Archives | Writing and Healing

Keeping Quiet by Pablo Neruda

Posted by Diane Morrow on November 16, 2014 in Blog, Healing Places, Healing Poetry

I am sharing this poem, “Keeping Quiet,” with my sophomores this week as a writing catalyst. I like the way it has the potential to open up a pool of quiet in the middle of things. It begins: Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still. Not instructions for counting to ten—that common advice for dealing with rising anger before reacting. No, this is longer—just a bit longer—stretching the silence out two beats longer. Now we will count to twelve. The opening reminds of something a teacher might say—a pre-school teacher? Or perhaps something a parent might say to a child before some kind of game. I think that’s what makes the line evocative—as if it holds the echo of something we’ve heard before. Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still. The poem continues: For once on the face of the earth, let’s not speak in any language; let’s stop for one second, and not move our arms so much. No language. No large gestures. What then? Fisherman in the cold sea would not harm whales and the man gathering salt would look at his hurt hands. A pause for not-harming? A pause for looking at our own hands and seeing why they might hurt? A pause to simply look at what we’re doing and ask why we’re doing it? And to ask whether in fact it makes sense? What I want should not be confused with total inactivity. We would not be doing nothing We would be doing something. It’s a bit like meditation what he’s suggesting. Or perhaps writing. Not doing nothing. Doing something. Doing something different. And then, he tells us, this might become possible: perhaps a huge silence might interrupt this sadness of never understanding ourselves Who would not want this? The poem ends: Now I’ll count up to twelve and you keep quiet and I will go. Do you feel it? A sense of a vast space opening up. The poet has left—and we are here—in the quiet. The full text of the poem is here. It is read by Sylvia Boorstein. The poem is from Extravagaria and is translated by Alistair Reed (The photo is from a video of the poem which has since been taken...

Make Your Mind an Ocean

Posted by Diane Morrow on November 2, 2014 in Blog, Healing Places, Healing Poetry

Continuing with the theme from a couple weeks ago of becoming an ever-larger body of water, I remembered a piece by Lama Yeshe called “Make Your Mind an Ocean.” Here is an excerpt from the piece which I’ve rearranged as a kind of found poem. It has to do with the mind becoming larger and larger and not depending so much on the tiny atoms of the world. The mind becoming larger and larger and in turn not being quite so disturbed by the relentless ripples and agitations of the world. If you’re all caught up in attachment to tiny atoms your limited craving mind will make it impossible for you to enjoy life’s pleasures. External energy Is so incredibly limited that if you allow yourself to be bound by it your mind itself will become just as limited. When your mind is narrow small things easily agitate you. Make your mind an ocean. I remember a time when my children were very young and I was feeling like I didn’t have any space left in my head anymore—as if I couldn’t hold any new thoughts. I got an opportunity to go away to the beach for a long weekend writing retreat and I took it. It was a weekend of just myself in a cottage next to the sound and then crossing to the ocean every day—to walk or just to sit looking out. It was September or October, quiet. I wrote a bit, but maybe not even that much. I remember the way it felt as if, walking, the ocean were literally washing my brain—clearing it, resetting it. Washing my brain, my body, my entire self. And when I returned—same young, vibrant children—same life—same ripples in that life–but I was different—and I had room for them again. I don’t live on the ocean—or have the opportunity to go there that often, but even to have been there once, gives me that image—that memory to work from. I like to imagine, especially when I’m feeling too small for the life I’m living, or too small for some problem I’m facing, the possibility of making my mind as large as the ocean. The sound of the waves and the blue stretching out to the horizon—and the depths of it—that vast and deep and large. “Make Your Mind an Ocean” is from The Peaceful Stillness of the Silent Mind which can be found for free at the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive. More about Lama Yeshe can be found in a tribute to him by a Christian monk, Father P. Bernard de Give, written after Lama Yeshe’s death. The photo, taken near Thunder Hole, Maine is by Billy...