Healing Library Table of Contents

1.  The Cure by Andrea Barrett

A short story, complete with a cure cottage, set in the Adirondacks.
Everything is as it should be, exactly as she would wish it: nine o'clock, on this December day in 1905 . . .

2.  The Magic Land by Julie Moir Messervy

A small and different kind of guidebook for creating a healing place.
Once upon a time, when we were very young, we each possessed a place of enchantment and dreams. . .

3.  The Lake Isle of Innisfree by William B. Yeats

A classic poem of healing place.
I will arise and go now . . .

4.  Island of the Raped Women by Frances Driscoll

A poem of refuge and reconnection.
There are no paved roads here and all of the goats
are well-behaved. . .

5.  Folly by Laurie King

A suspense novel--with a healing slant.
The gray-haired woman stood with her boots planted on the rocky promontory. . .

6.  The Summer Day by Mary Oliver

A poem with a question
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

7.  Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

A collection of interconnected stories

For many years Henry Kitteridge was a pharmacist in the next town over, driving every morning on snowy roads, or rainy roads, or summertime roads, when the wild raspberries shot their new growth in brambles along the last section of town. . .

8.  The Kingdom of Ordinary Time by Marie Howe

A new collection of poetry by the author of What the Living Do
It was the Coming of Ordinary Time.  First Sunday, second Sunday.
And then (for who knows how long) it was here.

9.  (from) The Spell by Marie Howe

A poem from The Kingdom of Ordinary Time

Our four-year-old neighbor Pablo has lost his wand
and so he tries to cast spells with his finger
which doesn't seem to work as well.

10. (from) On Being Ill by Virginia Woolf

An essay in which Ms. Woolf argues for illness as a topic for literature
and makes a case for creating a new language for illness
English, which can express the thoughts of Hamlet and the tragedy
of Lear, has no words for the shiver and the headache.  It has
all grown one way.

11. Talking to Grief by Denise Levertov

A poem in which grief takes the form of a dog in need of a home
Ah, grief, I should not treat you
like a homeless dog

12. Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain by Sharon Begley

An overview of the research on brain plasticity
with a foreword by the Dalai Lama
Of all the concepts in modern neuroscience, it is neuroplasticity that has
the greatest potential for meaningful interaction with Buddhism.

13. Long Quiet Highway by Natalie Goldberg

A memoir of a woman waking up through the practices of writing and Buddhism
This was the hardest part for me.  You came and went at the Zen Center
and no one paid attention.  No one asked me if I was going to return
or told me they were delighted to see me.  I was alone again; it was just
like writing.

14. October by Robert Frost

A poem to an October morning
O hushed October morning mild,
Begin the hours of this day slow,

15. The Enchanted Loom,
        from Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain by Sharon Begley

A chapter introducing research on the brain's malleability.
the more habitually you make a particular movement,
the more of the brain's real estate is zoned for that movement

16. Beautiful Boy by David Sheff

A journalist's memoir of his son's addiction
There’s nothing to be done, we have to do everything we can do. 
We have done everything we can do, we have more to do.

17. My November Guest by Robert Frost

A poem in which sorrow appears as guest and companion
MY Sorrow, when she’s here with me,   
  Thinks these dark days of autumn rain   
Are beautiful as days can be;

18.  When I Am Asked by Lisel Mueller

A poem on language as a place for grief
I sat on a gray stone bench. . .
and placed my grief
in the mouth of language,