Writers who explore the poetry and language of transformation often talk about the need to break down the barriers that artificially separate science and art – being willing to dispel some of the myths and notions of the scientific and the creative.
One writer described it as getting unstuck from a 3-dimentional mindset and being moved by the wonder of day to-day life; for example, not just thinking about a natural process like photosynthesis, but to be awestruck by the fact that photosynthesis even happens.
For the poet, the capacity for wonder is a gateway, a portal to the experience of what it is to be alive. It’s becoming a conduit to unleashing the energy from the realms of potential into the kinetic – something that moves, propels, and motivates others.
Quantum mechanics brings me back to the sense that we really have no idea what's going on here. We get glimpses once in a while, and we're blessed with those glimpses. And part of what we're here to do is be those sensory beings on the outpost bringing that information back for the rest of humanity.
Libby Wagner
One of my favorite ways of being is in wonder and curiosity. What if? What about? Why? I’m drawn to conversations and contemplations about the Beautiful Questions in human life. As a poet, I walk about trying to name things, to use my sensory experience in the world to make sense of it, even when I know that I’m trying to say the "unsayable." This doesn’t deter me from trying to connect, express, reveal. In my organizational work, I create spaces and places where people can connect with their artistry to arrive transformed by their conversations and their creations.
Holly Thomas
The right poem at the right time can loosen, trigger, or buttress almost anything. As intimate catalysts, poems distill and extend our experience—sharing everything from fear to relief, and from dismay to benediction.
As an editor, poet, and painter, I often teeter between creation and critique—with the risk of stifling creation by prematurely attempting to interpret or refine it. But when I find my balance and trust what is emerging, something with a life and agency of its own seems to enter the world. What happens next depends on those it touches.
Aviv Shahar
Aviv is the Founder of Aviv Consulting, helping leaders unleash strategic innovation, and is the author of Create New Futures: How Leaders Produce Breakthroughs and Transform the World Through Conversation.
