Writing with Juliet Iwelunmor

If I was to listen to all the voices within from all the places that I don’t know where, if I were to share all the lessons keeping words have taught me, as I crossed the 1000 notes threshold yesterday, the word felicity would come to mind. Yes, because I just finished reading Mary Oliver’s book of poetry entitled Felicity. But more so for the poem below, she wrote about a “voice from I don’t know where.”

Couple of weeks ago, I shared how stories I wrote were rejected recently because they read like a stream of consciousness. What they didn’t know is that I have been delving into what that means for myself and the world of Mary Oliver helps to clarify this deeply for me.

If I was to rewrite the poem for myself here, it would go like this (and thank you Mary Oliver for being a teacher).

So now that you have posted something to keep 1000 times, it seems you love to keep anything very much.

Yes, yes I do. My days are full of beautiful lessons.

And you don’t mind, the mind that keeps you writing all the time, with its gloom and glow musings?

Nope, I love the hope and impediments each day brings.

And you don’t mind keeping things that are joyful and things hard, like how academic spaces force you to dream things heavy.

I mean dreams have to be vivid with unusual clarity, even when they teach the point of a struggle.

And you have people in your life whose hands you would like hold.

Yes, I do, six I call my own personal people, plus many that are like legions to me and one with legs instead of hands.

It must surely then be happy now that you crossed 1000 notes on what to keep.

It is. My heart is full of joy, in a state of felicity for what it means to keep, keep words, your way, your way.

Felicity means a quality and state of being happy. To live through something that causes a state of happiness, a pleasing manner in art and language. There is a certain fittingness to moments that lead to felicity. Beyond things right and wrong, the middle where you meet, like a day with something in it forever, regardless of any hopes or impediments you may have encountered, that space where you touch yourself for yourself with the words and stories you tell yourself is to live in a state of being happy, felicity.

Yesterday, unknown to myself, I crossed the 1000 word thresholds of writing something every day for as much as I can. I didn’t know the power of words, my own, my way, until I started to keep them for myself. To do so right before Earth day is a reminder always, to love your words, love the world too, however you see, whether dark or bright, and all the in between. The strangeness and wonder of keeping words every day is a gift I will forever treasure. I hope you join and help me spread the warmth of words, the warmth of joy that comes when you keep words for you, no matter how small, this Earth day and beyond.