When requested to come up with some visual imagery, my response today was verbal:
My Thread is a Rope
The thread I hold is a rope.
My thread is not a delicate silken floss,
Bright with color.
The thread that I hold onto is a rope:
Strong, dull, dun colored,
Dirty, encrusted with the juices of sixty-two years.
Years of living, struggling, crying
Laughing, making, and holding hands.
Tarred by many more years of history,
Family stories, memories not my own.
Some strands of this rope are loose,
Unraveled, untidy, adhering to people and things
Left along the way.
But the rope is strong: I can
Pull, and lean, and even hang limp
From this rope.
— Sandra
The original request came with a poem by William Stafford:
AN OPEN EXPERIMENT for anyone interested:
“The Thread
There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.
~ William Stafford ~”
…………………………
- What color do you envision your thread?
- What does the matrix to which it is attached look like? How big? What is inside of it? Does it have color?
- Can you draw what you see in your mind’s eye of this matrix?
- How is the thread connected to you…… in your hand? or imbued thoroughly in your whole body and spirit. What color is the you holding the thread?
- Would you mind doing some drawings of these images and bringing them next Wednesday? I am going to try it myself and ask others to try embodying in art form these images, too.
