Environmentalists Anonymous-Day 11
9-27-23
For our writing warm-up, we took the first five minutes to reflect on the new season. The fall equinox was September 22nd.
How does fall feel to you? How does fall smell?
I passed around my new copy of Channels, one of the Writing the Land anthologies from Nature Culture. “Writing the Land is a collaborative outreach and fundraising project for land protection organizations. Through our anthologies, poets help raise awareness of the importance for land conservation.”
I have three poems in this anthology from my time at the Port Susan Bay Preserve over the past year.
I brought a copy of the book Rooted: Life at the Crossroads of Science, Nature, and Spirit by Lyanda Lynn Haupt and shared a passage from page 126:
“Darkness becalms us in a constant, receptive awareness. Darkness offers an intelligent stillness that fills and tills our psyche in a manner both difficult and beautiful—this is the fruitful darkness Joan Halifax speaks to in her lustrous book by that same name. This complicated moment on earth is not time to retreat into the simplistic metaphor of “bringing light.” The hope we must maintain, the imagination we must put to use, and the physical health we require all ask of us a more intricate wisdom.”
As we turn into fall’s shorter days and longer nights, how do we relate to darkness. What is our relationship to this fruitful, or sheltering darkness?
Write for fifteen minutes in response to these questions or the passage itself. I am reading this book as part of a Poet Camp book club.
Finally, I shared a news story from KNKX:
This article talks about the concept of marine heat, which is causing some unusual species to show up in Puget Sound and the Salish Sea. “Recent reports include two sightings in August of six-foot-long sunfish near Tacoma, Wash. Also recently seen: a huge bluefin tuna in the San Juan Islands.”
In this article, one of the scientists interviewed asks an interesting question in reference to these climate-induced environmental changes. We used this as our last prompt.
The real question is, when does it become the new normal?
Take 15 minutes to either respond to this article and/or this question.
A few additional reading recommendations from the group:
Hopeful climate fiction: A Psalm for the Wild Built
The Future We Choose: The Stubborn Optimist’s Guide to the Climate Crisis
Our next in-person meeting is October 11th from 12-1 pm at Village Books. All are welcome. We will now be meeting in the Readings Gallery.
Environmentalist Anonymous meets the 2nd and 4th Wednesday at Village Books from 12-1 pm. This is free and open to the public. I will email a synopsis of our gathering and post on my Substack page, Her Deepest Ecologies, for easier access (no subscription required to see writing group updates).
