Get Well, Reuben Woolley

6 Replies

Yesterday I wrote about Reuben Woolley, today I’ve recorded a poem for him. I’m going to send the poem to him by messaging him through his Facebook Page. I’m sharing the link so you can join us in wishing him well if you like.

Unfortunately there’s another page I need to share, a medical fundraiser for our #OctPoWriMo host Morgan Dragonwillow. Here’s what she wrote today:
“I fell on October 13th and the orthopedist says I, at minimum, stretched/sprained my MCL and possibly tore it and the miniscus. According to the doc, at minimum I can’t work for six weeks and the medical bills are starting to add up as I do not have insurance. Emergency room was $2200, the orthopedist I do not have a total for today yet but I’m sure it is going to be at least several hundred with the x-rays and this special brace, not counting future visits. The MRI is $525 and if I need surgery, a whole lot more will be added. Of course I have my regular bills, aprox. $800 a month, of which I’ll also need help with until I can start working again.

I do not like having to ask for help, but if you can it would be greatly appreciated.”

You can also help by sharing her fundraiser.

If you want to read the poem instead of watching the video, you can find the original here.

Read a poem for me

1 Reply

“Read a poem for me”. That’s what Reuben Woolley wrote on Facebook when he knew he was going to get a liver transplant. Reuben is a poet and the creator of I am not a silent poet, a magazine for poetry and artwork protesting against abuse in any of its forms. He also started The curly mind, for linguistically innovative poetry.

On October 17th, his daughter wrote:

“He is in critical condition. The surgery on Monday night was long and really complicated. Then on Tuesday, they had to do a second surgery after which doctors were a bit more optimistic. He is still sedated and we’ve been warned that evolution is slow in this sort of cases. Thankfully, his vitals are getting a bit more stable and the doctors have been able to slowly decrese some of the drugs he’s getting. Yesterday they also removed the sedation but of course it will take a while until it wears off.”

We’ve sent him many well wishes through Facebook, and I remembered that he asked us to read a poem for him. So I’ve made this call on YouTube, to get the idea started. Please join in if you feel like supporting Reuben in this tough time.

Today, for #OctPoWriMo day 20, my entry is Reuben reading from his new book:

Our prompt today was mountains. I don’t know Reuben personally, but to me he seems a person that will move mountains if he can. To create a better world.

Reuben, we’re thinking of you! ❤

Seasonal musings

3 Replies

Shall I compare thee to a summer day?
One of those blazing hot days when you don’t know where to find shelter?
One of those rainy ones when it’s too cold and too grey for the time of the season?

Or shall I compare you to a winter day?
One of those ice cold days when your breath freezes in your lungs?
One of those sleet filled days when every slope is a death trap?

Shall I compare you to an autumn day?
One of those windy days when there’s no hiding from the sound of the blowing wind?
One of those thunder filled days when lightning deforms everything it sheds light on?

I will definitely not compare you to a spring day.
My favourite season.

Our prompt on OctPoWriMo.com was ‘purple’. I’m obviously off prompt. I’m tired, and I already wrote a blog post for Procrastination Coach today. No energy left to write, I leafed through an old note book and found this one.

Touching

1 Reply

Stress
Raging, haunting
Throughout my body
Will I be disappointed?
Tears

Foot
Hurt, broken
Hiding in cast
Surgeon checked x-ray today
Relief

My day started with a huuuuuuuge fear of disappointment, I was scared out of my wits that the surgeon would have bad news for me today, at my hospital appointment. Instead, he declared that the healing process looks good.

I’m so incredibly and hugely relieved!!!!! It means I’m allowed to let my foot (well, cast) touch the ground again, 108 days after I fell. It still can’t bear any weight, but wooooowwwwww!!!

This will also mean that my dream of continuing my training program in PSEN this year is attainable, practically. The financial part is still a challenge, but a friend made me this: https://www.gofundme.com/f/be-a-ripple-of-healing I’m going to make it happen, somehow! If you like to contribute you can also ask me for a poem, a painting, or a coaching session! After being physically inactive for months I SO want to get back in the world again. If you’d like to talk to me: angela at procrastinationcoach dot net.

An elevenie is an eleven-word poem of five lines, with each line performing a specific task in the poem. The first line is one word, a noun. The second line is two words that explain what the noun in the first line does, the third line explains where the noun is in three words, the fourth line provides further explanation in four words, and the fifth line concludes with one word that sums up the feeling or result of the first line’s noun being what it is and where it is.

Quintessentially Dutch

21 Replies

I identify more
with riding a bike
than with being Dutch
which makes me
very – very – very
Dutch

I was able to make pictures of this windmill this weekend, thinking ahead for #ThursdayDoors. But what to write about windmills, to turn it into a post for #OctPoWriMo too? I ended up writing about being Dutch. I can assure you it’s really, really, really strange for me to not be able to ride my bike. I’m in my 16th week of not being able to cycle due to my broken foot, and it influences my life immensely. Basically I’m going nowhere. Can’t walk, so no public transport. Can’t use my foot, so not riding a bike. No car driving either. Luckily people take me out for walks, pushing me in a wheel chair (which I could loan through our Dutch health care system).

Tomorrow I will have to find a way to write about the GoFundMe page a friend set up for me. It’s no use having one if I don’t dare to share it…

 

IMG_20191013_143832IMG_20191013_143732IMG_20191013_143606IMG_20191013_143757IMG_20191013_143912IMG_20191013_171757

Timed out

20 Replies

Broken foot
Broken brain
Broken inspiration

Full recovery of function
Wanted, hoped fore

Statistics make no promises
Time isn’t telling yet

Meet the members of the cast
They’re used to tell time

Blue with a split
Summer time
Warm weather
Warm neighbours
Warm feet

White
One night only
Bloodied
Beyond repair

Red
Hospital, home
Morphine, fever
Television, sleep

Blue no split
Stitches stitching
Waiting, waiting
The discovery of patience

Yellow
Oh how this poem bores me!
Does this malarky ever end?
Still no walking
13 weeks and counting
Counting!
14, 15

Purple
Thinner leg
Tighter cast
Still counting
No walking
Waiting
ARGHHHHHHHH

This poem has no end. My foot is still in the purple cast. I fell on July 2nd, got the correct diagnosis three weeks later, was operated on on September 12th, and it’ll be December before my foot is cast out…

Our poor host at octpowrimo.com has suffered some physical bad luck, which is a very good day to share her Patreon page I believe. On Patreon you can support artists financially, and get special rewards in exchange for your support. Morgan has been hosting #OctPoWriMo for years now, generously sharing her energy and inspiration with many poets all over the world. This is what she writes about asking for support:

Why Patreon?

I’m in the midst of a breakup and I need to move and my finances are limited. Currently my only choice is to move into the shed/cottage/tiny house, in my daughter’s backyard. It has electricity, windows, doors, possibilities. I will have to come up with the money to fix it up and make it livable.

 

Checking out

1 Reply

Each day I’m exhausted
proud of making changes
fed up with the time it takes

Writing poems
is an act of defiance
protesting the void
reclaiming imagination

Prescription followed
check

Escaped into creation
check

Today’s prompt at OctPoWriMo.com was ‘Mother, may I?’. My mum visited me today, so I looked through my notebook to see if there was an unpublished one hiding in there. There was 🙂

IMG_20191001_114305

For you

4 Replies

tiptoe around the house
wear anger on your feet
when you find fault
crush it
dig your heel in
hard
then smile
“I got rid of that –
for you”

continue
to
tiptoe around the house
wearing anger on your feet
crushing flaws
‘for you’

OctPoWriMo.com today says:

“The Earth is a fine place and worth fighting for.”
—Ernest Hemingway

Today’s Prompt : Mother Earth

I agree. I’m off prompt today because I’m spending as much time as I can listening to a free summit:

A 9-Day Global Event to Explore How to Heal
Personal, Intergenerational & Collective Trauma

The summit is very on prompt I believe. You can still sign up for it, listen to the talks an download the bonuses. The talks are about individual trauma, collective trauma, trauma through generations, and our impact on the planet. The ones I’ve listened to so far are great. Here’s the online opening event:

Ire

5 Replies

 

I was eating anger by the spoonful, stuffing it into my mouth with unwashed hands, greedily swallowing without chewing, starved of life force, smearing my face, not caring what it looked like, eating, stuffing, swallowing, until I could feel the sadness subside.

I am at peace

Todays prompt at octpowrimo.com was black. It’s one of my favourite colours to wear, and charcoal is a wonderful medium to work with. Even with all these happy associations with black, I ended up writing a darker poem. I’ve written aplenty about depression, so there’s more blackness if you like.

I lost connection

19 Replies

at the pharmacy

while bombs fell

I worried when

you texted me

good things

you’ll miss

in life

the feeling of being alive

seemed to fall apart

beyond repair

the news broke

your last selfie

my train of thoughts

shattered

I switched off

your dreams

and apologised

Jane Dougherty wrote a fabulous cleave poem today, for the silence prompt on octpowrimo.com. Hers made me want to try one too. It turned out to be contagious. SMSaves wrote a very good one, called Working Mind Wanders.

How to read a cleave poem?

1. Read the left hand poem as a first one.
2. Read the right hand poem as a second one.
3. Read the whole as a third one.

I guess I could claim I’ve invented a new form, with the title and last line turning the poem into a diamond shape – if your fantasy is rich. I’ve been experimenting with tables before, I suspect I may have written one or more cleave poems before. I’ll search through my site and see if I can add some links or tags, so they are easier to find.

Update: no cleaves found yet, but two table poems, one diamond and one square:
i is a number (I’m not)
Disposition