poems in the gallery

Last Tuesday, I went to my first ever Art & Poetry in the Gallery, a free event held at the Jewish Community Centre. In addition to hearing guest poets read the poems that they write in response to the art in the gallery, attendees also get the chance to engage with the art by writing and sharing their own poems. These are the two poems that I wrote and shared:

When I am a Grandma

(in response to Jeanette Bittman's tai chi)

when i am a grandma

i will do tai chi,

and after practice, i’ll

go for coffee with the other ladies

gathered around a table, we’ll

brag about our children and grandchildren

complain about our aches and pains

laugh about our aging bodies,

and our aging husbands,

inspire one another

with tales of our second acts

the places we've been, just this past fall

the art we've made

the flowers we've grown

the studies we are undertaking

together, we’ll

look back on rich lives lived

and all that is still to come

there is more to the land than we know

(in response to Andrea's Dillingham-Lacoursiere art)

the soil reverberates with the footsteps of those who have walked here

the trees echo the names of those whom they have sheltered

the ocean holds within it the tears of joy and tears of sorrow 

that have been shed by the people who lived their lives here

the land holds all these things

and how little we know

how little we desire to know