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 in the column on the right

  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

In Any Event

If we are fractured
we are fractured
like stars
bred to shine
in every direction,
through any dimension
billions of years
since and hence.

I shall not lament
the human, not yet.
There is something
more to come, our hearts
a gold mine
not yet plumbed,
an uncharted sea.

Nothing is gone forever.
If we came from dust
and will return to dust
then we can find our way
into anything.

What we are capable of
is not yet known,
and I praise us now,
in advance.

Dorrianne Laux
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/dorianne-laux#tabpoem

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Next Read-Around is:
Thursday, February 2, 2023 at 5:00 PM PST

My Thoughts

I do not know anyone who has not been affected, or not had anyone close to them affected, by the extremes of life in recent years. Even an average life will be fraught with a fair share of hardship, dissappoinment, betrayal, loss, and defeat—tiny traumas or terrible tragedies that fracture us. The first two lines of Dorianne Laux’ poem, In Any Event, takes the experience of fracture as a given: if we are fractured, we are fractured.  What we do with that fracture, whether we turn bitter and angry or bright and kind, is up to us. 

The Dalai Lama once said, "Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional." With all the extreme weather and the divisiveness and violence going on in the world politically, nationally, ethnically, right down to our neighborhoods, and unfortunately, often within ourselves, it would be easy to lose faith in humanity. But Laux does not lament the human. She declares that we are fractured like stars bred to shine. The entire thrust of the poem flows from the fracture out—in every direction, to any dimension, and all across time—opening to  world of possibilities yet undiscovered or untapped.

What might you discover in the gold mine of your heart? Where might you go if you could find your way into anything? We truly do not know what we are capable of. We can challenge ourselves to hone our capabilities into something praiseworthy. Then, we might find we can turn this ship around, away from the edge of our now dissolution and toward something life-sustaining and bautiful.

Prompt Menu

  1. Journal or write a poem about a fracture in you or in your life. Laux says we are fractured like stars bred to shine. What is your fracture like?

  2. Journal or Write a poem of lament for humanity.

  3. Use the line “I shall not lament the human…” as your prompt and write reasons why not

  4. Laux uses the metaphor of a gold mine and an uncharted sea for the heart. In what way might the heart be a gold mine? What might you discover in the gold mine of your heart?

  5. In what way might your heart be an uncarted sea?

  6. Come up with your own metaphor for the heart as your prompt.

  7. Use “dust” as a prompt. Write about whatever that word inspires in you or wherever it takes you. Or asLaux suggests, Where might you go if you could find your way into anything?

  8. As usual, write about anything else that inspires you from the poem or from life.