How It Works:

1. Read the poem 

2. Do your own reflection on it, noting what it inspires in you

3. Feel free to use your own reflection as your prompt or…

4. Use the selection of prompts below

5. Pick one that inspires you and write (feel free to use only one or write several poems using different prompts) or…

6. Don’t use any of the provided prompts and follow your inspiration from wherever it comes

Talk The Everyday

Let’s talk the everyday world: the weather,
the recent misgivings, the funny story.
Let’s smile at the right moments,
nod our heads with a listener’s intent,
lock our eyes only for those
brief seconds polite society approves.

While we are busy looking for
the red carpet to roll out or for
the door to open in welcome,

we don't notice the unspoken conversation,
the one our hearts speak to each other
in the sacred meeting ground between us;

where we test the water for safety,
hold a wet finger up to heaven
to feel which way the wind blows,
and hold out our empty hands to show
we have sheathed our weapons.  

On the surface, I may say
“I am fine, and you?” but,
in the other conversation,
I say "my heart is broken open.
How about yours?" 

—Nick LeForce

If you wish to attend the read around (t’s free, fun, a great way to share, and reading a poem is optional). Note: If you registered already, you do not need to register again, simply use the link sent to you in your confirmation email. Register Here:

The next Read-Around is 11/6/25 at 5:00 PM PST

My Thoughts

Strangers To Ourselves: Discovering The Adaptive Unconscious by Timothy Wilson is one of my favorite books

we mostly think of heartbreak as the suffering we endure from a loss of some kind: a person, an animal, a cherished item, a special place, or an experience, (like the loss of trust from a betrayal). These are the heartbreak of contraction. But there is another kind of heartbreak that comes in those moments when we are deeply touched by something in life and the heart breaks open expansively.

I used to dislike small talk thinking it trivial. But I've come to appreciate it as a way of greasing the wheels of our everyday interactions. The word polite actually comes from,Latin roots meaning “polished” or “smooth.” It later evolved to mean refined manner and courteous behavior. And eventually go the bad rap of being inauthentic. The anthropologist Gregory Bateson noted that every conversation involves two levels: the surface talking a deeper conversation that is sizing up and summing up comfort and status of the relationship.

Prompt Ideas

1. Journal or write a poem about small talk

2. Journal or write a poem about a power outage.

3. What about a window, either an actual window with a specific view or a metaphorical window that provides a point of view.

4. Journal or write a poem about a window of opportunity that opened for you and how you responded.

5. Carter’s poem is written in a matter-of-fact style. Even the innocence of the transcendent experience is described simply. Write about an extraordinary experience using ordinary, mater-of-fact language.

6. Journal or write a poem about a transcendent experience (whatever that might mean to you).

7. Write about anything else in the poem or in life that inspires you.