“I didn’t have an instruction manual, and I searched for one. I was that kind of griever.”
—Sarah Davis
Preview: Breathing Wind Podcast Swap
Dear Emerging Form Family,
This week, something different! We want to share with you the wonderful Breathing Wind podcast, “warm, honest and insightful conversations for journeying introspectively through grief and loss.” This week’s main episode features an interview with Rosemerry on honoring the full range of grief and how creative practice helps with this. And next week’s bonus episode features a reflective conversation between Sarah Davis and Naila Francis about their interview with Rosemerry.
In some ways, Breathing Wind is very like Emerging Form—two friends who get together to discuss something something they’re passionate about. It began with Sarah Davis in 2019 as a personal loss project. After its first year, it evolved into a community of storytellers, each sharing their perspectives on loss through a miniseries format, and then a co-hosted format with Naila Francis. Talk about emerging form! The co-hosts say, “The goal for this podcast is simple: We want you to have more space to hear your voice, connect to your story and honor the truth of your own journey.”
Though our podcast subjects are different—creative practice and grief—there are so many similarities in our explorations. How might we change our perspective? What is the role of awe? How does trust come into this? Community? Guests on Breathing Wind include Grammy-nominated jazz vocalist Nnenna Freelon, author Sarah Chaves, and three-time Grammy nominated singer/composer, choral conductor, music director and vocal activist Melanie DeMore.
What We’re Reading and Listening to:
Rosemerry:
Soooo … the Barbie movie is out, and nothing could have surprised me more than this poem by Alison Luterman, who we featured in Episode 64. Featured this week in Rattle’s Poets Respond, “Barbie Manifesto” is a great conversation starter for anyone who has an opinion about how Barbie has affected our lives.
I just went to see Hamlet in Telluride—a local production of Shakespeare’s famous play in which the murdered king of Denmark appears as a ghost to his son and bids him to take revenge on the new king, Hamlet’s uncle. It’s the ultimate illustration of how our vengeance and hatred ultimately hurts ourselves. More relevant than ever.
Christie:
I read Wendy MacNaughton’s beautiful little sketchbook, HOW TO SAY GOODBYE, in one sitting. Two, actually, because I immediately read it again. The book documents some of the noticing she did while she was an artist-in-residence at the Zen Hospice Project. If you’ve ever been a caretaker for someone while they were dying, you will recognize these observations. It’s slender and spare, yet captures so much of those moments that are both endless and short.
I stumbled upon Claire Keegan's novella FOSTER and it was SO amazingly good that I immediately followed it with her SMALL THINGS LIKE THESE, which was just as beautiful. Both are quiet, thoughtful gorgeous stories that will stay with me for a long time.
My mom tipped me off to THE MEASURE by Nikki Erlick, and I tore through it. The premise is that one day every adult finds a small wooden boxes on their doorstep. Inside is a string that represents the length of your life and therefore how many days or years you have left. do you look? The novel explores how this new knowledge creates new classes and divisions and how it changes (or doesn't) how people live.
Interstellar
The heart that breaks open can contain the whole universe.
—Joanna Macy
Give me a heart that breaks—
ears willing to hear the difficult news
and legs that do not choose to run from it.
Yes, give me a heart big enough
to accommodate a wrestling match inside,
a mind that knows no one wins a war,
hands that move to help no matter
what the mind might say.
Give me a heart that opens
long after it thinks it’s already open,
and lips that know when to listen.
Give me a heart that knows itself
as other hearts. Give me feet
that will stand when someone must stand
for justice. And a spine flexible enough
to turn and see all sides. Snow falls
on all my thoughts. It sometimes
takes a long time to melt, a long time
before I remember again to pray
to be open, to pray for a heart that breaks,
to notice the stars shining from the inside.
—Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
A Note About Paid Subscriptions:
First, we want to thank ALL our subscribers! We are so grateful you join us in this conversation about what it is to engage with yourself, the world and others in a creative way. And a BIG thank you to our paid subscribers. You make this podcast possible. Starting this month, only our paid subscribers will receive our bonus episodes as a thank you for their financial support.
This week, you can hear Naila Francis and Sarah Davis revisit the interview with Rosemerry and pull out meaningful moments and explore them more deeply. If you are not yet a paid subscriber, you can go now to our website, EmergingForm.substack.com, or by clicking the button below. Thank you!
Two Questions:
(share your answers with us here on Substack or in our FB group)
How has your creative practice helped you meet grief?
What song helped you meet a deep grief?
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What song helped you meet a deep grief?
I have never been one to absorb songs, poetry has been my 'go-to' SO although many poems have carried me (including many of yours Rosemerry ), If I were to pick one that I have known a LONG time, it would be " A Brief for the Defense" by Jack Gilbert, because the poem encompasses the deepest despair of the human condition, yet the heart can distill the most exquisite peace and beauty which can sustain .... This phrase I have carried to keep my heart alive during unbearable grief " We must have the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless furnace of this world." sometimes distilled to "Stubborn Gladness" 🙏 💔
How has your creative practice helped you meet grief?
I have used creativity for the last 33 years, the length of time I've been building a relationship with my spirituality. I've operated on my belief of turning suffering (grief) into ART to expand my heART. 💔