Writing Prompt #16
I offered this prompt to my writing group on the day before Thanksgiving, which is also the day before Native American Heritage Day (which falls at the end of Native American Indian Heritage Month). This observance “commemorates the history, heritage, and culture of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives.”
While I have always loved gathering with family and friends for the holidays, this late fall celebration has been increasingly more complicated for me to acknowledge since we know its origins are based on a lot of false narratives. Tribal sovereignty, especially related to traditional foods, is an imperative issue.
For this prompt, I wanted to celebrate two impactful, female Native American poets: Joy Harjo and Linda Hogan, the former have served as a recent National Poet Laureate. Two of their poems inspired these prompts!
Perhaps the World Ends Here
By Joy Harjo
The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.
The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.
We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.
It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.
At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.
Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.
This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.
Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.
We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.
At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.
Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.
from The Woman Who Fell From the Sky (WW Norton, 1994) by Joy Harjo.
Writing Prompt:
This poem is an important meditation on the table and how it has been central to her life of family and connection.
This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.
Write a poem or prose using Harjo’s first and last lines from this poem. Is there a place or thing that comes to mind. Think about something that you are grateful for that might sometimes be taken for granted. A sink, a car, a bed, a garden?
The world begins at a ____________
Perhaps the world will end___________
Write for 15 minutes.
Gather
By Linda Hogan
(from The Book of Medicines (Coffee House Press, 1993)
Writing Prompt:
Think about the word gather. I love how Hogan describes a gathering of sewers at the start of this poem while also describing gathering up the fabric of a skirt. She also reflects on her mother, a healer.
By that, I mean, she always held a cure/ for hopelessness.
What people, place, or thing come to mind when you hear the word gather? What does gathering mean to you? Why is it important to you?
Write for 15 minutes in poetry or prose.
