What's up with Poetry?

In a workshop I gave last year, I found myself saying something we ended up having fun with because it didn't seem to make sense -- that the body responds to Poetry. Everyone started throwing in words in an effort to clarify the idea, but in the end we had to leave it at that. It's one of the things that used to frustrate me so much about teaching Yoga - the challenge of putting to words experiences that don't really seem to have words for them. Fortunately I've learned to make peace with that and in 'giving it up' I noticed that the words do come, if only I give it enough time. So this went to the back burner, which by now I've come to appreciate as the appropriate place for so much of the slow-cooking ideas that we work with in the practice.

Sometime later, I did come up with something - a word that captures the essence of what I wanted to say then (I'll get to that in a bit) but also, to my surprise, I realized there was no no need for a new way of saying it because it happened to be exactly what I meant: the body responds to Poetry. And BHAVA is a Sanskrit word that both clarifies and expresses this idea/experience. What I love about Sanskrit is the acknowledgment of the multidimensionality of words. Words are like huge, rich, living spaces that you can jump into, and Bhava is about that space that connects one to the world of feeling, the mood of ecstasy and self-surrender, the spirit of devotion, 'emotion' in a way that goes beyond our understanding of it... What it helps me connect with is that state of openheartedness, a fuller expression of being in love, an inspired state that transforms us and makes the unknowable knowable, the impossible possible. Sounds dramatic but just take a good look at any truly inspired work and you'll know that it's true. And Poetry, more an offspring of the heart than just the rational mind, is a word that we have that I think captures the essence of this space.

This inquiry is what led me to dive into the work of poet, David Whyte. And early this year, camped on the grounds of Mt. Madonna - a beautiful retreat center overlooking the Monterey Bay in California (which is an experience that I love in itself), I went to one of his 3-day workshops called What to Remember When Waking, and enjoyed the wonderful opportunity to experience the power of poetry through his work.

with poet, David Whyte

Here are some of the things that stood out for me:

1. Genius is the ability to keep the enthusiasm of childhood into adulthood. The word reveals more when understood in the context of its Latin definition: the spirit of a place ...where 'genius' refers to a geographical location where elements meet, rather than just being a Mozart or a Curie. Therefore, it is to be utterly and fully the meeting place of all the qualities that reside in you, inhabiting a way of being in the world that is completely your own.

Notice how the body (our being) responds when called upon in this manner and looked at through these eyes... It brings me to imagine what the world will be like if we allowed ourselves to unfold this way and   honored this in one another.


2. It is the opening of eyes long closed...

3. On sound/voice (which I think applies to communication in general): The actor's speech is incredibly intimate, it resonates in and with the body, and body resonance moves across to the audience. Therefore one has to be honorable about it because it can be real,  or it can be seduction, it can be just going for maximum impact.

As a teacher, I've always found it very helpful to have been taught to be aware of how our fears can subtly distort our message. It takes a lot of honesty and skill to be able to distinguish when we are being authentic or when, as David says, "we're just hitting our audience with it" so that we can look or feel good. 


4. If only we could give our faces to the blows of the carver's hands...

5. The day you arrive is the day you give up the project of yourself -- a radical letting alone.

If you really let this in, something in you shifts. I've had the privilege of seeing how true this is in my work as Yoga therapist: the body opens up to healing when it has released all tensing around the need to be other than what it is now. I must have really paid attention because of my own ongoing struggle to learn this lesson. 


Thank you for your work, David.