
instead of acting against myself,
I can reach out and take care of me
and thereby reach out stronger.

I don't have a lot.
I have enough. 
I can be here for you.
I can sit in the same room as you.
I can listen to your story.
Open up the world for you.
Help you tell your story.
Get people to listen. Or try.
Bring communities together. Try.

I sometimes feel so young.
I doubled my gray hair the last ten weeks. 

Still breathe, still be.
And reach.
Open. Continue to open.

I wrote myself out of abuse,
out of disorder,
out of homelessness,
out of numbness.

find vitality 

Meaning exists
in every moment
because we say so.

We create meaning
by collecting
observations. 

strip down
do less 
show less

That's where I find beauty, elegance.
Simplicity is my way to wholeness.
I am already whole. 
I feel my back pulse.

neurons can rewire
brain chemistry can shift 

A diagnosis
said I was hardwired 
to need antipsychotics forever,
that I would never be stable not really.

I learn daily my neurons' plasticity.
All thanks to repetition.

Yes I get tempted to work longer
to stay deeper in screens
but that doesn't help me. 
I'm learning to stop sooner.

pace
stay healthy
shift
 
take time to breathe 
the blue
the bicycles
a ringing bell

resist the urge to control
hear the music of stillness

​I'm captured by cremated energy.

keep it small 
your day will thank you 
I know you're addicted

let go
your body/brain
will thank you 

I invest in the edge between brutality and beauty. 
I write until I run out of ink. 
I work until I run out of life.
 
I want to perform confidence. 
It's no longer a luxury.
It is what I need in order to do the job I must do.

I need to pull in the authority and believe I know what I'm doing. 
Say what is on my mind. Listen. Let that be enough.
​
I give away my time a lot
to help others with little things
because I feel I should.

This is a distraction. 

I need to hold each activity in my palms and sit with it. 
Marie Kondo it. 
Ask, does it give me joy?

And if not,
and especially if it also doesn't feed my belly or build bridges,
I can let it go. 

Each thing I take on has several elements inside. 
Going deeply into them takes me away from other things. 

I don't want to do any of it halfway.
​
I want to immerse in each job, not fall apart, not take it on the surface level.
I want to aim higher, go big. 

​My next full-length play, see in the dark, will explore how we handle the threat of outsiders and ask the price of suspicion versus compassion.

As research for see in the dark, I'm asking some anonymous questions in the survey below. I'd love your input, as in-depth or quick as you'd like. You don't have to answer all the questions, but I appreciate your input toward any of these topics. 

You can also write answers to any/all of these questions below in the comments section, over email through my contact page, or if we're connected on Facebook/Twitter. 

I'll embed the form below and here is a link to the survey.

Thank you for your insights! By posting answers, know that your ideas, experiences and words may be used in this new play. 

Thanks again! 

Heidi Kraay

​In this week's Drop-In Writing Workshop at The Cabin, we focused on listening and sound -- dissecting that sense throughout our 90 minutes together. We started by reading "The Sound of One Fork" by Minnie Bruce Pratt.

The Sound of One Fork
BY MINNIE BRUCE PRATT
 
Through the window screen I can see an angle of grey roof
and the silence that spreads in the branches of the pecan tree
as the sun goes down. I am waiting for a lover. I am alone
in a solitude that vibrates like the cicada in hot midmorning,
that waits like the lobed sassafras leaf just before
its dark green turns into red, that waits
like the honeybee in the mouth of the purple lobelia.
 
While I wait, I can hear the random clink of one fork
against a plate. The woman next door is eating supper
alone. She is sixty, perhaps, and for many years
has eaten by herself the tomatoes, the corn
and okra that she grows in her backyard garden.
Her small metallic sound persists, as quiet almost
as the windless silence, persists like the steady
random click of a redbird cracking a few
more seeds before the sun gets too low.
She does not hurry, she does not linger.
 
Her younger neighbors think that she is lonely.
But I know what sufficiency she may possess.
I know what can be gathered from year to year,
gathered from what is near to hand, as I do
elderberries that bend in damp thickets by the road,
gathered and preserved, jars and jars shining
in rows of claret red, made at times with help,
a friend or a lover, but consumed long after,
long after they are gone and I sit
alone at the kitchen table.
 
And when I sit in the last heat of Sunday, afternoons
on the porch steps in the acid breath of the boxwoods,
I also know desolation. The week is over, the coming night
will not lift. I am exhausted from making each day.
My family, my children live in other states,
the women I love in other towns. I would rather be here
than with them in the old ways, but when all that’s left
of the sunset is the red reflection underneath the clouds,
when I get up and come in to fix supper,
in the darkened kitchen I am often lonely for them.
 
In the morning and the evening we are by ourselves,
the woman next door and I. Still, we persist.
I open the drawer to get out the silverware.
She goes to her garden to pull weeds and pick
the crookneck squash that turn yellow with late summer.
I walk down to the pond in the morning to watch
and wait for the blue heron who comes at first light
to feed on minnows that swim through her shadow in the water.
She stays until the day grows so bright
that she cannot endure it and leaves with her hunger unsatisfied.
She bows her wings and slowly lifts into flight,
grey and slate blue against a paler sky.
I know she will come back. I see the light create
a russet curve of land on the farther bank,
where the wild rice bends heavy and ripe
under the first blackbirds. I know
she will come back. I see the light curve
in the fall and rise of her wing.

Reflect
​
Read the poem once. What do you hear?
Read again. What else do you hear? What else do you notice?
What else does this poem say to you?
 
Listening/Silence

John Cage talked about the other half of sound being silence.
I’d like us to take some time now to listen and let silence speak to us,
so that we can be ready to really notice sounds in our next step.
For the next few minutes, please don’t write, read or talk,
and try to keep your movement/sounds still.
Set a timer for yourself for 5, 10, 15 minutes.
From this quiet place, listen to your breath. Listen to your organs.
Listen to the other listeners. The room. To what’s outside the room.
If you can, close your eyes. Otherwise, let your focus be soft. 
 
After your timer goes off,
you can take a moment to jot down what you heard.
 
Sound Maps

Next, we’ll be going outside. Bring a sheet of paper with you or a sketchbook. 
Grab some colored pencils or markers too. 
We’re going to make sound maps in the area around our residence.
This can look like many different things, but mainly the process is:
Go to an area outside. Wait there, listen.
Draw or briefly describe what you hear
in a spot on the page that symbolizes where you are.
Then go to another area.
Repeat until you’ve captured the sounds all around your building
(or inside your building if you prefer not to go outside).
Instead of a map of what you see, this is a map of what you hear.
Take about 15 or 20 minutes to do this. Take your time, go slow. 
 
Write

Back inside, we can incorporate the sounds into a new piece.
You can do this in several different ways.
Maybe you travel through the sounds as a journey, describing them.
Maybe you write a story that incorporates all the sounds.
Maybe a poem tried to define all the sounds.
Maybe a scene blows the sounds up into giant noises a character has to overcome.
Maybe you're a composer and create a new tune or song from the sounds.
Maybe something completely different.

Any way you’d like to incorporate the sounds writing something new is good.
You can use "The Sound of One Fork" as a model or push in the opposite direction. Use your life. Use your interests. Use what you hear around you.

During the workshop, I played additional music
(tracks from Gnarly Buttons by composer John Adams).
You can play music (preferably instrumental) and incorporate those sounds too. 
 
Write for at least 20 minutes. Share your work with someone. 
After we wrote for about 25, 30 minutes,
we created short poems out of our longer texts
and everyone had a chance to share --
​some hauntingly beautiful stuff came out of that session! 

Thank you for writing and listening with me. Enjoy your spring!

Dark alleyway, piss smell. 
Graffiti. Dumpsters. 
Shadow places for hiding. For trapping. 
A hole. No space to breathe. 
Screaming whistle. 

I sneak on people and don't mean to.
They jump. 
Blamed for my quiet feet. "You scared me."
I don't blame them for not being present,
Not noticing their surroundings.

Something behind me. 
I  turn and there's nothing. 
Except on my back, on my neck. 
Like a grizzly bear's hot breath. 
I taste metal. Nails. 

I was going somewhere important
​but now I forget who I am.
Now that someone's following,
I want to give up, turn around.
See who it--

inside the nothing, an orchestra
hear your heart beat, organs pump
insides tire for your rise and falling

do you ever thank them?

thank you, stomach
thank you, liver
kidneys, bladder

not everyone has them 

gratitude for intestines comes
when the beeps bops bleeps 
subside

that terrain of blank canvas
the ant there takes his friend back home
his friend now food

blind ants - what do they hear?

morning breeze
soft rain
the sky that robin's egg blue

a small strip of fog
a porch sit
the scrambled noise gone

instead is this sweater
this antique wood rocker
my hands chilled

study the horizon
find palms to warm them
take in mountain faces
pine green cardigans
roll eyes back

I belong in the mountains
like I belong in the sea
like I belong in a city high rise
like I'm learning to belong
in my skin

sometimes you love a person
with energy that takes you through
​the rest of forever

​In this week's Drop-In Writing Workshop at The Cabin, we wrote the story of our lives in using place, images and people.

We started by reading Jam Hale's poem "(people &) PLACES, an autobiography."
It's a long, winding poem with several vulnerable, heart striking moments.
​I'll include the beginning here, but look HERE for the full version. 

(people &) PLACES, an autobiography
by Jam Hale

Seattle, Washington and Yachats, Oregon
It's the ephemera that drew my attention
How a gin & tonic looks pale turquoise
In evening light--
A perfect marriage of 
The concomitant blue bulb at the strike of a sulphur match and
The flash of green on the horizon

Silver City, Idaho or Bear Valley Springs, California

I can spend hours hand feeding a horse
Watching her strong jaw
As I massage her neck
Those muscles
Her lips inspect the palm of my hand
For more apple, celery, green beans
The sound of her giant teeth chomping baby carrots
Could put me to sleep
The breath from her nostrils
Is sibling to the comfort of a hotspring in winter

It wasn't until years later that I learned
Some suckling horses are called
Green beans

Trail Creek, Idaho
It wasn't until years later that I could look at a hotspring 
Without filling up on a sense of loss
(or)
WHISKEY

I'm saving all my broccoli stalks and trimmings of asparagus
For the horses
I'm dirtying dishes just to have something to wash
A few dashes of tabasco

I'm not eating much these days

I will wash my glass
Between each drink
I'll wash my glass a dozen times a night
When my hands are soapy and wet
At least
They are occupied with an empty glass

This is why I'll never quit smoking
This is why I'll wash down crumbs of tobacco
(stuck to my lips like burrs on horsehide)
With one more glass of whiskey.
Rinse.
Repeat.

Reflect
What do you notice in this poem, so far?
What images, phrases, moments stand out?
What places stick with us most?
How does it make you feel, emotionally?
 
Meditate
Close eyes. Breathe.
Cast back on the places you’ve lived.
The places you’ve spent time, that impacted you.
Maybe a small, short-term town you passed through.
Maybe a city you spent most your life.
Maybe a gas station that meant a lot to you.
Try to look back far.
Your whole life. See it all. See now. See close-up.
Each place that bubbles up.
What are the images that capture that place at that time?
Who are the people that shine through the most, that space and moment?
What were you feeling then? What do you feel as you look back at then?
Try to let all the meaningful places come forward. No rush.
 
List
When you feel that is done, make a list.
List all the places that came up, in any order.
And any that you’re just remembering now.
Some places may come up multiple times, for those of us who go back and forth.
Stay true to that. The back and forth, the returns, the repetitions.
Once you’ve listed all the places that impacted you through your life,
by each place, write or draw an image/symbol that signifies that place,
and the person who most impacted you, or with whom you spent the most time.
People can also be animals.
Also note any significant events.
 
Write
Now, this list is your map. Use it, but you don’t have to follow it exactly.
You can change your mind, change the order, the places, images, people.
Using your map,
write your autobiography as seen through places, people and images.
This can be a poem, an essay, a story, a play, a long cartoon.
You can go back for inspiration from Jam’s poem
or cast it aside and do your own thing.
If you start to lose inspiration or clarity, take a walk.
Collect images from here/now.
Come back, continue.
 
Share
Share what you wrote with someone.
How did that go? How did that feel?
Thank you for writing with me!

Have you ever considered going into prostitution to get the next buck?
What it would be like to sell your body?
Have you ever held a sign?
Thought about writing sharpie on cardboard?
Have you ever thought with envy at the dancing sign holders
outside cell phone stores and tax commissions--
at least they have work?
I think as I walk past the homeless,
how quick to cross over that line.
How I've been there.
Not as long or as hard, but I know that side.
Climbing out of that nothing,
first I shielded myself 
walking past.

I can't afford empathy for you right now.
I've been there but I'm not there right now.
I can't give you a thing.
The man I was with when I was like you
used to give away anything we earned.
So we didn't eat.
So the bankers
the calls
the angry voices
after us
as he's making hand outs.
So no, 
I won't look at  you,
acknowledge you. 
​
I'm getting further from that point.
Never forget how close.
How close STDs, pregnancy scares, cancer, health collapse, car wreck.
Don't forget everything's possible.
Don't live on guard.
Be careful
and grateful,
be mindful
aware,
be generous,
know how little you make
how very little,
be willing to fight
to earn more.
Don't be dumb. 
Avoid thinking about money.
Try to stop.