Poems in this issue Linda Barrett Ruth Deming Jan Felgoise Marion Fox Angela Glover Jan Goldman Maxine Hobbs Grace Lynch Marvin Thall   Edited by Kristine Grow For more information about  writing workshops offered by the Cheltenham Township Adult School, contact: Cheltenham Township Adult School 1414 Panther Road Wyncote, PA 19095 Phone: 215-887-1720	Grace Lynch  Grace Lynch grew up in Virginia and moved to Abington 14 years ago. She is retired from nursing, teaching and mental health counseling. She has attended two fall terms of "Poetry Writing" in the Cheltenham Adult School.   Be Not Conformed…..   Hidden and insulated from the enticement My world was about rules and plain truths. Conformity. Be not conformed to this world…. The freakin’ world.  Danger.  Evil.   ‘Holy men’ drew me into the world of their ideas Closed to the dance. Suffering little rawness and newness Sewed up in a quilt of the feminine. Quiet. Unspoken.   Others did not protest Fell into the trance of obedience Falling. On the outside I waited.  Wanting to be on the inside Escape had no rules.   Truth Came not by a light from the heavens. From a seed in the underground Soil of doubt Nourished by anger and light from the ground Under foot.   Grew into a tree of many branches Roots made strong by stumbling and hope Watered by the visions from the feminine Cutouts from sacred friends. Creative.  Instinctive.  Truth.     Surrender   Letting go so I’m free to do    What I am to do. Fearlessly, I loosen my grip     On the affairs of my life. Then what? Anarchy of the parts who divide me    Into a whirlpool Going in circles.  Sputtering. Then trying with every head cell to      Control the eddy of Oughts and shoulds and goodness. The head is in charge of my fears of      Submission to the heart. Submission to the moment To the self who I am. The head meets the heart. Again why do I fear surrender? Meeting myself at peace with the moment, I fear the whirlpool. The heart is weaker than the head. Share your power. The heart needs some of your strength.	"Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it." Hannah Arendt
	Editor's note:   At this time, The Tookany Review is accepting only the work of writers who are enrolled or have been enrolled in Cheltenham Adult School writing workshops. Home

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