How Poetry Can Change Your Heart

by Andrea Gibson

  to see in the dark, the places others dare not go,

  and from that dark night of the soul

  let me pull treasure through the filthy wounds of the past

  the wretched corners of hell

  I emerge unscathed

  carrying gemstones on my tongue.

  Take me back to my breath

  the heartbeat

  that moves me

  gut the trenches of my smallness, unravel me,

  bring my soul to crisis.

  We bloody experimental circuits

  we crash-test dummies of redemption

  we survival poets

  it matters what we do here.

  We have learned to see in the dark.

  We can harrow the underworld

  and bring back the hallows. We survive

  everything. Crown us.

  We are praying at the stone, pulling

  swords and grails from its blood.

  Groan. Ache for the moon.

  My soft body accepts the wish. I have been waiting

  sixty thousand years

  at the bottom of the well.

  My skin catches every breeze. I choose today

  to be something more than a sinking stone

  so plug in our blood

  to that big typewriter in the sky

  I swear, these scars —

  can pick locks.

  One day all your survival attempts

  are gonna free somebody

  so say it with me:

  I give myself permission

  to exist in my own body.

  I want to scream

  till I can hear my voice over my fear

  I want to ask strangers

  tell me something that makes you cry

  I want to tear your soul wide open

  and leave a heart

  where your lies once stood, but that’s

  crazy! Right?

  You can’t just have feelings in public.

  You can’t just act like your voice

  matters

  You can’t be so unashamed,

  it’s ugly, how dare you,

  you’re not supposed to shine lights in the darkness

  you’re not supposed to burn this bright

  you’re not supposed to wear your heart so high

  you’re not supposed to feel this

  most people

  are so afraid of their own humanity

  that when confronted with truth

  they’ll tell you to calm down —

  but there is a place

  where these words are replaced by cries of —

  come on

  show us your brave

  give us a glimpse of that human

  speak that scar-tissue blues, lose yourself

  in the screaming end of a spiral where it all goes right

  the skies give birth to a clean soul

  one syllable at a time

  I’ve seen poets

  erupt into a pillar of light

  what if the only reason

  any of us were kept alive

  is to be here

  vomiting shards of our fractured psyches on this stage

  hoping just one splinter

  will lodge in the meat of a stranger’s heart long enough

  for them not to have to learn the hard way

  so c’mon, poets —

  we’re in the business of saving lives.

  You’re not supposed to care,

  you’re not supposed to speak up,

  you’re not supposed to rise up,

  but this is slam

  and we do.

  HOW CAN I TELL IF A POEM IS GOOD?

  “If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold, no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry.”

  —EMILY DICKINSON

  Does the poem bring a part of you to life?

  Did you have the experience of your mind dancing?

  Did you get goose bumps?

  Did something shock you awake because of its brand-newness?

  Does the perimeter of your skin seem to expand and glow?

  Are you more curious?

  Do you feel less alone?

  Are there lines from the poem you won’t be able to forget?

  Did you at one point feel like you were skydiving?

  Is there an image so clear and stunning it is still playing like a movie in your mind?

  Did it feel as if the poet was breathing air into your ballooning heart?

  Are you a different person than you were before you heard the poem?

  Does the poem make you want to write?

  Does the poem make you want to live?

  Do you hear the poem and feel possible?

  Did you at one point think, “I’ve needed to hear this”?

  After reading the poem did you think, “I am more human having read this”?

  Is this a poem you want to share with someone you love?

  THE GIFT OF AWE

  “Step into this experience with the goose bumps in your heartbeat.”

  —BUDDY WAKEFIELD

  Have you ever known someone who finds poetry in everything? A dishwasher who pulls a coffee cup out of a soapy sink and stares at it as if it is the face of a newborn baby—so tender? A desert dweller who weeps at the sight of the never-silent sea? Poetry is the pen-and-paper version of paying wondrous attention. Notice the way spilled gasoline makes a rainbow on the concrete. Notice the last brave leaf clinging to a winter tree. Notice how the moon in a nighttime car ride seems to follow you home. There is poetry in the noticing. In allowing your mouth to hang open in the presence of everyday magic.

  Have you ever had a bad day and then somebody hollered, “Come look at the sky!” and the sherbet colors of the setting sun brightened you? Awe invites us into the present moment. Awe frees us from contraction.

  To be awed is to be stunned awake. To recognize that we are at once tiny and giant. At once simple and grand. A part of everything, and everything a part of us.

  The poet’s job is to be awed. The poem’s job is to domino that awe into you. Here are some lines that might leave you awestruck:

  “To err is human; to forgive, divine.”

  —ALEXANDER POPE

  “Earth’s crammed with heaven.”

  —ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING

  But also, you can be awed by dinner rolls:

  Exultations for this Life I Pretend is Difficult (Excerpt)

  BY APRIL RANGER

  . . . My first meal at a “nice” restaurant

  was junior prom. When the waiter

  brought the basket of warm rolls

  my twin sister raved, she gasped

  at the glassware, exclaimed

  over each fancy fork

  and everyone chuckled

  while I folded my napkin in silence.

  (I am not sure what part of the world

  taught me and not her

  that it is shameful

  to be amazed by everything.)

  May I never be so rich I forget the grass.

  May I never be so loud I forget to listen

  to each brave breath stitching the world

  like threads sewn by beginners’ hands,

  Praise the uneven hem.

  The strength of the tiniest knot.

  Praise any torn and ragged cloth

  that warms me.

  Psychology studies have revealed that being awed can get us out of “monkey mind”—depression and anxiety. Seeing something astounding in nature, or in a documentary, or in a good book, can positively affect our mental health. Awe can release us from cycles of shame and grief and stagnation. Awe can lift us into the possible and offer us a life of exploration. The word “wow” is its own sort of tincture.

  Speaking of awe, want to know something AWEsome? There are poetry buskers! Poets who sit with typewriters on sidewalks as if they were musical instruments. Walk up to one and they may ask, “What do you want me
to write you a poem about?” You could say, “A turnip!” or “Something for Joan” or “Write me a poem that will keep me from quitting the team.”

  What if you could experience every poem as if someone were typing it just for you? Awe creates poetry. Poetry creates awe.

  WHO CAN BE A POET? (HINT: EVERYONE)

  Derrick C. Brown was not always the founder of Write Bloody Publishing, or the world-touring author of several books of poetry. Before all of that, Derrick C. Brown was a Christian magician (“Derrick the Dynamic”) who dreamed of purifying the Las Vegas strip through sleight of hand. But when the Gulf War was about to break out, Derrick was feeling very patriotic and decided to join the military. As a paratrooper he participated in many mock war exercises, and one evening, curled in a foxhole, where all he had to read was a tiny, abridged version of the Bible, and all he had to write with was a nubby golf pencil, Derrick began editing the lines to some psalms and rewriting them so that he could understand them better. He loved it. The rest is history.

  You, too, could become a poet at any time. You could be a train conductor and a poet. A fast-food worker and a poet. You could be an investment banker or a neuroscientist and also a poet. You could be a debutante glittering in your ball gown while the cameras pop like exploding moons and also be a poet. When you open yourself up to that idea, what might you create? What might you see as worthy of writing down? What, in your life, suddenly becomes art?

  In the Haida tribe, the word for poetry also means “to breathe.” Consider that your very existence is a poem. There is poetry in the way you stir your coffee, as if mixing the perfect shade of paint. Poetry in how your grandmother’s hands age or the way dust floats in the light. There is poetry in your evening commute, how brake lights in traffic look like a sea of rubies stalled ahead of you, while diamonds rush toward you in the oncoming lane.

  Poetry is not just for the college educated. Not just for the Shakespeare buffs or those with the most colorful vocabularies. It’s not just for the introvert in a turtleneck or the chain-smoker pounding away on his vintage typewriter, glasses askew. Literally anyone can be a poet.

  And this “exclusive club” really wantsyou to be one of its members. Only you can tell your story. Why are you waiting?

  Shake the Dust (Excerpt)

  BY ANIS MOJGANI

  This is for the fat girls

  This is for the little brothers

  This is for the schoolyard wimps and the childhood bullies that tormented them

  For the former prom queen and for the milk crate ball players

  For the nighttime cereal eaters

  And for the retired elderly Walmart store front door greeters

  Shake the dust

  This is for the benches and the people sitting upon them

  For the bus drivers who drive a million broken hymns

  For the men who have to hold down three jobs simply to hold up their children

  For the nighttime schoolers

  And for the midnight bikers who are trying to fly

  Shake the dust

  This is for the two year olds

  Who cannot be understood because they speak half English and half God

  Shake the dust

  For the boys with the beautiful sisters

  Shake the dust

  For the girls with the brothers who are going crazy

  For those gym class wallflowers and the twelve year olds

  afraid of taking public showers

  For the kid who is always late to class because he forgets

  the combination to his locker

  For the girl who loves somebody else

  Shake the dust

  This is for the hard men who want love but know that it won’t come

  For the ones who are forgotten

  The ones the amendments do not stand up for

  For the ones who are told speak only when you are spoken to

  And then are never spoken to

  Speak every time you stand so you do not forget yourself

  Do not let one moment go by that doesn’t remind you

  That your heart, it beats 900 times every single day

  And that there are enough gallons of blood to make everyone of you oceans

  Do not settle for letting these waves that settle

  And for the dust to collect in your veins . . .

  SO YOU WANT TO WRITE A POEM

  “& I shopped for a women’s suit once

  It was charcoal & lifeless

  I wore it to an interview for a job I didn’t get

  & kept it in my closet for seven years

  & that’s all to say I tried being obedient

  but, I liked being a poet a little more”

  — JANAE JOHNSON

  The best way to start is to find something you feel passionate about. A person, a place, a political issue. Death, grief, growing up, childbirth. Avocados, if you feel fiery about them. Poetry uses heightened language to create heightened feelings, so a poem about the dentist by someone who feels just-okay about going to the dentist won’t be that interesting. Tell the world how you feel about the freckles on your daughter’s face. Or the internal terror of being lost in the Macy’s Day Parade. Write a poem about a moment witnessed on public transportation that impacted you (we all have one) or a poem that illustrates how the word “crush” got its name. Write a poem that someone would want to read on their deathbed. A poem you’d want a baby to hear as a map for this world. Make a list of things you could speak about for thirty minutes or longer. Review the list. Congratulations, these are all already incredible topics.

  The poet Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz advises that if you’ve told a story more than three times in your life, it should be a poem. Are there interesting stories you want to tell? Poetry can be an awesome vehicle for that.

  Is there a person or thing you want to celebrate? Write an ode, or a praise song. Is there a person or thing you were taught to not celebrate, but want to reclaim? Write an ode to that person or thing. Can you write a poem for the cockroach in your apartment, that worthy opponent? A poem for the perfume of your ex on someone else’s neck?

  We often think of poetry as full of grand, sweeping sentiments and massive abstract nouns such as love, death, life, birth, heartbreak, etc. And it is. It is! But poems are successful when they focus on much smaller details. Know this: The details of your life are the poem. What you remember, what you write down, those are the images. So much of poetry is the noticing: the folds of an ear, the exact shape the clouds overhead took when you learned the news of _________. Become the detective of your own life. Carry around a notebook. Write the nitty-gritty down. We know people cried at the funeral—but what did the wafer taste like in your mouth? We know watching childbirth was a miracle— but what was the one private thought you had that completely shook you?

  You own the details of your life. If you can write the important ones down, clearly, vividly, honestly, your poem is already there. The rest is just practice.

  THE MYTH OF WRITER’S BLOCK

  Writer’s block is make-believe and many times used as an excuse to be lazy, because a writer wanted a brilliant poem to appear without really wanting to do the hard work of writing it. You can always write something. Even if it’s overflowing with suckiness. And most likely, if you haven’t been writing in weeks or months, the poem you are going to write will suck. Writing is a muscle. Like any other of your muscles, if you don’t exercise it, it will get weak and limp. If you work it out every day, it will get strong and sculpted. So here are the two crucial steps to sculpt your writing muscle:

  1. WRITE EVERY DAY.

  Try this for a week: Write. Every day, for ten minutes. No matter what, every one of us can find ten minutes in our day to write. Maybe you set your morning alarm earlier than usual. Maybe you take a break from Facebook, or Candy Crush, or Combating the Patriarchy, and devote ten minutes to your craft. Maybe it’s the thing you do in between brushing your teeth and dreaming. Take a t
rain to work? Try it then. Put an alarm on your phone that reminds you. Don’t allow yourself to forget it. Writing can often seem like a giant Cyclops we have to wrestle. But it isn’t. And ten minutes is something we can all manage.

  “But what do I write about?” you might ask. Some days you will know exactly what you want to say—your life will feed you a topic. Other days you will feel like a dried-up well. Those days you can simply start by writing about how it feels to be writing, or by noticing things in your environment, noting the high and low points of your week, exploring a photograph or your feelings about something you read. One really cool exercise is to write a “five-sentence biography of the day.” It will seem silly at first, but it does not matter, as long as you are writing for at least ten minutes straight, without pausing to judge, read, or correct what you wrote. Here’s Zen Buddhist author Natalie Goldberg’s advice for this practice:

  Keep your hand moving. Do not pause to reread the line you’ve just written. That’s stalling and trying to get control of what you’re saying. Don’t cross out. That’s editing as you write. Even if you write something you didn’t mean to write, leave it. Don’t worry about spelling, punctuation, grammar. Don’t even care about staying within the margins and lines on the page. Lose control. Don’t think. Don’t get logical. Go for the jugular. If something comes up in your writing that is scary or naked, dive right into it.

  Some days all you can squeeze out is ten minutes. Other days you will find yourself writing for hours. But as long as you get in those ten minutes each day, you are doing your job of choosing to be a writer. By practicing writing, even if you have “nothing to say” (those are the days you really learn!), you will be prepared when something big happens in your life that you want to write about. You won’t have to retrain the writing muscle. It will just be waiting for you.

  2. READ! IT’S A CRUCIAL INGREDIENT.