Meditate

Self-care is a radical act in a world that values production over people. Reading, reciting, and writing are ways to reconnect authentically with oneself and to challenge the status quo.

Reading: Find poems in our anthology that speak to your experience, that widen your world, or that create connections across time and place.

Reciting: Voice the beauty and the truth that needs to be heard. Find a poem that can be a daily affirmation.

e.e. cummings

anyone lived in a pretty how town

(with up so floating many bells down)

spring summer autumn winter

Jane Mead

From World of Made and Unmade

In my dream my mother comes with me.

We are in the meadows we call

The Flats, walking the dogs.

Walk straight past the water trough,

she says, do not engage the moss.

Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm

sturgeon

i twist and gasp

open and close my mouth

searching for air

whenever a sturgeon is caught in the rainy river

i know

the feel of strange hands touching my body

the struggle

Joy Harjo

Praise the Rain

Praise the rain, the seagull dive

The curl of plant, the raven talk-

Praise the hurt, the house slack

Wang Xiaoni

I Feel the Sun

Down a long, long corridor

I keep walking…

—A window straight ahead so bright it hurts the eyes,

Rachael Boast

Cocteau Twins

I’ve heard the phrase between you

and me too many times to believe

it to be true, but between me and you

Changming Yuan

Chinese Chimes: Nine Detours of the Yellow River

you are unaware of your obscure sources

but you are explicitly sure of the vast sea

as your final destination

A. J. M. Smith

The Lonely Land

Cedar and jagged fir

uplift sharp barbs

against the gray

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