Guided Writing Session Directory
Below, you will find recordings for each Guided Writing Session dating back to August 2021 when the sessions began.
Take a moment to review the Usage and Guidelines Folder below for information on how to post work and use the directory.
Use the Independent Entries Folder for submissions not specific to a monthly program or Guided Writing Session.
More About Guided Writing Sessions
Fear
Nascent understanding
My nascent understanding of the antidote to fear
Is the opposite of my habit.
My past strategy has been to hold my breath
and disappear from now.
My child-self insisted that now feels too big.
Too going on forever.
What there was “adult” in me stood tsking,
disapproving of my “is”.
It advised me to just rush through this.
Take a running leap,
eyes closed to unpleasantness.
But always, I would peek them open.
Mid-jump, mid-air, I’d find myself
Wiley-coyoted,
legs churning as I plummeted,
mouth a-gasp with fright.
Over and over,
Again and again
The same result.
Whoever would imagine, my solution is the inverse
of what that “grown up” said.
It was only little me, disguised as grown-up.
Pretending to be big.
Her interpretation of that word.
Speaking as “Society”.
Mimicking “some other” instead
of being me.
Me, who is here and now,
listening to my child-heart.
I can witness my own panics
as they rise up.
I can sooth them with each tide of air
moving through me,
turning to undertow as fears release,
becoming something else.
No longer seen as shadow, but transformed,
what “is” shimmers with possibility.
My eyes look with curiosity, prepared to meet
whatever’s there.
I know that future findings may please me, or not.
I see them as a convergence
of my circumstances,
But always, with a lesson.
It takes a certain tilting
of my heart
to hear the pitch
of my alignment.
——- Devon Burris
Hi Devon,
Thanks for sharing this poem about fear and your "nascent understanding" of how to confront (sometimes unbearable) pain without closing your eyes, or running away like Wiley E. Coyote, trying to escape the too-muchness of terror and grief. I'm not quite sure what you mean in these lines: "Whoever would imagine, my solution is the inverse/of what that 'grown up' said" -- your writing can be cerebral at times, as we've spoken about before. But the depth of feeling and your authentic struggle to cope with life's hardest truths -- and emerge with some understanding -- is powerful, indeed.
Mark
Hi Mark.
Thanks for the feedback. My favorite part of making this poem is using Wiley-coyoted as a verb. It makes me laugh.
The line you referenced is simply my amazement that rushing instead of taking my time does not solve fear for me. Perhaps this repetition is unnecessary- it’s just my way of expressing the wonder of being wrong, when I was so sure I was right.
I still find this realization to be stunning. I may have to reconsider all my rules. That one about keeping emotion an arms length away hasn’t worked so well, either. I’ll play with that today.
Thanks again,
Devon