A REFUGE IN THE SMALLEST OF PLACES
BY TRACY SCHLAPP
For Emily Dickinson, one of the singers.
And for all who those fleeing on those ancient migration
trails north, for home
Joy Harjo, A Refuge in the Smallest of Places
We set the table on our workshop days by first reading a poem out loud. It is the jump-off point for writing exercises. We borrow lines, we finish thoughts, we let the language sink into our bones. Practically speaking, poems are easily transported into prisons, they can be photocopied and shared. A poem provides a short lesson in how to arrange language on a page, how words sound side-by-side. Poems are immediate, they are epic. And poets are teachers with wide-lived experiences and the ability to see and transform details with precision. They can provide clarity. There is nothing more satisfying than reading a poem and having the room burst into whoops.
Someone sang for me and no one else could hear it
Now I am here in the timeless room of lost poetry.
Joy Harjo, A Refuge in the Smallest of Places
In The Timeless Room of Lost Poetry, Patricia Norenberg describes her own room, filled with hundreds of books in different languages that she can leaf through in her own time. Imagination lets Pattye escape her prison time. Amy Zimmerman explores ideas of freedom and personal priorities in her Timeless Room.
The Coffee Creek Correctional Facility group in minimum read three alone poems together, harvesting phrases for their own writing.
Alone by Carl Sandburg
Alone by Philip Levine
Alone for a Week by Jane Kenyon
Michelle Ehlers wrote: For me it was getting late; for you, where you were, not. Loneliness reappeared and my reality was again clear … Take me back to my memory, for I was fulfilled there. Your touch, your smile, the smell only you possess, I could feel the unconditional love only a mother knows of a child … Reality is, I messed up and cannot take it back. I am alone, yet surrounded by people, people I don’t really know. Now, I must seek inner freedom to a life of healing as to combat, the lonely feeling. Comfort within my own skin is where I must start as nobody can truly fill me until I truly feel worthy. The journey is mine and those I love are waiting as I jump through the fiery hoops not willing to give up on them or me.
Nicia Campbell wrote: The bed on your side seemed familiar, inviting, yet sad with your absence. How easy the mattress forgets the weight, but the fabric holds your scent and comforts me in a warm embrace. I smile as I drift off with an intoxication by your smell. Anticipating your return, I giggle as I enjoy the new Ritual.
EL Maldonado selected “under the black sky” for her poem Solace. In Alone, Lorinda Bowen modified Jane Kenyon’s line to write: “I wonder why you’re not here.”
We tracked the phrases that each writer selected from the three poems. By compiling and modifying those phrases, we constructed this found poem.
Alone
turning to water under a black sky,
following a broken trail of stones.
A lone
gust of wind —
for me, it was getting late;
for you, where you were,
Not
in the bed on your side. | TDS