Reflections on 'Self-Care" by Solmaz Sharif

with poems and prompts

I saw my first counsellor when I was twenty. I’d been self-harming since I was ten, so I didn’t exactly rush into it. She suggested that I try jumping on empty egg cartons as a way of expressing my anger. This suggested affronted me, for at least three reasons:

1. I was vegan

2. I wasn’t angry: I was very sad, very tired and very scared.

3. Also, every day felt like a daily epic struggle for my life, and her suggestion was more appropriate for someone who was riled up after an argument or a difficult day at work.

Thirty-two years later, and I’m still living with mental health challenges, along with some chronic physical issues – and, predictably I’ve heard many more “helpful” suggestions along the way; here’s just a small sample of them. Every single one of them is real.

You get the picture, I’m sure. Which is why I was so excited to hear this poem by Solmaz Sharif.

Self-Care

Have you tried
rose hydrosol? Smokey quartz
in a steel bottle

of glacial water? Tincture
drawn from the stamens
of daylilies grown
on the western sides

of two-story homes?
Pancreas of toad?
Deodorant paste?

Have you removed
your metal fillings? Made peace
with your mother? With all
the mothers you can? Or tried

car exhaust? Holding your face
to the steaming kettle?
Primal screamed into

a down-alternative pillow
in a wood while tree-bathing?
Have you finally stopped
shoulding all over yourself?

Has your copay increased?
Right hip stiffened?
Has the shore risen
as you closed up the shop?
And have you put your weight
behind its glass door to keep
the ocean out? All of it?

Rang the singing bowl
next to the sloping toilet?
Mainlined lithium?

Colored in another mandala?
Have you looked
yourself in the mirror
and found the blessed halo

of a ring light in each iris?
Have you been content enough
being this content? Whose

shop was it?

Although it’s delightfully engaging in an easy, accessible way, it’s a deeply clever poem, which, behind its humour, is deadly serious. And self-care is serious, which is why its commodification is so jarring. I vividly remember the moment I realised that self-care refers to caring for yourself. Not buying bath salts or chocolate fountains or booking a day at the spa, but feeling compassion for yourself, with all its sadness and tenderness and love.

At first, I thought Solmaz’s brilliant poem was, like my little outburst above, a list of responses to illness or distress. Then I realised it’s concerned with something deeper – it’s about the messages we give to ourselves – the ways in which we find ourselves wanting; in which we blame ourselves; in which we seek a perfection which isn’t only impossible, but is also deeply flawed – shaped as it is by the corrupting forces of commodification, profit, reputation, ego.

It's a hard thing to write a poem consisting totally of questions, and to maintain a momentum. But this poem is actually held together by the questions - they are its form, the scaffold and its engine, the force - even the violence – of the poem. And there’s great variation and contrast within them: some questions are wryly ironic; some wildly and humorously exaggerated; some painful, confronting, disturbing. Some reflect, for example, the huge pressure that the “you” of the poem is under – the reader, the poet, or a universal “you”, trying to hold back the ocean with a glass door. Some reflect intimacy and insight, compassion – “Made peace/ with your mother?” “Have you finally stopped/ shoulding all over yourself?”

In the context of this poem, the comedic “shoulding” carries a lot of weight. Should is a complex word … it holds a separation within itself. In the space of this tiny word there’s a distance between the way something is, and the way someone imagines it should be. Think about the word should for a while and your head starts to spin – it’s a like a hall of mirrors. In a poem, this kind of small, deep, multi-layered word can be a gift: one word can effortlessly introduce drama, complexity, an inferred narrative. So let’s use it.

Exercise.

For a minimum of five minutes - and a maximum of ten – write a list of the shoulds you tell yourself .

You can deliberately ramp it up for ironic or comedic effect. Or you might find that you don’t need to

Allow the serious shoulds to emerge too. Don’t set about writing this poem with any intention, any argument to make, or any story to tell. Just write down those shoulds, freely, loosely, playfully, angrily, and let the words do the work for you – they know where you need to go.

I would LOVE to see what you write, so please do feel free to post it here, or to tag me (Clare Shaw) if you share it on social media.

For our paying subscribers … there will be an additional article and prompt heading your way in the coming days, featuring an awesome poem by Jon David – but until then – have a great week everyone, and, erm, take care!