Welcome to Writers Resist, the December 2022 Issue

In case you didn’t know

Writers Resist celebrates each quarterly issue with a virtual reading, and you are invited to join us for this issue’s gathering.

Writers Resist Reads • Saturday 28 January 2023 • 5:00 p.m. PACIFIC

Zoom information:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88356614245?pwd=a1FRMndJYzI3VzE1Ym9yZUU2ODhHdz09

Meeting ID: 883 5661 4245
Passcode: 247349

In the meantime, we know the world is fraught with conflict, so give yourself the space to enjoy our December 2022 issue featuring works by:

Christina Bagni

Lisa Brand

Tara Campbell

Jacqueline Jules

Karen Kilcup

Livvy Krakower

Kathleen Kremins

Dotty LeMieux

Maenad

Renee McClellan

William Palmer

Yvonne Patterson

Stephen Sossaman

Holly A. Stovall

Samy Swayd

 


Photo credit: K-B Gressitt

just-ice

By Samy S. Swayd

 

don’t drink from this dripping
cracked cup, for it’s my own heart—
my beats poured into words for broken
lines, making this page perplexing
and pale.

but if you take a taste, you must sail with
a deep breath and an active mind, and paint
a spirited sign to remind you of Thoreau’s
tender daring triplet daughters—
“simplicity, simplicity, simplicity.”

unlike the daughters’ times, today’s
world is complex and keeps birthing
busy people, or people with big blind
spots, causing stable slices of life to slide
back into the deepest, darkest ends.

only sensible sailors see
the ice silencing
the just
in the name of justice.

as for the i, me, and myself—three wide eyes,
on Monday, we weep and wail

watching caskets of kids
and baskets of gun-shells
piled in schoolyards’ corners.

on Tuesday, we whistle with tears

seeing bees and birds, with
chemicals-washed wings, seeking
sustenance and safe landings.

on Wednesday, we witness or overhear

the same simulated politics—
tuning down voters’ intellects
and pruning people’s primary rights.

and then it’s all over again, like the rain,

not of America’s Alaska,
but of India’s Meghalaya.

so, what are we to do, besides being mindful?
turtle-talk our minds to articulate

the many similar unfolding trends?

circle-walk our hearts to remain humming—

despite the Court’s “daggers” and bites?

quick-axe the frightening forecasts

and the long-term side-effects?

or book a room inside our heads

and ask denial for a dance?

 


Samy S. Swayd is a retired adjunct faculty-researcher in religious studies, who has taught in a few Southern California universities, mostly at San Diego State University. His courses included American religious diversity, spirituality and the environment, and comparative mysticism. After a decade long career in administration, he then earned initial degrees from the University of Washington, Seattle, and a Ph.D. from UCLA. The present selection is from a book manuscript in progress on spirituality and goodness.

Photo credit: Liz West via a Creative Commons license.


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