Is there a basket big enough to hold all of ourselves? Wins, losses, employment, recreation, love, sorrow and joy, wellness and sickness? ~ Karin Fendick
Sifting, Sorting, and Organizing
I love the look of baskets lined up on open shelves; some duplicates, others unique in shape or color. Each one issues invitations. Some say, “look and see what I hold within.” Others beckon, “fill me.”
I grew up hearing the phrase, “A place for everything and everything in it’s place.” This led to sorting and sifting and organizing in a way that compartmentalized life. Work was deposited in a basket. Family had a basket. Play and enjoyment was dropped into a small basket of its own. Jesus had a basket that we pulled out on Sundays, or at best a few minutes a day when we prayed; we certainly try to keep our spiritual life contained and isolated, but shouldn’t it infiltrate every space, every place?
And what of pain or illness? No matter how hard our attempts to close the lid of the basket we place it in, the contents spill over into every other basket in our lives.
Is there a basket big enough to hold all of ourselves? Wins, losses, employment, recreation, love, sorrow and joy, wellness and sickness? A God-created space that He fully inhabits?
A basket for our life. Whole, complete. Integration instead of compartmentalization. Yes!
Mary Oliver’s words spoke directly into my spirit:
“Poetry isn’t a profession, it’s a way of life. It’s an empty basket; you put your life into it and make something out of that.”
In her poem, Primogeniture, Julie Agoo writes of a multi-purpose basket:
PRIMOGENITURE
someone put that basket under the dresser.
Chose to. Bent. Kicked it maybe.
Not the first time, it’s spent
years there, unthought of; only some time out
Of exile chasing a life
in the sun. The blond wood is well-stained
for all that. It has held sandwiches, beer, a knife,
sunscreen and clippers. Diapers. Once,
a specimen of toadstool that ate that hole
right through the end. But it was strong enough!
I remember it full of gloves and a Peterson’s Guide,
peonies roughly shoved through the upright handles.
And her hand pulling the weight, and the shadow it cast
on the terrace—like a sundial—
a penny from the war lay in the fretwork,
I remember that, working its way in or out—
And, lifting it from her, the light
Weight that made my hand feel light.
That’s just as clear today as when
she came in from the garden late
and put that burden down right here.
Perhaps the following questions can help, as you ponder baskets, letting words come to shape into poems.
What burdens have you set down or picked up in baskets?
How many baskets have you split yourself into?
Is there a special place for your pain or does it get hidden away?
Can you imagine an integrated life?
What would be the shape of your full-life basket? Can you describe it?
Let the words come and fall in place. Play with them. Feel the weight of them. When you are ready, share them with us.
Here is the poem my heart responded with:
TRAVELING BASKET
I took my basket to the shore
collecting pebbles, sea glass
worn smooth and pale
I carried that basket to the forest
adding pine cones, leaves
curled and bright
Next I took it to the mountains
trying to capture sighs, wonder
awed by glory
Basket in hand I
journeyed home, unsure
was I too small, or
too large to fit and fill
this life, still weaving
twig by twig
Submission Guidelines
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Enjoy the prompt.
We look forward to reading the poems that spill forth!
Right around Thanksgiving, I make a big pot of tea and reread all the poems in my journal. Inevitably, it ends up being a commentary on the year itself. I’ve been following this practice since 2002, and believe me, the poems say more than I could in a thousand pages of journaling.
Though not from a liturgical background this poet felt led to celebrate the holy through the time span from Ash Wednesday to Resurrection Sunday. From Ashes to Glory is a collection of forty-seven brief psalms written as a daily offering of worship that will encourage and draw you closer to God in any season.
Part memoir, part humorous and poignant defense of poetry, this is a book that shows you what it is to live a life with poems at your side. Megan's story is one you won't want to put down; meanwhile, her uncanny ability to reveal the why's and how's of poetry keeps calling—to even the biggest poetry doubter. If you already enjoy poetry, her story and her wisdom and her ways will invite you to go deeper, with novel ideas on how to engage with poems.
Throughout her celebrated career, Mary Oliver has touched countless readers with her brilliantly crafted verse, expounding on her love for the physical world and the powerful bonds between all living things. Identified as "far and away, this country's best selling poet" by Dwight Garner, she now returns with a stunning and definitive collection of her writing from the last fifty years.
Karin is a handmaiden of the Lord; saved by grace; a worshiper; a poet; a broken heart; a lover of words; hungry for truth; amazed by love; on the Potter's wheel His work in progress. After five years in Africa, Karin and her beloved husband of twenty years, Rick, are back in rural Canada where chronic pain drives her to the feet of Jesus. She is powered by prayer, love, and many cups of strong coffee. Author of From Ashes to Glory (A Psalm a Day).
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