Writing workout for Vulnerability; Writers’ Workshop
Set a timer to 15 minutes & write
Write a letter to Vulnerability, talk to it like it’s a person, he/she/they, tell them why you’re writing them this letter, is it to ask for some space? Is it to thank them? Is it to tell them off? Describe how you feel about them. What do you wish from them? Think about your five senses, and how they are in relation to Vulnerability.
Example:
Dearest Vulnerability,
I love you. I love the spikes of your emotions and the way you teach me how to hold myself – even when all my parts feel like they’re made of flakes. I love you. Remember when you held my hand and had me walk blindfolded into the forest? I trust you. I trust you until I don’t.
How can I keep trusting you when your words stretch and curve into anxious what-ifs? I could hold your hand and walk into a forest blindfold, but soon enough I cannot help but smell smoke and feel ashes on the tip of my nose like flurries. I want to love you. I want to trust you. I do, but how can I? I have been catfished before. Someone took your photos and played your role, someone else promised to keep me safe in my fragility, only to trip me.
Loving you is easy, but trusting you is the most complicated art to master. Loving you is easy, because loving poets is always easy – at first, until the words are wielded into knives. Loving you is easy, because you come in the shape of flowers in a mason jar, petals falling on my dining table, making a garden out of my home, your scents intriguing, kind, and vast.
When we sleep together, I keep an eye open, and another holding you. When you make my breakfast, I wait for you to take a bite first, and then thank you for the luscious forest you planted me. I wish I could trust you, without losing myself. I love you, Vulnerability. I need you to understand that while my love is conditional, it is always learning how to make more space.
With patience,
Dana S.
The writing workout has been developed and written by Dana Seif, the founder of The Poetry Passport. You can find her on Instagram here.
The Poetry Passport 