"Alice had never engaged in the arts in the past and was feeling understandably nervous about being creative," said Emily Christensen, JFS Arts & Aging Coordinator. “Yet through choosing lines from six existing poems, she arranged a group of lines that expressed some of the grief she had been experiencing,” Emily said. The real challenge for Alice came in choosing one of two ways that would best end the poem. “I thought that I should visit my husband’s grave and that would help me to decide,” Alice told Emily. After that visit, Alice realized that both lines best expressed her feelings.

This is the final poem she created:

And so make life, death, and that vast forever
Make the mighty ages
Of eternity
For who has sight so keen and strong
Within the silent shade
The world is all one’s own
And I stay here
All, all alone
…thoughts like these are idle things
But in my sleep to you I fly.

(Poems used include "A Farewell" by Charles Kingsley; "Little Things" by Ebenezer Cobham Brewer; "The Arrow and the Song" by Henry Wordsworth Longfellow; "The Violet" by Jane Taylor; and "If I had But Two Little Wings" by Samuel T. Coleridge.)

Emily said that Alice was surprised and pleased to see what she was able to create, and was grateful for a supportive and nonjudgmental environment where she could explore new creative experiences.

Exploring Creativity, which is free, meets every Wednesday from 10:30 to 11:30 am via Zoom. Contact to sign up.