We are more than halfway into March break and there is a greater distance between my shoulders and my ears. I’m already sleeping more deeply though not longer.
This morning, I reread Tobi’s post with her March break resolutions and felt the connection which comes from a professional and personal understanding; our teacher friends don’t need an explanation about the deep sense of concern or worry or not-enoughness. Time and the pandemic and social forces stretch us. Forces draw attention and division pulling us apart.
Yet, within this gap of time, I’m slowing down and listening inside more, so I was delighted to listen to Jane Hirshfield on Ezra Klein’s podcast said that “a good poem is never accusatory”. I sat with this idea for a few days. I thought about this poem, and this poem. Both came from challenging situations, and I realized these felt like accusations in the moment, but instead, they were a response, my response, the specific reaching out to the universal.
In the interview, Hirschfield explains this so beautifully:
So, for me — there might be somebody else who would have a different definition of a good poem, and they are entitled to their own taste and their own preferences. But, for me, if a poem points a finger and shakes it at another person, it is a narrowing of understanding. You can do that without poetry. You don’t need a poem to say j’accuse and point your finger.
But poems are, for me, always an attempt to see from more than one point of view in more than one way, to enlist the collaboration of tongue, heart, mind, body, everything I have ever experienced, and to try to write into an awareness which is larger than the everyday, walking around forms of thought.
My brother took up rock climbing and my understanding of the vocabulary skimmed the surface. To me, repelling down a cliff face or “belaying” was the release of tension. That was my childhood understanding. Until today, when I looked up the term while searching for a way to describe this loosening that is happening in me. I was wrong and this shift in meaning, the new comprehension matters.
Thinking in a White Room 
I enjoy reading your thoughtful prose. Thanks for reminding us that you can reflect and find meaning in something as simple as a word.
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So clever! This section “….our teacher friends don’t need an explanation about the deep sense of concern or worry or not-enoughness. Time and the pandemic and social forces stretch us. Forces draw attention and division pulling us apart.” always hangs in the air…
and yet, you balance finding beauty in a small moment (leaning more into poetry), and, clearly, this may drive what you are thinking in terms of planning without it feeling too…work-like?
Maybe this is permission to do what moves you; to bring some of your passions back to the classroom and see where it moulds with students.
Or maybe I am reading way too deeply into your post and should just go have a glass of wine.
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You are reading so generously and I am hoping to help them find their passions instead of holding onto mine. But, I can belay = hold the skills and criticality necessary for academic pursuits while they find their way to the summit.
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The idea that good poems are never accusatory is yet another thing that I will sit with. As always, you give us more to think about and another podcast to listen to! I appreciate belay in a whole new way.
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My favourite line: “…there is a greater distance between my shoulders and my ears.” Doesn’t it feel good?? I am already thinking about when to take a day off next week because I don’t want this feeling of relaxation to go away.
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Yes! Do ii, Lisa. 👏🎉
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I was going to tell you my two favorite phrases but the other commenters already caught them! This is a beautiful piece and – like a god poem- it provokes thought long after the reading. I love that you show how your understanding of belay has changed. I did a little technical rock climbing a long time ago but the feelings were unforgettable. The responsibility for setting up the belay is great. The first step off the ledge is hard. The feeling of rappelling down from your belay is delight. And as you climb up, grasping at tiny rocky outcropping nuggins, you depend on your trust in your belay to catch you if you fall.
PS- I cannot access your links to the two poems above. Can you share the titles?
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Oh dear! Thanks for letting me know, Fran. I thought I linked them to my other blog posts, but I’ll go back and fix that. Thanks so much for your generous comments.
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