The opportunity to gather with seventy other poets to write—and celebrate writing in community—was powerfully transformative. To witness other would-be-conscious souls negotiate and find voice amidst the flood of impressions coming in from our tumultuous and violent landscape (politically and socially), was deeply inspirational, and even healing. […] my week within the Community of Writers was one of the poetically richest of my life. My belief in the vitality and necessity of poetry in our world is stronger than ever.