If you wish to attend the read around (t’s free, fun, a great way to share, and reading a poem is optional). Note: If you registered already, you do not need to register again, simply use the link sent to you in your confirmation email. Register Here:

Next Read-Around is 2/6/25 at 5:00 PM PST

How It Works:

  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

  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

My Thoughts

Poetry can be a subversive art, turning us on our heads, giving us a view of things previously inconceivable. Poetry has the power to find the light in the dark and the heavy in the light. Poetry praises the insufferable burdens we bear and reminds us, patiently and sometimes painfully, that the answer is never in polished teeth and membership in the club. And whatever answer the poet gives, the core question often is: Why do we let so much of the life at our fingertips pass us by? That’s why poetry is subversive, restoring us to life, by turning our heads on the previously inconceivable as does Adam Zagsjewski in the poem, Betrayal. It is an excellent example of poetic subversion, finding a sublime delight in the act of betrayal.

Note: Feel free to replace woman and assoicatied pronouns with the gender of your preference when reading it

Betrayal

The greatest delight, I sense,
is hidden sublimely in the act of betrayal
which can be equal only to fidelity.
To betray a woman, friends, an idea,
to see new light in the eyes
of distant shadows. But choices are
limited: other women, other
ideas, the enemies of our
long-standing friends. If only
we could encounter some quite different
otherness, settle in a country which has
no name, touch a woman before
she is born, lose our memories, meet
a God other than our own.

—Adam Zagajewski
Translatedfrom Polish by Remata Gorczynski
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/adam-zagajewski

Prompt Ideas

  1. Journal or write your own poem about betrayal.

  2. What betrayal (yours or others) have you delighted in?

  3. Poetry often puts opposites in relationship, like betrayal and fidelity. Journal or write about the connection between opposites (acceptance and resistance; rebellion and compliance; disdain and admiration, shame and pride, etc.)

  4. In what way might staying true to ourselves require us to betray someone or something in life?

  5. Use Zagajewski’s brilliant imagery as a prompt: From the light in the eyes of distant shadows, I…

  6. Journal or write a poemabout an encounter with some quite different otherness? (another species, astrange and fascination person, etc.)

  7. Journal or write a poem about touching someone before they are born…

  8. Consider what might happen if you were to encounter a God other than your own.

  9. As usual, write about anything else in the poem or in life that inspires you.