I’ve been following @loisfay for a while, liking liking liking her beautiful poems, prompts and insights so much, that I finally reached out and asked her to share her words here, too.

(I think it was initially the fact that she identified herself as ‘crazywritergurl’ that made me think we’d be friends.)

We bonded over a love of words, of books, of learning, of reading, and of creating safe places for people to share. She conceivably has the dream job, as the bookclub facilitator within a Seniors Residence or North Vancouver.

She shared her debut poem, Moving Day, last Wednesday (and then, as we are learning to navigate having multiple authors with authorship over multiple wordpress accounts, we were gifted a bonus poem from her, too, Bookstore.)

A friend recently pointed me in the direction of a New York Times article about the psychiatrist who pioneered the use of light therapy to treat seasonal affective disorder, who also prescribes poetry to his patients.

In the article, a great-grandmother shares her take on poetry:

“Poetry generally picks me up. There’s a nugget of truth in every poem, and I flip through them to find ones that resonate with me and will get me going. I read them aloud. Every time you go back to a poem, you read it with a different set of ears.”

Margaret Shryer

I love this idea of poetry as a pick-me up… and I have found so many little truth nuggets in Lois Thevarge’s writing that I am truly stoked to welcome her as our first poetry contributor to the Wellness Almanac. Keep an eye out every Wednesday for her offerings, and free free to pop a comment or a LIKE in the comments.