#133 Soft place to land

Poems as love letters to friends

Aug 06, 2023

Dearest,

Happy Friendship Day! 💓

Last weekened, nook hosted the Friendship as a Soft Place to Land Workshop.

As per usual, I met some wonderful participants — intelligent, curious, observant, and most importantly, kind. (If you are reading this — I love you. Thank you for existing!)

When I first shared the workshop details, I had mentioned that we were chalking out a couple of hours to cherish friendships we have been lucky to call ours, and in doing so, maybe will even make a few new friends.

And that’s exactly what happened.

By the end of the workshop, people were swapping email IDs, Instagram handles, and even throwing open invitations for a cup of coffee in their city.

My heart was so full. Isn’t friendship in the casual intimacy of knowing a stranger through a poem shared?

Aristotle said that friends hold up a mirror to each other. And “once you’ve seen yourself in a mirror of friendship—in both positive and challenging ways—the reflection cannot be unseen.” (Big Friendship by Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman)

A poem that gorgeously marries casual intimacy and the act of witnessing & being witnessed in friendship is Oranges by Jean Little. We discussed it at length at the workshop.

I peel oranges neatly.
The sections come apart cleanly, perfectly in my hands.
When Emily peels an orange, she tears holes in it.
Juice squirts in all directions.
“Kate,” she says, “I don’t know how you do it!”
Emily is my best friend.
I hope she never learns how to peel oranges.

Some of the observations shared included:

Kate’s ability to not see Emily’s flaw as a flaw but celebrate and cherish it
Kate’s very humane need to be needed by her friend
Orange as a metaphor for life, innocence
Hints at trauma
This being too profound a poem for children (yes, this is a children’s poem!)

Like how we eat an orange, taking apart sections, we ate this poem, layer by layer. That’s the deepest way in which you can meet a poem.

You bring your experiences, your moods, your understanding of who you are to the table and bite into the flesh of the poem.

You read a poem to carry a part of it with you forever, the way you carry friendships in you. Whether a friendship survives or not isn’t important, if it, even for the briefest time, makes you feel witnessed and gives you the joy of witnessing another.

Last Sunday evening, sitting in a virtual room while the sun teased me through the curtains, I felt known, seen, and heard, and to me that’s as close to friendship as one can get. :’)