Songs are Thoughts
Songs are thoughts, sung out with the breath when 
people are moved by great forces and ordinary speech 
no longer suffices.
Man is moved just like the ice loe sailing here and 
there out in the current. His thoughts are driven by a 
lowing force when he feels joy, when he feels fear, when 
he feels sorrow. Thoughts can wash over him like a flood, 
making his breath come in gasps and his heart throb.
Something like an abatement in the weather will keep him 
thawed up. And then it will happen that we, who always 
think we are small, will feel still smaller. And we will fear 
to use words. When the words we want to use shoot up 
of themselves – we get a song.
Orpingalik1

Some of your group may be interested in writing poetry or songs based on your oral history research. The thought of writing a poem can be a bit scary for some. So read a few poems aloud and discuss them before starting to write your own. Read poems or songs together to create a chorus. Look at songs to see how they are similar to poetry. Read or listen to traditional pisiit and use them as models to write your own work.

Ideas for Writing Poetry

• You could start your poetry writing sessions by writing about common things that you find in your home or your meeting area. Look at the object carefully; touch it; smell it. Try free-writing: write words or phrases that come to mind as you examine the object; describe the object. Try putting your list of words and phrases together in different ways. Don’t worry about rhyming.

Twizzler
Red, long, shiny, juicy, twisted
twizzlers – Buy it!

Chewy, juicy, strong tasting
strawberry smile-making taste – too good to be true!

Pure strawberry twizzlers in my
mouth on a cool day.
by John Tugak
from All Ours 1992

1. From Songs are Thoughts Poems of the Inuit, edited by Neil Philip, published by Doubleday Canada, Toronto, 1995