Welcome to Appetite for Living

Welcome to Appetite for Living! It’s great to have you here!

I’m Amanda, a writer and poet living on Yuggera/Turbal country (Brisbane), Australia.

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Your in reconnection, remembering and radical hope, Amanda

Appetite for Living #1

Well...it’s been 12 months since the idea of a regular newsletter landed in my lap. So much has changed and yet here we all are and here I am staring down at the same blank page. The past couple of years have felt a lot like that. We continue to be asked to loosen our grip and adapt.  It's been another year of trusting, letting go of timetables and surrendering to the innate timing of things beyond our control.

I don't know about you but I feel like I'm coming to the close of another year without much on the outside to show for all of the work thats been going on below the surface. As the pandemic continues to roll in and out from our shores at different times and in different ways, it can feel as if we're stuck in an endless winter.

Most of my writing work was also underground this year, below the surface of the page. Writing, whether it's above or below ground, helps me make sense of the world. It's one of the ways I ask the questions that I know I have but can't quite articulate yet. The act of writing itself, and poetry in particular, helps me move in the direction of the answer. I've been writing my way with a torch and a shovel, with a spoon at times,  but I finally feel like I'm  tunnelling my way to the surface again.

I wonder how you are feeling as the calendar year comes to a close? Does your above ground life reflect what’s been happening below the surface? 

The idea for this conversation with you came to me like a poem often does, seemingly out of no where with that familiar fizzing quality that I've learned to take good notice of. Every time I think I've been close to writing it, life intervened or it didn't feel quite right.  I noticed how much I wanted to rush things, to pin it down, give it a shape, a form and a timeframe, and, I noticed all of the feelings of frustration, disappointment and shame that accompanied not having yet done it!.

I haven't worked everything out and I still don't really know where this is going, What I do know is that it needs to be given the space to unfold. I also recently realised that it wants to be both spoken and written. Somehow this way it feels more like a conversation and less like a dispatch.

There will also be a written transcript including poems from me and others, podcasts, books and other resources that feel like they're related or have inspired me somehow.

So after what felt like an eternity hoping, planning, contingency planning and then surrendering to the gods, here I am, back in my home town 25 years after I left and back at the page, almost 12 months after I hoped to be writing this.... and yet now feels like the perfect time for both. I have washed up on distant yet familiar shores ready to begin again.

It's summer here in Australia, and in Queensland where I live, it's very warm and increasingly humid. I remember how wild and pungent it smelled that first day out of hotel quarantine.  I've lost the scent of it now though somehow. I cant make out the fragrant layers, I'm not even sure if I notice it much at all any more.  How quickly we humans acclimatise, adapt and forget.

Coming back home here, feels like coming full circle and to a cross roads all at once....like discovering a new city and still being able to follow my nose. There are new highways but if I want to, I can still take the old roads with a few inevitable wrong turns along the way. 

I cant help but think about these lines from the poet TS Eliot:

“We shall not cease from exploration. And the end of all our exploring. Will be to arrive where we started. And know the place for the first time.”

It's been a time of reunions and fresh starts and in amongst the euphoria, I'm also pondering where I might be now if I'd not strayed so far from the path. What my career and home would look and feel like, and my bank balance. I've been thinking a lot about the detours too, especially the ones that took me furtherest afield. The wild experiments infused with both liberation and failure. The ones that might be quietly suggested that you remove from the CV of your life because they confuse the narrative.  When I lose myself, I look here to those often spontaneous and sometimes wobbly attempts at exploring the edges of whats possible, and there I am, in full technocolour. The light, the dark and everything in between.

I felt the same tingly impulse when I made those decisions as I did when the idea for this letter popped into my head. It's the same feeling I felt when I met my husband and when I decided to drive down a road I didn't know and would end up living on 5 years later.  The feeling comes from somewhere much deeper and feels much less desperate than a craving. It says to me this is important, pay attention. When I move from that place, there I am time and time again.  The older I get, the more I understand that these moments are evidence of a much deeper undercurrent that flows below the surface of my everyday life. A story arc with a timelessness and a purpose I can't fully understand. Flowing towards the sea regardless of hinderance.

This life continues to be a wild ride and its up to each of us to decide whether we're going to keep our eyes open or shut, to bare witness to the suffering and the joy. The American poet Jane Hirshfield said in a recent interview with Krista Tippet for the Onbeing podcast:

“it’s my nature to to question, to look at the opposite side. I believe that the best writing does this...it tells us that where there is sorrow, there will be joy, where there is joy, there will be sorrow. Acknowledging the fullness things is our human task….to know what we can suffer through and know what we can change.” 

Writing helps me to not turn away, to find the beauty in amongst the mud and to follow the nudges. I think this is what I mean by appetite for living. It’s taken a year to be able to begin to articulate this and it’s still unfolding. Tingly nudges need to be trusted to unfold in their own time.  We can force and rush and try to wrangle them into where we think they need to go, bulldoze a motorway that makes for the most efficient route or we can decide to pause for a moment and ask where do we want to go? With the help of this letter, I hope to write my way through life's landscape in a way that gives me as many tingly moments as possible.

I'd love this to be more than a one way communique, and more of an invitation to start a conversation with ourselves, each other and the world around us. Speaking this in my own voice feels somehow more alive too. I hope there is something here that you can tuck into your pocket for your onward journey and as always, leave what doesn't fizz behind.

Wherever and however this finds you, and whatever this season means to you, may you feel loved and supported. Whether you’re spiralling in to your longest night or out to your longest day, may you feel the peace of that moment.

I'd like to sign off with a poem I wrote last week about how it feels to be on the trail of something important and illusive.

POEM HUNTER

I close my eyes
hoping to find you there, 
a whiff of treasure on a blank ocean.

Compass in hand,
with barely a hint of you 
I plot a course.

Then in a splash there you are,
I scramble for my net
and you're gone.

Not lost, just swallowed by the sea
travelling unseen
until I catch a glimpse again. 

Finally, arriving at that distant shore
only to discover
the mere ghost of you. 

So I journey on,
steering by starlight, knowing 
there are infinite ways to navigate God. 

Go well friends and with much love from me Amanda xx

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Questions you might like to ask:

Where have you taken a detour on a roadtrip and in life?  Why? How did it feel? 

How did you feel when you joined the highway again?

What does appetite for living mean to you?

When have you lost it and why and how did you find it?

Is there something alive for you right now that you’re feeling compelled to pin down? What would it look and feel like if you allowed it to take more time?

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Poems and links:

Jane Hirshfield speaking with Krista Tippett for the Onbeing podcast:

The Fullness of Things

You can read more about me on my website:

amandacooke.com

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A lot of below ground writing happens here down by the river.

Until next time,

xAmanda

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Appetite for Living is a free regular letter. If you’d like to have access to additional monthly audio episodes, questions for contemplation discussion threads, and more behind the scenes insights into my creative and personal processes and practices, I invite you to become a paid subscriber. Paid subscribers will also be able to comment and engage with the Appetite for Living community. I so appreciate and value your support!

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