precious

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 15:36:00 +0800

if I wait
if I am quiet
if I do not speak

if I regard you from a distance
if I do not lunge at you
if I take small careful steps

if it doesn’t work
if I can’t get near you

if I give up, things will come right, so everyone says
if I tell you I have given up on you
if your response to that is to rush joyfully away
if I turn my head to hide my tears
if I walk away

if I walk for long enough
if I do not speak
if I am quiet
if I wait

if it doesn’t work
if I stop walking and find I am truly alone

if I relinquish my ego to the heavens, but the heavens give it back
if this happens several times
if the heavens have decided I need my ego in order to do my work

if I ask, ‘What is the method?’
if I suppose that ‘What is the method?’ is the wrong question
if I know that ‘Where is the Way?’ is a better question
if I think of Leonard Cohen who tried going up the mountain but came down again
if I suppose that the answer is among the houses, not up the mountain
if I look among the houses for a teacher of the Way who can help me

if it doesn’t work
if the teacher has gone ahead of me to the place at the end of her path
if I find myself floundering in her dusty, meandery footsteps
if she left me only one book and it doesn’t contain the answer

if if turns out that this is the Way and I’m already on it, ego and all
if this is the Way perhaps I’m wearing the wrong clothes
if I had known the Way would be this hot and dusty would I have taken it?
if I know myself at all: no doubt I would have

if the Way leads me to a thousand different houses
if in each house I find a little piece of the puzzle
if the people in each of the houses embrace me
if once I have found the piece, I must walk on to another house

if some of the people from the houses follow behind me
if it seems I have become a teacher, incomplete as I am
if letting people call me a teacher is a shameful piece of egotism

if I am always first a student

if only all the pieces were in one house, I could sit down and get comfy

if I found them all, I could build that house and invite everyone over for a puzzle night

if I build the house anyway, everyone can bring their pieces!
if I’m not strong enough to build a house, I can build just one little room
if everyone comes and adds to it, it may be as lovely and surprising as the house of Wikipedia
if there are still pieces missing we can give up searching and just make them ourselves
if there are pieces missing we can still enjoy the puzzle

if in the collective house I will not have a room of my own
if I continue to be afraid that in the collective house I will not have a room of my own, will I ever actually build it?

if the way I arrange my room makes most visitors uncomfortable
if I like my room the way it is
if nobody else in the house has a room like mine

if the puzzle has an enormous hole in it

if I end up being the janitor and doing all the cleaning
if I stop doing the cleaning nobody does it and the house gets in a muddle
if I tell myself the muddle doesn’t matter to anyone but me
if I force myself to leave it someone will eventually do it

if I get sick of the muddle and noise and go back to the road, the search
if I find a piece of the puzzle and come back to the house for a while

if the road, and the house, are both, together, the Way

if you would walk beside me it might be nicer
if you would walk beside me, each of us might be less lonely
if you’ve got some of the puzzle pieces, even better
if you’d give me your pieces there might not be such a hole in it

if you are walking beside me, but my ego is blocking my senses
if you’re talking to me now and I’m too deaf to hear you
if you’re looking at me, but I’m too blind
if you’re holding out the pieces and I don’t take them
if you want to swap them for something even more precious that I am holding on to

What’s on

Come and write with me! Creative writing is fun. In my classes there’s no ‘good’ or ‘bad’ writing, no judgment, assessment or competition — just encouragement, inspiring writing experiments and easy-to-understand information.

Workshops available

‘Expand your boundaries’: Leap or tiptoe out of your poetic comfort zone in a supportive group environment. Let Janet’s writing experiments lead you to write in new ways. Look at example poems and discuss how form can create feeling. 2-5 hours.
‘Perennially Popular Poetry’: It’s often said that poets today are writing for each other — but what if we want to capture the imagination of those who are not poets, critics or students? Learn what it takes to write a great poem, and maybe come away with some of your own. 2-5 hours.
‘Poetry alive’: performance for teens and adults. Half or full day.
‘Poets and poems here and now!’: participative poetry for kids in years 4-6 or 7-9. Students express themselves with fun writing activities and learn by example that contemporary Australians of all ages are writing poems. 1 hour.
A custom workshop to suit your needs.

Courses available

Contemporary Poetry Writing. 7 weeks.
‘Expand your boundaries’ experimental creative writing. 7 weeks.
‘Develop, improve, publish’: further skills in creative writing. 7 weeks. For those with some experience.
A custom course to suit your needs. Previous students have enjoyed courses in poetry appreciation, zine making, performance writing and literacy through poetry.

Unless otherwise indicated, all my workshops and courses are suitable for beginning writers and those with some experience.

How much?

Community groups: talk to me
Courses and series: talk to me
School incursions: from $100 per hour
Private lessons: $40 per hour

Prices are in Australian dollars.

Contact me

Download my CV

Proximity

precious

because writing is my vice

Workshops and courses for poets and writers

Workshops available

Courses available

How much?