I volunteered at Write On’s Health & Healing Conference this morning. Which meant I basically got to listen to an author panel and a writing workshop for the cost of sitting in the back of the room and helping hand out name tags.
The workshop was titled: “The Body’s Voice: A Somatic Journey into Poetry on Grief” led by the poet Phillip B. Williams. In it he gave writing prompts about grief, from describing what grief is, to how it shows up in our body, to writing around the moment of sudden loss . . . describing the setting or anything besides the actual grief. I grabbed a scratch piece of paper and went through the exercises myself.
Grief isn’t always death, but sometimes a different kind of loss — of love, friendship, expectations. I wrote about the Mike & Ike’s I’ll never buy again at a gas station. The brightness of my office when I got the call that a college friend had died. Where grief sits in my body, write in my chest, twisting like a knife.
The prompt that got to me was writing a love letter to my body. “Dear Body . . .” I wrote, “you didn’t give up on me after I harmed you . . .”
I wasn’t expecting my morning to start on this note, but it was beautiful to be around a community of writers. Afterward, I walked to a cafe in Fish Creek and ate on a bench looking over the harbor. I felt grounded, in my body, and connected to myself.
I guess I should volunteer more.
With Love,
Natalie