Natasha Pepperl
“The Stakes” & “to be present in the real world” Following the unexpected death of two young family members, I turned to poetry as a way of creating beauty from pain. Grief and trauma can cause the same phrases and images to play on a mental loop. During a week of particularly intense grief, I wasn’t able to come up with any new poems on my own. But found poetry allowed me the creative freedom I needed to find my voice. To create the following poems, I used articles and color blocks from a TIME Magazine. Then I added stitches by hand to create more texture, feeling, and durability. I used colorful thread and unorthodox patterns so the sewing avoided resembling the hospital stitches that are burned into my memory. Then I used Photoshop to add more borders. Though it wasn’t intentional, the poems that resulted have underlying themes of grief—but also speak to the intense connectedness that is humanity. antilang. no. 7
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