Up: [[Life Writing Ideas]] Course: Writing into Paradox with Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer for 27Powers Created: 2023-08-28 Updated: 2026-02-10 I adore Rosemerry and got so much from this class. 182 people were on the call. ## Defining Paradox Paradox is two truths that seem completely opposite that exist at the same time. Instead of ‘but’, use ‘and’. Example: *I hate and I love.* — Catullus ## In Class Gems from Rosemerry > [!Orbit] [[Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer]] > Pretty poems or anger/rage/fury poems are boring. To be alive is to experience opposition; to know that things are horrible **and** there is also so much beauty in the world. > [!Orbit] [[Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer]] > All of art touches on “What does it mean to be alive?” If it doesn’t do that, it will be infinitely forgettable. To be alive is to experience opposition. We live in a world with this full spectrum. **This** is what it is to be alive. ## Using Poems as Platform A guy in the class writes snarky political poems. Rosemerry objected to this saying, *If it doesn’t have opposition, I will not trust it. I’ll know that it’s more propaganda than poem.* Update: The day of Trump’s second inauguration, Rosemerry wrote a poem. And the day after, she wrote another. - [Steadfast](https://ahundredfallingveils.com/2025/01/19/steadfast/) - [[Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer]] - [On Inauguration Day, Amy Serves Me Tea](https://ahundredfallingveils.com/2025/01/21/on-inauguration-day-amy-serves-me-tea/) - [[Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer]] ## A Process for Writing into Paradox 1. Make a list of statements that I think are true. 2. Look at each truth and try to find its opposite. I don’t have to believe the opposite truth that I come up with. See [[Examples of Opposites]] 3. Choose one of the paradoxes and explore it. I could write evidence of why something is true, then the opposite and write evidence for that. Or be very curious about the one I don’t think could possibly be true. Ask lots of questions about how it is true. There’s no way to do this wrong. An additional idea from a course with Alison Luterman. If a memory is difficult, use paradox to write about it. For a bitter moment, find the sweet within it. There will be one there. Hold the complexity. If you have trouble meeting the paradox, if you don’t want to know, this is valuable information that is worth noticing. One of the women in the group said she keeps a list of "A few things I won’t be writing about."