Something Rising Beneath Me

“And in me too the wave rises. It swells; it arches its back. I am aware once more of a new desire, something rising beneath me.” – Virginia Woolf, The Waves

 


In response to Breena Clarke’s recent Waves on making space for ourselves and others and our ongoing invitation for shared dialogue, creative women around the world are submitting their words through The Q and participating in #womenmakewaves.
While Nora Jane Child posed a poignant question on Twitter,
Samantha Schinder and Sacha Rosel responded to questions in The Q about our deepest needs, creative selves, and our space within the world with powerful poems.
We welcome you to read them in full below.
We are aware once more, something is rising.

 


Samantha Schinder, My Deepest Need, in response to “What is your deepest need?” in The Q

Sacha Rosel, Flowerseeker, in response to “How do I define my creative identity” in The Q

 

Our Waves, art by Laura Berger

Nora Jane Child, @norajanechild, #womenmakewaves

 

Samantha Schinder, Women against the World, in response to “What is my deepest need?” in The Q


“My Deepest Need”

Samantha Schinder

 

An immersion of words

Trickling flow of conjugations stampeding down my limbs

Onto paper like steam

From the sauna of inner release.

I cannot unstick myself

Until the words are sweated out.

Do they make a merry mess?

Sometimes more so than others.

But the process is still the same.

The ritual of relieving

The pent-up letters

Dribbling down the pen

Until a break,

A breath of refreshment, of outside,

As the words melt into place

Or else evaporate into otherness.


“Flowerseeker”

Sacha Rosel

 

Writing is first waiting:

here comes the qi

emerging from the sky

condensing into words

blooming beyond my eye.

Then it’s green sea of possibilities

unchained,

singing

from my hands and bones,

flooding the page.

Flower neverending.


“Women against the World”

Samantha Schinder

 

Hammering constantly from all sides.

Help                      You are not good enough.                 Help

Us                            You are not pretty enough.                        us

Fight.                                   You are not enough.                            Conquer

Enough.

How

Do we

Combat an onslaught

Ragin’ at us from all sides?

The defense           against a

    Hammer                 is a shield

 But is not                  a shield

     Such                   a blunt

      Ignorant               unwieldy

     Object?                    Not

        If                              the

               Shield                       is made

            Of a                      mettle

               Instead               of metal

                  Words               Combined

                     As one                      But many

               Voices against                    the damaging

             Torrential down-                   pour, uplifting us

 

 

With words, we may yet win.

Author: A Room of Her Own

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