Day 30 of 30: Congratulations

Congratulations!

We have shared this virtual space for 30 days — 30 days of words, phrases, images, and lines borrowed from lives lived and imagined.

We have drawn from the mentorship of our daily hosts and the poets and poetry that inspired them: Glenda Funk, Stacey Joy, K. A. Holt, Gayle Sands, Lauryl Bennington, Lizzy Mandrell, Jennifer Jacobson, Crag Hill, Kate Currie, Stefani Boutelier, Jordy Bowles, Naydeen Trujillo, Padma Venkatraman, Margaret Simon, Kim Johnson, Susan Ahlbrand, Allison Berryhill, Abigail Woods, Ann McClellan, Kaitlin Robison, Shaun Ingalls, Emily Yamasaki, Jennifer Guyor-Jowett, Anna J. Small Roseboro, Susie Morice, Jessica Garrison, and Kole Simon.

And, I hope, we are all transformed in some positive ways because of this experience. My deepest gratitude to our hosts and to all our teacher-poets sharing this space for 30 days and allowing us to bear witness to one another’s lives.

P.S. Today, maybe tomorrow you may feel relief having reached May first. Indeed, some days it was hard to write or to be okay with not reading and responding to everyone (though you wanted to). And sometimes you did not know if your comment to yesterday’s poem was received–this is part of the limitations of this space as all spaces do. I hope you learned to give yourself grace. Still, relief, yes? But you may begin to feel something akin to grief. (I already do.) Welcome this. Cry if need be. (I already have.) And then come back to this space when you are ready to write again, maybe May 16th.

Inspiration

Today, I simply ask that you approach this final day any way you need to. What do you have left to say, to write, to explore?

• Was there a poem from earlier this month that you want to go back to or answer to?
• Have you come to understand yourself as a writer in a new way — is there a poem in that?
• Is there a poem or topic that you want to “thank” in some way with a new poem or perspective?
• Is there a poem you wrote from your point of view that you’d like to try from another POV. Any of that will do today.
• Is there a form or topic that we did not explore that you want to uncover or introduce in your poem today?
• Or maybe you’d just like to write a congratulation poem to yourself. Why not?

If you need an idea or more direction for today, try borrow lines and verses! Revisit your favorite day of this celebration and “borrow” lines from other people’s poems to create something new while honoring the lines that have stirred our hearts and minds this month.

Process for Borrowed Lines

• Pick a day and select lines from several poems to make something new — a found poem. After your poem (or after each line) indicate the poets/poems you’ve borrowed as a thank you to the poets who inspired your verse.
• Choose a poem from #verselove that you loved or found intriguing and try to answer someone else’s poem with a poem of your own.
• Choose a line from a #verselove poet that you especially appreciated. You might pull out one of their lines to begin a poem of your own.
• Respond to someone’s poem with a new point of view. For example, I wrote a poem on Tuesday about moving; you might write a similar poem about a day you moved.

Sarah’s Poem

*I will add my borrowed line later today, but here is my thank you note for being with us this month.

“Gratitude”

I am sitting in my big, comfy chair with my coffee
as I have at this time for the last thirty days, and
I am thinking about all the different ways
we have poem-ed together.
I hear you. I feel you. I thank you.

And there are other hearts out there who may have not shared
but who have, nonetheless, heard you express and feel blessed
to have read your verse and the rest.

I am just so thankful to you all
for sharing this virtual – no actual- space,
for being vulnerable, honorable, adorable, and invincible,
for your beautiful words on the page, some we just could not say in our days,
and for witnessing lives lived in this-
way.

I love that we are all equals in this space — not the same (thank goodness),
but here — there is no shame -ing or blame-ing.
There are no grades made, no cutting blades of apprais-al.
There are no requirements or performance.
This has been a place to express, collect, reflect, and even experiment.
If you are new to verse, you have likely discovered,
uncovered poetry’s gift of therapy —
its power to assuage souls, stir inspiration, and bring joy.
When you share your poem with us, it goes from yours to ours, and,
well, thank you.

Thank you for being with us this month as a reader, as a poet, as a poetry lover! We would love to hear about your experience and gather suggestions for next year. Please take this survey.