Embodied Ceasefire

a poem for peace

I was going to post an essay about creativity today, about how creative practice is essential even when it shows up in the margins of what seems more important. A worthy topic, and I’ll publish that essay at some point. But today, as I was fiddling with the essay, another piece of writing came across my desk—my writing colleague and friend Ellie Roscher published a post today about embodying nonviolence, which reminded me of a poem I’d scribbled in a journal a few weeks ago. In keeping with that theme (a theme we could all do well to stay mindful of), here it is.

“When we hear the word violent, many of us think of physical violence, yet we are learning more and more about the affects of other, more subtle forms of violence. Most of us are not actively, explicitly, overtly physically violent, so our work in nonviolence is to excavate toward how these other, more subtle forms of violence show up in and with us.” -E.R.

Embodied Ceasefire

It may be 
you feel at war
with a stranger. 

It may be
you feel at war
with a neighbor.

It may be 
you feel at war
with a friend.

It may be 
you feel at war
with something you can’t quite name. 

It may be 
you feel at war
with yourself.

Do you feel it – the war – when you find it inside,
how its violence wants to feed
on fear or uncertainty or pain? 

Too much or not enough, be it space, food, love
can make a battle feel like the only option
on the quest to live how you want to.

So if that, any of it, 
even just a morsel,
tastes true for you... 

feel the war–
(often best done with support of a loved one
or in the company of your therapist) 

where it wants to live in your body
how it yearns to break out
what it wants to destroy–

and allow the war, whatever wants a fight 
–whatever pulses with need to prove power-over–
allow it a chance to float to the surface (don't force it),

where it can rest on the calm waters of your skin as you breathe
or rush alongside tumbling cascades as you sweat it out. It won’t be comfortable. 
But it’s on its way to becoming something else

something seen, felt, and heard 
acknowledged long enough to allow a letting go, claws softening
into that which may, in time, release their hold on peace.

As Rumi wrote, “The war is over. The band is singing. Come and dance.”

Poem found in Slouching Toward Radiance.

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Event Notes:

Mark your calendars for October 21 if you have reason to be in the Minneapolis, MN area—Chris La Tray, Krissy Kludt, and I will be at Moon Palace Books at 6:30pm for a dialogue about the Stories from the Trail anthology, other recent work (Remember to order/bring your copy of Becoming Little Shell which came out at the same time as Stories from the Trail and Chris can sign that one for you too…) and other things we’re thinking about at that point in the year. Event is in person, and Minneapolis is usually very lovely to visit in mid-October.