Coffee, Tea and Poetry, Simple Pleasures for Body, Mind and Spirit … “I say let the world go to hell, but I should always have my tea.”Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes from Underground
When I started The Bardo Group, now The Bardo Group Beguines (publishers of The BeZine), back in February 2011, I had in mind the human union in sacred space (common ground) as it is expressed through the arts and the sharing of work that is representative of universal human values however differently they might bloom in our varied religions and cultures. I feel that our art and our Internet-facilitated social connection offer a means to see one another in our simple humanity, as brothers and sisters, and not as “other.” They also offer a means to get some other good things done.
I have written about:
English poet and musician, John Anstie and the Grass Roots Poetry Group, that was founded through Twitter friendships and that published a collection to raise funds for UNICEF;
Dorothy Yamamoto, a poet and editor who brought a group of A-list English poets together to create a collecton, Hands & Wings, to raise funds for the rehabilitation and support of torture victims seeking protection in the U.K.; and,
Silva Merjanian who – along with her publisher – has donated procedes from the sale of her collection Rumor to fund assistance for Armenians escaping violence in Syria. The last time I spoke with her $5,000 was raised.
Today I’d like to bring three more initiatives to your attention:
Evelyn Augusto’s “Guns Don’t Save Live, Poets Do,Dueling with Words to Stop Gun Violence;”
Jazz singer Candice Hawley’s “Let’s Talk About it,” a free and open discussion of Anxiety and Depression; and,
Rev. Terri Stewart’s Peacemaking Circles for Seattle’s incarcerated youth. Terri is the founder of The BeZine’s sister site, Beguine Again, and a member of the zine’s core team.
“537 children under the age of eleven have been killed or injured by gun violence in the United States this year alone, according to Gun Violence.org.” Evelyn Augusto
Evelyn asked me to share information on her project (I’ve included some info in a few Sunday Announcement posts).
She is available to come and speak at high schools and to youth groups;
She’s encouraging more people to write and post poems on gun violence;
LET’S TALK ABOUT IT: Special for our Silicon Valley/South Bay friends, a workshop hosted by Jazz Singer Candice Hawley as part of her church’s Good Works Project: Let’s Talk About It is a free and open discussion of Anxiety and Depression, Chemical Imbalances and overall Mental Health. Candice says, “you’ll hear stories of lived experience, see a presentation by Tanya Pekker, MFT, on anxiety and depression, engage in a Q&A with all participants and more . . .” Saturday, October 28, 10 am – Noon, Boys & Girls Club of the Peninsula, Moldaw-Zaffaroni Clubhouse, 2031 Pulgas Avenue, East Palo Alto, CA. Register HERE.
courtesy of Terri Stewart
Note: Among other things, Terri Stewart and colleagues are holding peacemaking circles with youth who have been picked up on possession of firearms. Recently the success of these circles was acknowledged by the Seattle Times HERE.
The July issue of The BeZine covered prison culture and restorative justice. Learn about peacemaking circles in this excerpt from July’s The BeZine.
JUSTICE IN NEW-OLD WAY
by
Terri Stewart
Rev. Terri Stewart, Associate Pastor at Riverton Park United Methodist Church
Today, we sat in the King County Youth Service Center lobby that had been turned into a courtroom for the sentencing of one of the youth we have been working with. I am a member of the King County Peacemaking Coordinating Team (PCT). We apply the principles of Peacemaking Circles, an ancient process taught to us by the Tagish and Tlingit First Nation people to modern court cases. A new-old way.
Today, we heard from the judge, the prosecution, the defense, the PCT…and then the respondent (person who did harm) spoke. And then the victim’s mother spoke.
We were all blubbering and sniffling by the end of it. But not because it was hurtful. The tears were because of the witness of transformation and hope. To see a genuinely healed person extend their hand to honor the victim. To see the victim’s family stand up and say, “Do more of this.”
There are some flaws to work out but that is because we are human. And this process is all about becoming more completely human.
In this particular case, the respondent had committed felony harassment. This charge on a juvenile record could irrevocably alter his future. It would limit his housing, loans, educational opportunities and more. I don’t know if we really understand what we do to juveniles when we hang felonies around their neck during a time in their life when their brain is not fully formed. But I digress.
I remember the mother of the victim looking at the respondent and saying (paraphrase), “It is so good to see you this way. Before, all I had as an image of you was the threat on social media where you had a gun and were threatening my boy’s life. You were scary. Now you are human.”
During the Peacemaking Circle process that took about 8 months, we discovered how similar the respondent and victim were. They were both from homes going through divorce. They both loved photography. They were both kids being sunk by the social systems around them. One responded by acting out. The other by withdrawing. In this case, working towards healing the family systems healed the crime. It helped everyone remember that they were human. And that we are all human.
I share below with you the recommendation from the PCT and the joy in a complete dismissal of charges against the respondent. (I’ve removed the names of the young people involved).
Can I get an Amen?!
Summary and Final Recommendations for Referral #4
July 7, 2017
Good afternoon, my name is Safia Ahmed and I am a member of the King County Peacemaking Coordinating Team. I have the honor of speaking on behalf of the team to share the work that has been done in this case and our recommendations for sentencing.
To begin, the Peacemaking Coordinating Team would like to honor and thank the victim and his family who gave their courageous support for this case to be referred. Their support and willingness to participate was instrumental in this restorative process to promote healing and partnership between King County, community based organizations, faith based communities, and the youth, families and communities of King County.
We received a referral for the respondent’s case on October 11, 2016 from Senior Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Jimmy Hung. A home visit was conducted with the respondent and his family to determine the suitability of this referral for the Peacemaking Circle process. In addition, a home visit was also conducted with the victim and the victim’s family to share an overview of the Peacemaking Circle process, answer any questions and gain an understanding of what level of participation in the Peacemaking Circle process they may want to have.
After completing both home visits, the Peacemaking Coordinating Team accepted the case. The following summarizes the work done since accepting the case in December 2016 until July 1, 2017.
Five Healing Circles with the respondent, the respondent’s family and community members who wanted to show support. Each circle was on average 3 to 4 hours long. These circles were to promote healing, peace and reconciliation and as preparation to meet with the victim and the victim’s family since they indicated their openness to actively participating in the Peacemaking Circle process.
The respondent and his parents participated in an all-day community circle with King County Executive Dow Constantine and other King County leaders on March 11, 2017.
The respondent’s mother attended a 3-Day Introductory Peacemaking Circle Training from April 26-28, 2017
One Pre-sentencing Circle and One Sentencing Circle that included the presence of the victim’s mother along with criminal justice stakeholders; friends and family from both parties.
Approximately 8 hours of check-ins via phone and text with the victim’s mother and her family, keeping them apprised of the respondent’s progress with the Peacemaking Circle process.
Ongoing check-ins with the Criminal Justice stakeholders involved in the respondent’s case, keeping them apprised of the respondent’s progress.
One home visit and approximately 20-25 hours of check-ins via phone and text with the respondent over the course of 7 months.
The following outline was agreed upon in the Sentencing Circle as a conclusion to this case:
Reimbursement to the victim’s family for 8 of the 12 counseling sessions the victim partook in for self-care and healing work. Each session cost $120 for a total of $960
2 sessions paid by the respondent
3 sessions paid by the respondent’s family
3 sessions paid from funds provided by the community and the Peacemaking Coordinating Team
The respondent’s father kindly agreed to show support to the victim and the victim’s mother by offering to pay for a trip as an opportunity to spend time with each other to rebuild their relationship along with having a positive experience coming from the respondent and his family.
In addition the Peacemaking Coordinating Team also recommends the following:
6 months of volunteer work with the Peacemaking Coordinating Team as a way to give back and pay it forward that includes:
Attending the Peacemaking Coordinating Team meetings once a month
Participate and help lead a monthly Young Men’s Circle in support of other young people who are going through similar situations.
The respondent, with the support of his brothers and parents, has agreed to these recommendations as a way to heal the harm he has caused to the victim, the victim’s family and to the community at large.
The Peacemaking Coordinating Team would like to conclude our review and recommendations to this case by again expressing our heartfelt gratitude to the victim and the victim’s family who graciously permitted the respondent and his family to participate in the Peacemaking Circle process even while contending with the harm inflicted by the respondent’s actions. It is our belief that their generosity and commitment to restorative practices have given space for the healing process to begin for both families. We would also like to express our appreciation to the court, our criminal justice partners and the community for the continued support of our work.
Shalom and Amen,
Terri Stewart
Currently Terri is raising money for the King County Peacemaking Teams. As I write this $1,555 of $2,000 has been raised. Details and to donate link HERE.
‘Twas All Hallows’ Eve, and all through the house
Every creature was stirring, even our pet mouse
Oh the pumpkins were carved with very great care
In the hope that trick-or-treaters soon would be there
The children were agitated, not one in her bed
As visions of sweet treats danced in their heads
Dad and I in our costumes and me with my cap
Had settled by the door listening for the first rap
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter
We sprang to our feet to check on the matter
We threw open our door to offer sweet stash
While witches flew by, all glitter and flash
And the moon on the rise and the dark ground below
Gave lustre and bluster to ghosts on the go
And what to our startled eyes should appear,
But a miniature ballerina among goblins, one bear
Now, Alice! Now Ernie! Now Jimmy! Now Chris!
Come little Tony, big Brandy and Trish
To the top of the stairs, don’t any one fall …
Now dash away, dash away, dash away all
Write a Halloween poem or a poem commemorating a traditional fall celebration from your own culture. If you feel comfortable, leave your work or a link to it in the comments section below. All work shared on theme will be published here next Tuesday. Anyone is welcome to take part no matter the status of your career, beginning, emerging or established. You have until Monday, October 30 at 8 pm PST.
Last Wednesday’s Writing Prompt, The Scent of Ma’amoul, October 18 was to write about favorite winter memories and these poems are mostly just that. All are well done. Welcome to Anthony Carl and Lisa Ashley, newcomers to Wednesday Writing Prompt. A warm welcome back to Renee Espiru, Kakali Das Gosh, Colin Blundell, Paul Brookes, Sonja Benskin Mesher and Ginny Brannon. Enjoy this weeks collection and visit the poets at their blogs as well. Join us tomorrow for the next prompt. Everyone are welcome to share their work, no matter the stage of career: beginning, emerging or experience.
winter offering
the first frozen
day and my whole
world is swallowed
in snow. quiet air
chills my bones
as i draw each breath.
exhale.
every grey puff
is winter’s sacred
meditation chime,
an invocation
of gratitude as time
fades quickly away.
ANTHONY CARL majored in English Literature and has worked in the financial services industry for twenty years. Poetry is his outlet for creativity and staying sane. He is the author of one collection of poetry, Awaiting the Images, and his work appears in publications such as Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Panoply, and Empirical Magazine.
Snowball Wars
Red rubber boots, unlined and stiff, crackling with the cold,
stuffed with small round snowballs at days’ end,
attached to our snowpant cuffs
like the thistle burrs in summer to our socks,
we seven heedlessly dumped it all out on the kitchen linoleum,
pulling off those puffy clown pants,
draping wet woolen mittens, grandma knit,
over the wooden rack in the corner.
The mittens and hats never dried between forays
into that foot-deep,
knee-deep white stuff,
yet back on they went, wet and clammy next day
our enthusiasm warming the wet threads.
We never tired of building the snow forts
creating our cover, our barricade for attacking the neighbor kids,
defending our clan against them all,
my job to form the balls,
keep the pyramid pile stacked
so my brothers could jump up and fire them
over the top of the u-shaped fort.
I cowered from the enemy’s rock-hard snow bullets,
happy to make the ammunition behind the front line.
Were we catching a sense of what a war would be like,
years before my brother was sent to Vietnam?
I tried hard to follow directions,
pack the snow hard,
slapping the balls together in my smaller hands.
They were older, my brothers, like savages sometimes,
so maybe that’s why they invented the ice ball—
snow dipped in a bucket of water,
then surrounded with more snow—
so dangerous when they connected.
Perhaps our padded clothing kept us safe,
the ice ball dipping the source of their soaked mittens.
Gram had hot chocolate on the stove sometimes
when we came inside in the twilight
on the best winter days.
And no, my balls never measured up to theirs.
The dash says 53 today,
not bad for January.
I glance across the street
into the opening of his tent
pitched there
on the sidewalk
under the overpass.
What tethers his tent there?
His body? His belongings?
He’s a white man, balding.
I can’t stop looking at him.
I check the light.
I invade his tent again.
He’s putting on his shoes, I think,
his tent flap rolled up
to catch the morning light.
Cars move through the intersection
rolling by one after the other.
It’s my turn to go.
Winter’s cut crystal breath
blasts concrete city
and clement countryside alike
as darkness drops down.
We live mostly inside these days.
Some live outside,
connected without choice
to nature’s moods and rhythms.
Gelid wind rushes ‘round corners
down brick and steel canyons,
sneaks beneath crackling tarps
pitched in peril
on grass-barren ground.
Mean homes huddled together,
snugged up behind a stone pole,
the metal dumpster,
a frigid freeway barricade
in hopes of blocking sleety rain.
Who blows on numb hands
inside these rimed plastic walls?
He lies on back-breaking sidewalks
night after night,
hears stiff tarps snapping
with the same indifference
as the taps of sharp-soled boots
skirting his home.
It’s colder than a witch’s tit out there,
we tell each other
over a drink at the bar
while hundreds
hunker down
that frozen-in-time night,
shivering,
waiting for morning
when the tent flap can roll up.
LISA ASHLEY, MDiv, Spiritual Director, Chaplain with incarcerated teens at the King County Detention Center, story-catcher and emerging poet, lives on Bainbridge Island, WA, where she meets with clients, writes and blogs at www.lisaashleyspiritualdirector.com She has also written for The BeZine.
#None keeps promise #
That scarlet evening beside Shilabati is still sleepless
That earthen road through which we did wayfaring
is still waiting for you
That deck bridge across the river
is abiding still now just for you
Some wintry leaves are flying on its chest agonized
On that severe brumal evening
lights of sideway poles were reflecting from the crystalline rivulet
After a long walk we settled on a giant pebble
Grasses -sedges and bamboos were grown most for their foliage
Remains of some aquatic plants were kissing our mortal feet
Divers waterbirds were peeping through hydrilla
You uttered softly witnessing the pole star
,”Jhimli -we will come here again during the next fall of dew .”
and touch the last pole
Now it is a wintry evening anew
I’m tramping again restless and lonely here
Tears rolling down my cheeks are amalgamating with crystalline water of the rivulet
You haven’t kept your words
The mild bridge is calling me
saying -“Don’t wait anymore -none would come –
none would wipe your tears -none keeps promise .”…..
that now perceives a full moon in darkness
slightly hazy behind the thinnest of cloud coverings
behind the stark grasp of wintered branches –
a something – but in reality an absolute nothing
dreaming inconsequentially that it’s a something
by reason of the idea that it guides the scudding pen
across the page in the way it learned long ago to do
to produce a modicum of words – just sufficient
to say that there’s a something that perceives…
and so on and on; there will come other occasions
when it will choose to allow itself to be beguiled
into imagining that grand & conspicuous heaps
and heaps of words make some kind of sense –
all the stout metaphors and the dancing images
circumlocutions qualifications periphrastics…
but in these bold moments before this winter dawn
it has a sudden understanding that between words
– whatever words you so carefully choose –
and the infinite scintillations of externality there are
gross mucky swamps and dire deserts monstrous
mountains & galaxies that can never ever be traversed
Gray chalk hills fade one behind another
until they dissolve into oyster sky.
Ice crystals dance on gelid air,
glisten highway’s edge, and settle
in the crooks of sleeping maples.
Evergreens bend with the weight
of their thick winter shawls.
In spite of its bleakness, we are taken by
the stark frost-coated beauty of it all.
Northbound…
my core senses those timeworn mountains
long before my eyes discern them.
Yet, it is not these ancient mounds
that draw me back, but the folks therein
I long to see—those I love who wait for me.
With each mile passed, the years begin to dissipate;
like those hills now veiled by mist and gloam;
my pulse beats faster as this heart anticpates
that final stretch of road that leads me home.
A sudden snow shower,
flakes fly past the panes,
we watch in silence
mugs in hand; steam rising.
You turn on an old movie—
one seen a dozen times,
maybe more…
we laugh in unison,
quoting favorite lines,
echoing off each other,
anticipating what comes next…
as the steam rises
Jamie Dedes' THE POET BY DAY Webzine 