Poetic Energy

Published April 19, 2013

by iris_author

On Wednesday March 20th, IRIS hosted its fourth annual Earth Hour event, in Michelangelo's Restaurant. The event ran through the afternoon with an amazing line-up of musical performances, guest speakers, games, and lantern-making workshops.

One special addition to the event this year was "Poetic Energy", a poetry workshop led by Elana Margot and supported by FES Professor Catriona Sandilands.

Taking place in a separate room lit only by sunlight, the participants joined together to express their feelings towards the environment, earth hour, and anything that was on their mind really.

As an experience, the workshop asked one to be vulnerable in conveying experiences, thoughts and emotions in a way beyond the limits of academia and everyday language.

Through poetry (and other forms of art), one is able to escape the confines of "rational" logic which is structured to separate subject from object ("I" and "you"). Indeed it is an empowering exercise that draws on the imagination to communicate being in ways that takes emotion into account.

And it is this connection which is needed to be made in the world today. We have all the scientifc evidence to prove climate change is real but we lack sufficient action in tackling the issue.

If we recognize that the means are as important as the ends, then maybe it's time we integrate other methods of expression into theorization, communication and action (all of which are intimately linked to one another).

I understand I went off on quite the tangent with this topic but one cannot understate the political potentials to be found in art and the need for its incorporation within everyday life.

By the end of the event, we pieced together parts of our work to create a collective poem, which was later shared in front of all our earth hour guests (below is the collective poem)

...

Oh right, earth hour, climate change, and all the stuff I still can’t explain, can’t fix, and don’t have enough time to learn all I want to know

I was told they were open books; they had some pages ripped out. But I know they like to glow; fly into kaleidoscopes

Cold wet fur against warm pink skin

Toothless Lions
Soil-

A closeness I hope I have.

Plastic cheese
in a cooling
fridge

An accumulative catastrophe of toxic instability.
Have we blindly lost our humane sensibility?
Can we rise to repair our fragmented uncertainty?

Technological bravado
Toxic

Movement and tiny experiences that matter.

The scope of these transformations is urgent yet monstrous.

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