Photo & post (remixed) from the archive, April 2018. Woolly Bench, Glasgow Botanical Gardens.
I'm taking a dose of my own poetic medicine this morning. Reminding myself that big life transitions* can feel like sea swimming alone on a moonless night. Heart beating fast. Wondering if my toes are going to be nibbled by baby sharks or whether I'll emerge wearing a jellyfish on my head**. Everywhere is a shade of darkness. I'm scared of swimming too far out.
Except I already have.
I often use poem prompts to jump start my creative writing process especially if I'm feeling rattled or unsettled. When I’m trying to work stuff out. You know that claggy stuff that hides in the folds and creases of our insides somewheres? It's a bit gooey. It contains all sorts of wonderful and weird ingredients. Magic ingredients.
Inspired by the introductory manifesto in Belonging by Toko-pa Turner, I used her first line "For the rebels and the misfits..." (and borrowed a couple of other words/turns too) as a seed for my own piece. To make some understandings. It’s absolutely fine to do this for our own personal poetic medicine. It’s powerful. It honours the impact of another’s words on us. How it’s moved us. Changed us just a little bit.
Poem-making like this helps me work out what on earth this 'stuff' is trying to tell me. To give myself a promise of moonlight at the end. So I can see the shore. It’s absolutely fine to do this for our own personal poetic medicine.
* If we share it on, remember to cite and credit the source and the inspiration.*
For the rebels and the misfits, the outsiders and unbelongers.
For the rootless, the uprooted, the refugees, the scarred ones and the orphans.
For the otherwired ones, the Black and Brown and Indigenous ones, the custodians of the original lands and ways.
For the cast-outs, the gobby ones, the dare-to-expose mavericks, the silenced ones.
For the weirdos, the misunderstood ones, the ones-who-missed-out and the can't do the 9-5'ers. Refusers of the capitalist machine ones.
For the wild ones, our creature kin, branched ones, planted ones, watery ones and for all the elements that make this world. Make us.
For the ponderers, the hyper-empaths, the quiet ones and the shy ones.
For the wild imagineers, the rejected ones, the queer ones, the naked sea swimmers, the midnight storytellers and the fire-side poets.
For the silver-streaked, wise sisters of the blood-free clan.
May you open up to the raw power of your voice. Let you scribble yourself through wet ink on to paper. Into the air. Your songs reach the moon. Weave wonder in to your night dreams.
Let the thirsty page drink up your voice and drink some more. Drunk, be your own pen medicine. A lyrical balm. Take when needed.
May you risk mistakes. Risk being unlikeable. Dare to grow beyond who you've been expected to be. Words have that quiet way of shaking up your insides. And unsettling those around you.
If you dare to share your quirks and cracks and hopes and dreams – though they may shock and tease – may they reach those who recognise the uttering of a feral wordster. A fellow tinker. And let you be their medicine too.
May you see that when you live your own poetry, the disapprovers, the naysayers and the unbelievers will move to the side whilst you continue to stride. Gather your family-ar kin.
It will take time to move from one land to another. To be in exile from your old life. You may be shunned and invisible-ised, demonised and misunderstood. The loneliness may sear you.*** Suddenly, you'll find yourself one step past that middle space. One step too far forward to step backwards. This is wobble space. 'Oh fuck space'. The no-going-back-space.
May you hold on tight to this liminality. Hold on to the one thing you know – your raw voice is tilling a new land – upon which you will plant new seeds into rich soil. Fertilised with all you have ever known and all that you have ever risked and the nutrients of long-buried nocturnal wishes.
Eventually you will rise up. Supported. Rooted. Wildly alive.
© Dal Kular
Oh Dal you amazing wonderful inspiring woman! Love you and your poetic medicine ❤️