Mindful Poetry April 14th Gathering

This week for Mindful Poetry Moments we gathered to listen and contemplate Roger Robinson's poem "A Portable Paradise." We were joined by special guests Kara Michelle Pierson and Desirae Hosley. 

Kara Michelle Pierson is our current Wellspring Fellow and Owner of Lilac & Indigo. Find an offering to recharge and reaffirm yourself through rest and creativity, https://www.lilacandindigo.com/classes-events  

Desirae Hosley is a Spoken Word Artist, Performance Poet, Motivational Speaker, Actress, and Community Organizer. Join her for Social Therapy Beyond the Zoom Screen and check out her newly released book, The Silent Poet-Reintroduced as...Human.

(If you'd like to read the full transcript, that can be found here.)

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by Wade Hopkins

My garden always says to me slower
At first it seems fast with riot flowers
My first pause shifts my eyesight and
I take in tumult shapes of every green
My first breath guides my attention the buzz and blur
of each leaf and bud.
As the moment opens to me so does the garden.
Listen to the stone, caress the leaf, my garden is
invites me to take a trip in time. It always says to me
slower.


An Anthem for Paradise: After Roger Robinson
by Elena Estella Green

When I am all out of hope
I turn to music and quiet singing.
What kind of melody did they
Play in Paradise? What dirge
Was played at the expulsion
From Eden in Genesis?
Questions always feel hopeful.
Why was Paradise so short?
I am so grateful that there exists
A loophole, that heaven and hope
Follow me. That the song in my heart
Never forgets even on its
Darkest day.
A sunrise always
Begins in the dark.

Encumbrances
by Sarah Pinho

My inner voice always says to me
simplify, little sister
so that you may breathe.

Cut down the thick vines of RSVPs that bind you
part the waters of your excessive yeses
pull out by the roots the number of times you look at your devices
and dig a deep hole to bury the pile of paperwork on your table.

Assemble the aftermath into
a garden
ready to capture the seeds
falling in guano
from the sky.

Nestle into the green, green growth
stretch your arms wide against the dirt
and breathe.

Body of Love
by hadley hutton

I love your bones,
Father always says to me.

My marrow begins each day
knowing this framework of love.

In the fresh hope of morning
I practice loving the bones of the world.

My feet falling for the bare-bones of grass,
arms thrown wide to sky’s scaffolding.

I reach to meet the skeleton of the mountain top
stretching to heights of gratitude,

exercising my love muscles awake—
ready for the day. 

the secret feast
(wise man from Trinidad & me)
by Rana Dotson

What feels hopeful to you?

They put me here
to feed me
what might kill me, he said.

They didn’t know,
I eat street food.

Name four things you will hold, he said.
Name four you will cast away.

Write them down. Speak them aloud.
Say to yourself: this. Not that.

Laugh while cutting a slice of pie.
As you throw yourself into the joy of it.

Say to yourself: this. Not that.
Consume it.

When you speak to the Powers That Be,
name What Heals You.

What Heals You.

Pour yourself a glass of wine,
While you do what fuels you.

What Fuels You.

Laugh bellywop laughs
over the secret feast.

you and your secret feast.

I May Be Poetry Tailgating
By Emily Little

There are seventeen children sitting on my tailgate.
I only buckled in three, but those three brought
The four Boxcar Children and
The Five Little Peppers and
The Ingalls Sisters and
Addy Walker, American Girl—So

We might as well be the
Caboose of a train or a stagecoach or a wagon or part of the underground railroad—
But we are not.

I’m a mother—
Getting grounded in words
While cheerios proliferate
And imaginations crawl over seats
And toes tap in anticipation of hip-hop class
And White people still enslave Black people, but now we call it Prison.

Maybe this odyssey of a van
has horsepower enough to pull us
And our children
Through this.
Through this to a place of abolition and equity and justice and liberation,
Maybe.

Maybe it starts with
Moth-eaten old stories and newly birthed poetry
Written in parking lots, doors ajar.
Maybe.