Creative Writing

During an introductory tour of the Mindflight groups on the first night, we went to the mythical masks group where we each wrote one line of a poem to weave into a " spirit ladder." Each of us was given a phrase to complete -- either "I am", "I was", "I will be" or "I am not," to later be rearranged into a collaborative poem which represents all the Mindflight kids.

On Monday in writing workshop, we took a passage written by Miles Davis, rearranged the words into phrases of our own , glued them onto black posterboard, and painted around the words to construct the word collages you see above. The phrases varied significantly from the text -- things like "I am something worth keeping," or "When I see something, I usually go and do it." This is what the pieces looked like in the finished stage. (Of course, they're better in person!)

The sky moves around when rain is coming.
Ice lances of our blue night.
The birds around our streets leap back into the fading night.
Climbing up ladders rung by our language, lifting toward the sun!

S.M.

I've Known

I've known people with different thoughts
I've known what they feel
My soul is carried with them in their troubles
I bathed in their sadness but mostly their bubbling laughter
I built my character around them

I looked upon them with respect and a peaceful conscience
I heard the talking, the babbling voices which I carry in my heart

I've known people
My soul has grown alongside their lives.

K.G.

Mask Over My Eyes
Try to look through my mask, Try to see my eyes.
Try to pry the mask from my face, Try to change my smile.
Try to make me see through my eyes, not my heart.
Try to change my magic on yo, Try on my mask.
Try to exercise your rights, Try to own me.
Try to be reality, not a myth.
Try to be a person, not a stranger.
Now you are ready for your own mask, now you are.
Now you are ready to be with me, now you are.
Now you are ready to see my eyes, now you are.
Now you are ready to smile with me, now you are.
Now that you are ready, let us be myth.

A.F.

Wednesday we walked to the Baker River, carrying our colorful masks feeling like we were in a whole new world. We stood our masks in the river allowing the current to whisper around them as we sat on the beach and read passages from Haitian Folk tales and aboriginal elder. This experience gave us food for writing our own poetic lines, as we thought about sacred places and things that have special meaning in our lives before the short journey back to our dorm. Thursday we read a poem by Langston Hughes and then wrote our own poems using the first two words of each line as common text. Some examples of our writing are the three pieces above. Greg made it clear the first night that we were to keep a journal of each day's events in our file, to reflect on what we thought and did. Most of us got at least a couple of days finished--there was soooo much to do it was hard to remember every day! Here's a sample, which also let's you see that there was a whole lot of socializing going on! Journal Entries for Sunday July 20th and Monday July 21 I am not going to give you the entire rundown on what was done every day at camp in this journal I'm going to just give you the most memorable moments of each day (not necessarily in order). I came and I was first in my room to show up so I picked the bed that is literally on the dresser and the desk. my most memorable moments from Sunday would have to be meeting my roommate Caitlin, seeing Crystal for the first time and knowing right away we'd get along great, meeting all the different people here, Almost falling over in a chair next to the HUB, Crystal walking into a tree, asking every one in art what's a duck, righting Feel Like I'm Flying Higher Than A kite, and discovering that I like playing pool even if I really bite at it. My most memorable moments from Monday were Crystal banging on my door at 6:00 am, Breakfast Beastis, Beastises, and any other form of the word beast that I called everyone, cutting up that poem and making lines like, 'shit happens to me a lot', How every time Josh tries to flirt with Caitlin she beats on him, deciding that Crystal is part rodent and calling her rodent for the rest of the day (I later decided that mouse would be a better nickname), starting my home page with 'hi all, 'n welcome 2 my space', meeting Alicia F, who I haven't found an appropriate nickname for yet, and Dorothy (auntie am! auntie am!), being chalk girls with my little friend for the guys playing pool at break (they decided to give us the job instead of the guy who was doing it before us because we are better looking), starting our masks out of sticks, old sheets and black paint, going to Wellington State Park for pizza and swimming where I realized that Jeff never stops smiling so now he is known as smiles, and Caitlin just wants to choke Josh, and I remember pulling an all-nighter with Caitlin and Ellen.

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