Poetry Workshop: Someone says writing is self-care

“Writing is self-care,” Says Ocean Voung. He said he often starts writing from anger and sees how he can transform it into a page.

“It is about distancing emotions from yourself,” Says Yok, whose poetry workshop I attended, “and turning it into poetry.” She showed me her curated poems; some are free-form, and some play with fonts, colors, and lines.

Writing is about deep thoughts and emotions, arousing, stirring, and awakening those feelings. The wordsmith exhibits them to express their truth as they appear on the surface. Sounds deep?

It was a gloomy Sunday at Kilik, a bar in Aree Valley, Sukhumvit 26, Bangkok. High enough ceiling space for a cloud to float upon your head lay a red handmade notebook among other stationaries on the table. Cocktails and mocktails were served.

“We are using mood-board and free-writing,” says Yok, “to compose a poem.” She told me in our breaking-the-ice conversation.

Not the first time I have done a mood board; it was years ago at the London College of Fashion. In Fashion Design class, the tutor asked me to create one for things that I like and another for those that repel me. That day, We did it the same way; cut anything we wanted from a magazine, glued them on the board, colored, painted, or did whatever we felt. “Shut your thoughts; surprise yourself.” Says the LCF’s tutor. It seems easy, but it works profoundly with us.

Eventually, a mood board was green as jealousy, red as passion and pain, a clock as timing, and full of noises.

Then, we started free-writing before picking words, phrases, and sentences from Murakami’s novels and collaging them again, this time in a poem:

As soon as I disembarked;
“I imagined a town far away.”
Stopped and turned to look behind me
“Of course,” I said. I’d figure that one later
When I got back home,
How are you?
I can imagine how surprised you must be to all of a sudden
He opened his eyes and smiled.

Reality, reality.
Put in simple logical terms, it’s easy.
“It’s OK to think that. ’Cause it’s the truth.
I was right back where I started.
That being said, though, I can’t rid myself of my old familiar doubts.
Aren’t I spending all my time and energy in some…
Holding me back, keeping me to a single viewpoint.
Had lost all living warmth.

Imageries and stories reminded me of Supernova (2020), a gay drama starring Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci. It explores gay couples’ turbulence spawned from dementia. An ailed writer takes a journey to end his life in his favorite place.

Creating art, such as composing a poem, literally makes a mess. It can be scary as you would encounter trauma during the process; it works fascinatingly deeply.

Hence, it is good to have people to support you, allowing you to disappear into those emotions and thus utilize words to express them. Reading them to an audience, you discover which glance that trigger your impulse to pronounce those words and what it means when they come out of your mouth to other’s hearts — from papers, and voice, to the world — like a good bottle of Bordeaux wine in search of the right glass for a tasteful sip.