Each of our writing groups begins with an improvisation. We arrive to find a small handful of magnetic words clumped together at our seat. While waiting for others to join us, we comb through the words in our pile, foraging among them for the poem waiting there. We seek it out, applying ourselves to the task of releasing it from the surrounding jumble. Humorous, bizarre, sublime, disturbing, nonsensical, profound...all poems are accepted. Without judgement, we welcome each as gift.
A lovely writing exercise and, at the same time, a fitting model for life. We are presented at birth with a bundle of descriptors. Whether girl or boy, healthy or infirm, privileged or not, plain or attractive, these and other labels cling to us as we come into awareness, with others added in each passing year.
Our innate temperament unfolds, extroverted or inward~turning, with a set of aptitudes and constrictions that we carry with us as we relate to our families and the larger world. Events and encounters pull us forward. Some help us flourish, while others impose challenges, boulders in our path.
These many and varied details are the raw material of our lives. Our poem emerges from the interplay of these inner and outer forces, and it is one that continues to unfold for as long as we draw breath.
However, just as in our writing exercise, we are not passive participants in this process. We are given numerous opportunities to improvise, to consciously choose how to mix and manage the ingredients of our lives.
Each moment is an improvisational prompt offering itself to us. Rather than acting in the same stale and unconscious manner, we can be alert for wise and creative responses. At each juncture, we can be conscious that we are adding another line to these poems of ours.
Each moment is an improvisational prompt offering itself to us. Rather than acting in the same stale and unconscious manner, we can be alert for wise and creative responses. At each juncture, we can be conscious that we are adding another line to these poems of ours.
While some verses will be more pleasing, all are an expression of that which imbues and gives rise to everything. For it all flows from that God~energy that sustains us and offers us myriad possibilities to awaken more fully. And awakening is infinitely more rewarding~~and fun~~than lumbering on through the fog.
Improvisation is never easy. It requires that we take responsibility for grabbing what comes our way, wanted or not, and turning it into poetry. Like now. I open my box of magnetic words, grab a handful, note a minimal worry that I won't find anything of merit, and discover the following poem…
Improvisation is never easy. It requires that we take responsibility for grabbing what comes our way, wanted or not, and turning it into poetry. Like now. I open my box of magnetic words, grab a handful, note a minimal worry that I won't find anything of merit, and discover the following poem…
Here are garden and shadow,
Roses whisper like medicine
Between ugly screams.
Our choice.
Heal the day,
Journey whole.
On this path of evolving consciousness, it's all just one grand Evening at the Improv. May our creations be true. And may they be works of beauty that heal the day and let us journey on whole.
Namaste, my fellow poets. Namaste.
Leia Marie
