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

The Word

Down near the bottom
of the crossed-out list
of things you have to do today;

between "green thread"
and "broccoli," you find
that you have penciled "sunlight."

Resting on the page, the word
is beautiful. It touches you
as if you had a friend

and sunlight were a present
he had sent from someplace distant
as this morning– to cheer you up,

and to remind you that,
among your duties, pleasure
is a thing

that also needs accomplishing.
Do you remember?
that time and light are kinds

of love, and love
is no less practical
than a coffee grinder

or a safe spare tire?
Tomorrow you may be utterly
without a clue,

but today you get a telegram
from the heart in exile,
proclaiming that the kingdom

still exist,
the king and queen, alive,
still speaking to their children,

– to anyone among them
who can find the time
to sit out in the sun and listen.

—Tony Hoagland
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/tony-hoagland

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 1/8/25 at 5:00 PM PST

My Thoughts

Given the demands and complexities of modern life, lists are a godsend. They keep us on track, help us to remember, and give us a sense of accomplishment. Lists for routine and periodic activities can save us from reinventing the wheel: grocery list, shopping list, daily and weekly to-do list, household chore and cleaning lists, bills-to-pay list, project list, etc. all of which serve a vital function in managing our lives. But as useful and necessary as they are, list can also bury us in the details of life, overwhelm us, and hem us into routines that dull our senses and deaden our lives. In Tony Hoagland’s poem, The Word, describes how the word “sunshine” in an otherwise mundane shopping list opens the world up reminding him that pleasure is also a thing that needs accomplishing and is as practical as all the other practicalities in a day—and perhaps even more practical in our lives as a whole.

Wouldn't it be amazing if you found you had unknowingly and unwittingly wrote sunshine, or any other soulful thing to appreciate, into your life. Imagine scanning a list your made earlier, surprised to find “smile” or “the sound of a waterfall” or “the fragrance of lilies” in the mix—whatever might stop you in your tracks momentarily, like an unexpected present from a dear friend meant to remind you that there's more to your life than can fit on a list. Hoagland offers the beautiful analogy that a word or phrase can be like a telegram from the heart in exile. Not an email or text message, but a telegram. You’ve seen it in old films, back in the day when electronic communication was first introduced and the message included the word "stop” between every idea and every sentence. Perhaps that is what the heart in exile most wants from us: that we find moments in our day to pause and let in the light, to open our senses to something that restores us to ourselves and enlivens us. What word or phrase might you find between the lines in your list that brings you back to life?

Prompt Ideas

1. Journal or write a poem about different types of lists that you keep and how they serve you and limit you in life.

2. Do you have a list of my favorite things in the style of the sound of music? If not, create one. If you do, revise an update it.

3. Tony Hoagland's poem, written in 1992, was likely created by hand. The fact that he points out that sunshine was penciled in between items gives it the feel of a playful aside or afterthought, something he might well have forgotten he added in a busy day. Describe a time when you got a surprise from an earlier moment?

4. Hoagland describes the word sunlight resting on the page. Pick a word that is beautiful to you and describe how it relates to the page—does it rest, sit, dance? Is it jittery like a Mexican jumping bean? Does it want to hatch out a brood?

5. Hoagland claims that love is as practical as a coffee grinder. In what way is your word or phrase , however ephemeral or sublime it might be, as practical as, say, a kitchen appliance?

6. I love the line in the poem, tomorrow you may be utterly without a clue. I assume he means that about the practicality and subtlety of things that really matter. How easily we forget we forget the soft side of the heart when faced with the harsh reality of the daily grind. What can you do to keep what matters in view?

7. Journal or write a poem about the heart in exile. Who or what cast it out? What does it want you to know?

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