1. Read the poem 

2. Do your own reflection on it, noting what it inspires in you

3. Feel free to use your own reflection as your prompt or…

4. Use the selection of prompts below the poem

5. Pick one that inspires you and write (feel free to use only one or write several poems using different prompts) or…

6. Don’t use any of the provided prompts and follow your inspiration from wherever it comes

Witness

Sometimes the mountain
is hidden from me in veils
of cloud, sometimes
I am hidden from the mountain
in veils of inattention, apathy, fatigue,
when I I forget or refuse to go
down to the shore, or a few yards
up the road, on a clear day,
to reconfirm
that witnessing presence.

Denise Levertov
https://poets.org/poet/denise-levertov

Next Read Around is April 1, 2022

My Thoughts

There is so much in the world around us that we do not see, that we let exist in the background, without really noticing, as we go about our lives, busy in our own worlds or chasing after our own goals. Even when we “see” some thing in the world, we may not really see it. The word witness means to “know” something by personal experience as opposed to knowing about something through indirect means (being told about it or reading about it or by pictures). We may also notice something  without any real personal engagement, without actually ”experiencing” it. Denise Levertov’s takes witnessing a step further pointing out that it is not a once and done act and must be reconfirmed. The mountain is different at dawn than dusk, in spring than winter. Witnessing is a quality of presence in the world. She notes that we, like a mountain hidden by clouds, can be hidden in clouds of our own inattention or apathy or fatigue.  In those moments, we are no longer available to witness or be witnessed by the world. I suspect a deeper sense of belonging in life awaits us if we could be a witnessing presence more often in life.

Prompt Menu

1. What is the difference between seeing, or sensing (hear, smell, touch, taste) and witnessing?

2. Journal or write about something you witnessed and what you know by your own personal experience from that witnessing. For instance, while hiking during spring in Yosemite as a teenager, I was recruited to help carry the body of a boy about 10 years old who had drowned in the fall and his body was trapped. I was stuck by how the body was so bloated it appeared to be a full grown man in size and weight.

3. Journal or write a poem about something in life that you have “witnessed” at different stages or moments (a mountain at different times of day or different seasons, a plant growing, a flower unfolding, etc)

4. Journal or write a poem about “hiding” in life. When, where, or with whom do you tend to consciously “hide” (shy away from or hold yourself back from)? What are the benefits and drawbacks of hiding? What do you imagine would happen if you were to “show yourself” or bring your full self to the situation?

5. Track the ways in which your attention gets hijacked on its own and journal or write about how that happens. What hijacks it, how you might catch it being hijacked, and what you might you do to reclaim or take charge of your attention.

6. Journal or write a poem about a specific situation, conversation, time, place or person to which or to whom you refuse to bring your attention. Consider especially such a time when you have to be or find yourself in the presence of that trigger. Describe what you do physically, mentally , and emotionally to distance yourself or keep yourself intact in that situation.

7. Pick something or someone in your environment that you have become familiar to the point of “taken for granted.” Give yourself the task to reconfirm your witnessing of that thing or person. Write about how you re-engage your “witnessing presence” and what happens when you do.

8. Journal or write about anything else that might inspire you from the poem or life.