Every voice has a story.
Every story adds to the signal.
Our Words is a living library of poems, stories, essays, spoken word, and reflections from across the Poetry & Prose Network community.
These pieces come from writers at every step of the journey—discovering their voice, refining their craft, and connecting through the simple power of words:
Some began as quick workshop prompts.
Some were forged through peer feedback.
Some were born under the spotlight on stage.
Some were written simply because a story needed a home.
Together, they capture moments of courage, vulnerability, and genuine human connection. This is more than a digital gallery—it is a living record of our community’s journey: the voices we’ve heard, the stories we’ve shared, and the connections we’ve built along the way.
The Stories That Helped Shape Us
Before there was a network, there were voices—people writing, sharing, listening, and discovering what happens when words become a shared experience.
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Community-Defining Pieces
I’m a Poet
Nervously I walk up to an open mic
To read a poem I hope you’ll like.
I’m seeking validation as a poet,
Hoping your response will show it,
And by your response I’ll finally know it–
I have been, will be, am a poet.
I’ve written poetry for years, but rarely shared.
An introvert, full of doubt, I never dared
To read my poems in which my soul I bared–
I was too scared.
For years I waxed and waned, ebbed and flowed.
My career led me down a different road.
Yet whenever I picked up a paper and pen
And wrote a poem I felt whole again.
I grew old fighting the demons of self-doubt;
“Damn the demons”, I heard myself shout
It’s finally time for me to come out
And declare I’m a poet; it’s what my life’s all about.
Poetry helped me to deal with my life;
The abuse, the self-harm, the rage and the strife.
I wielded my poetry like it was a knife,
To hurt the person who’d given me life.
It worked for a while, when I wrote I felt free
Of the hole in my soul, gnawing at me.
And then I had an epiphany,
The only person I was hurting was me.
I stopped using words as weaponry
And soothed my wounds with poetry.
The Sounds Wild Snails Hear
Half of a snail shell floated on top of the flower bed.
Topless,
its inner whorl like that of an ear,
glowed a delicate white against the red-orange cedar mulch
giving a new meaning to an ear to the ground.
What do snails hear?
Perhaps these stomach feet hear the slow geologic slosh of the planet’s molten core
or the measured drip of glaciers.
Sliding along tasting the salt of the earth,
She transforms mineral to silvery ribbons.
All the while the surf on the other side of the world
quietly roars in her chambered nautilus ear.
Seismograph Readings from My Body Electric
I sing the body electric
Birthday cake crumbs still floating in my stomach, January 1986
In the liminal pre-sleep phase, just before the sandman seals the deal
I celebrate the me yet come
My body is filled with buzzing, rumbling, levitating above my bed
I toast to my own reunion
I can’t control it
can’t get down,
I’m terrified
something awful
When I become one with the sun
The next day in math class where I watch my sluggish, frog-eyed teacher
scrawl on the overhead projector,
“Q. E. D.” for what he cavalierly says is, “Quite-Easily-Done,”
the librarian rushes in and whispers in his ear.
And I'll look back on Venus
I'll look back on Mars
“The Space Shuttle Challenger has exploded,” he relays matter. of. fact.
And I'll burn with the fire
The news sends me crashing into the mattress of reality,
with the electric sizzling knowledge that
last night’s fizzing sensation
was a somatic divining rod
Of ten million stars
of the teacher and six other space pioneers who are now fiery sparks
among the brilliant dust that we are made of
that sends light relentlessly, mystically
to us with the speed of beckoning
Ashes to ashes, star dust to star dust
And in time
Q. E. D. Quo Era Demonstratum, thus it is demonstrated
And in time
we sing the body electric
We will all be stars
Kari Tai with lyrics by Songwriters: Dean Pitchford / Michael Gore
The Tosh Barn
Soft meadow grasses trace the barn’s
cedar walls kissed a soft pewter
by years of peace-dove rains.
Rivulets chased rivulets down the grains
raising ridges
as rough as the years gone by.
Standing proud in abandonment,
doors shuttered barely holding back
memories of bolts of horse power as
muscled stallions rippled across the field
crushing yellow flowers beneath their hooves.
Sun streams through the slats
and a sweet grassy smell steams out
as lovers roll in the hay.
A woman ponders her place in this world
with her forehead pressed into the cow’s side
as she works rhythmically, time passing in a trance.
The barn, its peaked roof parting daydream clouds
rooting us to everything we share
sun, wind, and air.
Nothing is new under the sun
Nothing is new under the sun
except the dark cottonwood leaves rustling applause
outside the barn.
A visual touchstone to
Redmond’s past,
where everything is new under the sun.
I’ll Be Seeing You
At the end of a long week,
my soul goes looking,
not for home exactly,
but for yours.
When your words reach my ears
the fog begins to clear,
My mind opens.
My heart follows.
Some nights,
you press a thumb
against a scar
I'd forgotten was there.
Other nights,
a cracked smile,
a phrase folded into my pocket
for the journey home.
But always,
you leave me something real,
something my bones feel.
When we're together,
the weight of the world
slips off my shoulders.
I leave lighter
than I arrived.
I borrow courage
from your cadence
until it sounds
like my own.
I never knew
your thunder
could uncork
my bottled lightning.
Or that
in a room full of strangers,
I could finally
find myself.
Then comes
the final round of applause—
that bittersweet note
that beauty, too,
must pause.
Chairs scrape the floor.
Hugs refuse to end
at the door.
Goodbyes soften into,
I’ll be seeing you.
Four words promising return,
not an ending
but a thread
stretching forward
through the days between us.
Hope hums in my head.
I walk home wrapped in our words,
a quilt stitched from voices,
warming the quiet,
tucking me gently into dreams.
I’ll be seeing you.
Inspired by feedback from the Poetry & Prose Network community.
A tribute to the connections that remain after the final applause—the friendships, encouragement, and shared moments that turn a room of writers into a community.
We Hold the Pen
Life is written line by line
and each of us holds the pen.
A page is only paper
until we stain it with meaning
pressing point to parchment,
striking a spark
souls catching fire
one phrase at a time,
leaving bright imprints
burned into memory.
A stage is only silence
until we speak our stories
waves of words
washing over, carrying us
from isolation
into community,
turning listeners into witnesses,
and witnesses into believers
somewhere between
the quiet of the page and the
pulse of the stage,
words become connection,
connection becomes courage,
and lives are transformed.
One story. One voice. One line at a time.
We hold the pen.
What mark will you leave?
Inspired by feedback from the Poetry & Prose Network community.
A reminder that every person has a story worth telling and the power to shape what comes next.
We Are Poetry & Prose Network: A Poetic Manifesto
We are a carrier of creation
An incubator of inspiration.
A laboratory for lyrical liberation,
refusing to stay silent.
A server for self-expression.
An amplifier of authenticity.
A data center for dreams,
audaciously defying doubt.
Malware for fear.
Hardware for hope.
Software for the soul.
Bandwidth for belonging.
In an age of algorithms
and artificial minds,
we remain, stubbornly,
people powered.
Your stories, our signal.
On page and on stage,
transmitting the truth,
raw and real.
A human heart
circulating life
through a city of machines
We are the Poetry & Prose Network.
Draft by draft.
Story by story
Voice by voice.
Where stories become signals,
where strangers become community,
and where voices don't buffer—
they break through.
Inspired by feedback from the Poetry & Prose Network community.
A reflection on the voices, values, and vision that shaped our community.
Add Your Words to Our Words
Every poem, story, and reflection in Our Words began with a single spark—an idea, a conversation, a workshop prompt, or a moment that refused to be forgotten.
Now, we’d love to amplify yours. Whether you’ve attended one event or twenty, your writing is an essential part of our community's story.
What We Accept
📜 Poems & Spoken Word Pieces
📖 Short Stories & Flash Fiction
🖊️ Essays & Creative Nonfiction
💬 Personal Reflections inspired by PPN events & prompts