We will not give in and go mute

Poetry and art. They are necessary and potent in this shitty world.

They hold up a polished mirror to our reality, offering clarity and empathy through a single medium or via the economy of language – a term I believe Zachary Kluckman, a poet in Albuquerque, NM, once introduced to a group of us.

You are not alone.

Sylvia Ramos Cruz, retired physician-surgeon, active activist/poet, and dear friend to many, once told me, “I believe the only purpose of life is to help each other through.”

The human beings behind a work of art or a poem remind us we are not alone. When I lose sight of this, it is often in conjunction with social isolation. I work, come home, read the news, sleep, go to work again. It is no wonder depression sinks in as dirty water into a dry sponge.

I know poetry is in no hurry, though. It is irrevocably patient and compassionate. When I’m ready to open my eyes to the page again, it is there.

Good folks, too, are out there, moving through similar motions.

Toad Hall

There is more to it. Art and words hold the potential to speak through and receive echoes from nature, mindfulness, and any form of sensing and doing that feeds your soul.

When I reach such a level of overwhelm that it’s all I can do to get myself to and from work, there are, at the very least, the trees and old houses. The royal-looking oaks are lined up near a country crossroads opposite acres of vineyards. When I steer onto this road, I raise my coffee tumbler and toast the trees. Soon after, I approach a living antique farmhouse, three stories tall with softly lit windows on foggy mornings. A small sign is situated in the grass near the road, and the Old English script declares it Toad Hall. I say good morning to Toad Hall.

When I am too tired or unmotivated to write, this is my poetry. To notice and to give thanks for such things is not cute or trite. I feel that, in a digital world with content created for 2-second attention spans, taking a pregnant moment to observe the world away from screens nourishes us.

The Tube, and poetry in a bottle

In a couple of weeks, I will return to London for a friend’s memorial. I have not wandered the city since 2019, pre-pandemic. It will be lovely to see old friends, but in our grief, I expect emotions to run high and spill over.

I will need poetry.

Some writers and lovers of words are doing incredible, outside-the-box work. In England, Deborah Alma is the founder and director of Poetry Pharmacy. She has three shops sprinkled across the country and each one sells books, of course, but also medicine bottles with labels such as Hope, Sea-Fever, Older & Wiser, and Existential Angst. Instead of drugs, each bottle contains compressed poems packed into pills. (You can read more about Deborah’s labour of love here.)

We will not give in and go mute. Across the centuries, poets have been notoriously innovative. Sometimes we courageously call out to the world, while other times we quietly rebel.

Through all the shit, poetry will not shut up.

I come into the peace of wild things

As we write this, here in the UK we're enjoying all of the signs of spring and we love to see this persistent renewal in the small things, branches edged with blossom, the return of birdsong and the returning light. As the world feels so unsettled and uncertain, maybe these tender shoots of renewal can remind us that vulnerability is not weakness, but a form of strength and even a kind of generosity.

Kindness and compassion feel especially necessary now and poetry remains, for us, a shared language for these states. Poetry may help us hold complexity and difference, and introduce new voices where we might listen with good attention and empathy. 

-excerpt, Poetry Pharmacy’s 4/20/26 newsletter entitled, I come into the peace of wild things.

Permission to share on this site granted by Deborah Alma

Cheers to poetry, art, nature, authentic goodness (poets can sniff out wolves in sheep’s clothing a kilometer away), and resilience.

Cheers to you.

Keep pedaling,xoxo,

Kim