Turning toward the ache

How poetry is teaching me to feel it all

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Photo via Unsplash

I know next to nothing about poetry.

I'm someone who, until recently, had exactly one poetry book on her bookshelf (which I mostly bought because I liked being the kind of person who owns a book of Kate Baer poems). Someone who admires poetry from a foggy distance, with the nervousness of a student who knows they're looking at something beautiful but dodges being called on to elaborate in front of the class.

But one sunny day in late September, my mid-afternoon scrolling led me right to a post promoting an upcoming live workshop with Joy Sullivan called How to Write a Poem. I can't explain why, but I knew I had to be in that class.

Of course, by the time I returned a few days later to track down the registration link, the workshop had already sold out to the public—which left me with two options. I could wait for the workshop to (hopefully) be offered again some unknown time in the future. Or. I could let my impatience get the best of me, pony up a few hundred bucks, and become a member of Sustenance, Joy's community for writers.

I'm now in month three of my Sustenance membership, and let me tell you, from the moment I impulsively handed over my credit card, my experience has been both expansive and UNSPEAKABLY humbling. I find myself surrounded by seasoned writers with warm smiles, MFAs, and ways with words that leave me buckling at the knees.

To be honest, I still don't totally know what I'm doing here.

At least right now, my writing plans don't involve shifting to focus on poetry or becoming a prolific poet. But I keep showing up—to office hours and open mic sessions and craft talks with renowned guest teachers. And as I do, something inside me start to thaw.

As a kid I rarely struggled to access my feelings. If anything they had a way of pulling me under, swallowing me whole.

As an adult, I joke with friends that my body’s m.o. is to go ‘full robot’ in life's climactic sentimental moments, particularly the ones with a lot of buildup and expectations around them. It’s not an absence of feeling, exactly—more like a plate of glass slid between us: close enough to witness the feeling, to see its contours and feel it approaching, but where an invisible shield keeps me from getting swallowed up. From taking my final bow after ten years of childhood Nutcrackers, picking up my parents at the airport when they'd fly in for the holidays, exchanging vows in front of friends and family … I was all composure, hands and face pressed safely against the glass.

It's not just the sappy moments that render me impenetrable, either—I'm just as likely to evade pain. Anything that threatens to split me at the seams, really. Any feeling on the distant horizon that threatens to swell so big it might flood the whole system and sweep my legs out from under me. My body has shown a self-protective propensity for stopping the surge by freezing over.

And so I often find myself hardening almost imperceptibly, turning away from all kinds of things that threaten to crack me open: faraway fears about loneliness and loss that circle like crows; images of bodies being pulled from rubble and children wailing as death rains down from the sky; Instagram reels of squeaking kittens that throb with the sweetness of a toothache.

Photo via Unsplash

Inside the workshop, Joy reveals the secret to writing a good poem is to start with a tiny, tender detail. "Yes, tender like beautiful. But also, tender like a bruise." Collect them in a notebook, she advises. Notice them out in the world, give them your attention, use them as fodder. I'm confronted by the very real possibility that there is no poetry without the will to feel, to name what aches.

When asked if anyone can write a poem, Maya Angelou replies:

"Yes, I think so. I don't know if anyone will write a poem. You have to want to. You have to have sharp ears. And you have to not be afraid of being human."

I start to wonder if poetry might be something more than my latest curiosity or a hobby waiting in the wings. Something more like a silver-haired mentor with kind eyes and crow's feet, maybe: guiding me gently toward what hurts. Teaching me to thaw, to feel the swell, to weather the bruising in service of being more fully alive.

It's a Friday afternoon, and I log into the Zoom room for another live Sustenance event—this time, Office Hours. Joy leads us in workshopping a handful of pieces from brave volunteers. I'm there as a witness—mostly because nothing I've written feels ready or worthy of sharing in this forum, but also in hopes of becoming braver through osmosis.

It's A's turn to enter the hot seat. She reads her poem aloud and we collectively lean forward in attuned silence, absorbing quiet blows of violence and loss, secrets and anger, described with harrowing precision. I wince, and notice a familiar quiver in my jaw.

She keeps reading. The ache migrates into my chest, radiates down my arms, threatens to metastasize into the full-body impulse to slam the book shut, swear it's all too much, turn to stone. I do not look away.

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💭 On My Mind

This conversation between Cody Cook-Parrott and Jacqueline Suskin was the perfect companion on a neighborhood walk last week. In addition to exploring ideas from Jacqueline’s new book about seasonal creative practices, these two generously meandered through a range of topics from connecting with the Earth, to Fern Gully, to creating work in response to atrocity and holding space for hope.

✨ Weekly Dose of Internet Delight

Until next time,
Michelle