Do This
-from Wednesday by Cassie Premo Steele
You ask me how to make your dreams come true.
Don’t be a dunce. Of course I know what to do.
But don’t get excited. I don’t have commandments,
a handy list to calculate the common denominator
of fear over glue. You know me by now. I’m a guru.
So I’ll say: Get in the saddle. Be a ninja. Listen to
a waterfall. Play. And you’ll look at me as if I’m
speaking Swahili instead of bonhomie and say, “Hey!
Are you on morphine? Give me some concrete
perspective here! This is my dream!” And I become
redundant (at least to me) and start to spell it out.
Even the classifieds are not in a paper anymore.
Stop the shameless selling. Inspiration is not a
formula to tout. Bazinga is funny because Sheldon
does not shout. Grateful is the gateway to be wise.
You don’t need an optometrist to see with new eyes.
Do what mothers do: be quiet for a long time for
development to materialize. Find a tribe. If the one
you are in is a jailer, exonerate yourself. Let the
revolution catalyze. Come out. The opposite is
homicide. It’s about a worldview. Ideas start inside.
Go into the dumpling of your skin and find
integrity within. It doesn't take a psychic (or if it
does, she only helps because she’s punctilious).
You don’t need what you think you must have: not
that job, that man, that title, that money, that
layaway plan. You can’t implant metamorphosis.
Even Athena wore an aegis. It was to protect her
from this: toxicity, duplicity, and complicity.
All the things that split. Dreams are born in unity.
Wear your shield as Athena did, and you, too,
can grow her dream of this: democracy, domesticity,
felicity, simplicity, authenticity and synchronicity.
Now stop putzing. Do this. Do. Right now. You.
-from Wednesday by Cassie Premo Steele
You ask me how to make your dreams come true.
Don’t be a dunce. Of course I know what to do.
But don’t get excited. I don’t have commandments,
a handy list to calculate the common denominator
of fear over glue. You know me by now. I’m a guru.
So I’ll say: Get in the saddle. Be a ninja. Listen to
a waterfall. Play. And you’ll look at me as if I’m
speaking Swahili instead of bonhomie and say, “Hey!
Are you on morphine? Give me some concrete
perspective here! This is my dream!” And I become
redundant (at least to me) and start to spell it out.
Even the classifieds are not in a paper anymore.
Stop the shameless selling. Inspiration is not a
formula to tout. Bazinga is funny because Sheldon
does not shout. Grateful is the gateway to be wise.
You don’t need an optometrist to see with new eyes.
Do what mothers do: be quiet for a long time for
development to materialize. Find a tribe. If the one
you are in is a jailer, exonerate yourself. Let the
revolution catalyze. Come out. The opposite is
homicide. It’s about a worldview. Ideas start inside.
Go into the dumpling of your skin and find
integrity within. It doesn't take a psychic (or if it
does, she only helps because she’s punctilious).
You don’t need what you think you must have: not
that job, that man, that title, that money, that
layaway plan. You can’t implant metamorphosis.
Even Athena wore an aegis. It was to protect her
from this: toxicity, duplicity, and complicity.
All the things that split. Dreams are born in unity.
Wear your shield as Athena did, and you, too,
can grow her dream of this: democracy, domesticity,
felicity, simplicity, authenticity and synchronicity.
Now stop putzing. Do this. Do. Right now. You.
For 10 years, Cassie Premo Steele invited friends, fellow artists, clients, and colleagues to join her in a poetry writing collaboration. Every Wednesday she asked them to add a word to a Facebook thread and constructed a poem that wove the spirit and intentions of all those words into one piece of writing.
The result is this book.
In it you will find a wide range of subjects and ideas contributed by more than 300 people from all around the world. It is an exploration on collaboration and on the artistic task of creating one song out of a multitude of different voices.
The result is this book.
In it you will find a wide range of subjects and ideas contributed by more than 300 people from all around the world. It is an exploration on collaboration and on the artistic task of creating one song out of a multitude of different voices.
--from the introduction by Daniel Dowe
What people are saying about Wednesday
"What an innovative use of social media and collaboration to bring the art of writing poetry alive!"
--Virginia J. Pulver
"Cassie Premo Steele's Wednesday poems are fun, clever, and interesting! I am always amazed at what she is able to come up with using so many word contributions!"
--Kezia Willingham
"Wordy Wednesday has been a great spark to start my day - it gets my creative juices going by playing with the words that jump to mind immediately and sorting through them until I find just the 'right' one. I even titled a painting of mine, using my word for that day - it was perfect - and probably wouldn't have occurred to me otherwise."
--Libby Bussinah
"Wednesday infuses freedom of expression with poetic genius!"
--Elizabeth JoAnn Sumner Jones
"Wordy Wednesday to me is a combination of friends, feelings and words brought together through the raw, impeccable talent of Cassie Premo Steele".
--Kathie Turner
"Wednesday is pure fun! It inspires my heart when reading others’ creative thoughts."
--Lisa Hills
"How can one person put the collective awesomeness of Wordy Wednesday in one quote? To keep with the one word theme: FANTASTIC!"
--Leisa Marie Mounts
"Wednesday poems inspire creativity through collaboration, unite a varied group of strangers with the power of one word and Cassie Premo Steele's eloquent writing. Wednesday brings joy and fun to a disparate band of writers."
--Kris Friend
"Wordy Wednesday - a glimpse at co-creation fun!"
--Gail McGrail Glasser
"Wordy Wednesday is a collection of multiple individuals' one-word thoughts brought together creatively by our poet, the amazing Cassie. Most of us have never met, yet still we are able to come together as one, join our words -- the result? Always a knock-out piece of poetry that none of us, alone, could render."
--Joyce Norman
"Cassie Premo Steele crafts our individual words -- our diverse thoughts and images -- into a coherent treasure! That is the magic of a poet!"
--Charlotte Koon Ehney