Darkness and Light
End of Year Newsletter and Healing Circle Poems
Hello friends!
This post is both our end-of-year newsletter and a reminder for our December Healing Circle tomorrow, Saturday, December 27th, at 1 pm ET. Read on for announcements, details, and some pictures of us!
We don’t know about you, but it has been one heck of a year. We have had some serious highs and lows, and we are looking forward to a fresh start. As we transition into 2026, we wanted to give you some updates.
Subscriptions
We are so grateful to all of our free and paid subscribers. We started accepting paid subscriptions on January 1st, 2025, which means that many annual subscriptions will renew on the first day of 2026. If you still want to support us, thank you so much! If you don’t feel like you can continue contributing to our work, now is a good time to end your subscription.
That said, if you are a free subscriber and you want to show us some love, now is a great time to upgrade your subscription! We are planning to bring you lots of substantive work in the next year. Get ready for more audio and video posts, interviews, advice columns, personal essays, and more. As disabled creators, we are deeply impacted by every subscription.
Contacting Us
There are several ways to get in contact with us. You can always leave a comment at the end of a post, and we will be sure to read it. You can also email us at illnessandinsight@gmail.com. Please do NOT email us at illnessandinsight@subtack.com; it will get sent to our spam folders. You can also send Sage a message via Substack direct messaging.
Book Club
In January, we will read One for All by Lillie Lainoff. In February, we will read Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice by Leah Piepzna-Samarasinha. After that, we will take a break for a few months. If you have any book suggestions, let us know.
Healing Circles
We will continue to host monthly Healing Circles in 2026. Starting in January, we will switch to the fourth Sunday of the month at 2:00 p.m. EST.
Sage Advice
Sage is collecting questions for the advice column, so please send her your questions about mental illness, chronic illness, and disability.
Interviews and Collaborations
We are looking to do more artist collaborations and interviews with folks with chronic illnesses. If you are interested in sharing your story or work, please contact us!
December Healing Circle
The December Healing Circle will be tomorrow, December 27th, at 1:00 p.m. EST. Here is the Zoom link. As we celebrate the winter solstice, the theme of our circle is Darkness and Light.
For anyone new to Illness and Insight, our Healing Circles last 75-90 minutes and offer a structured opportunity to slow down, welcome some silence, reflect on poems that help us delve into a relevant theme, and share the deep wisdom that we each possess. We always leave the circle feeling more grounded, connected, and alive than we entered!
Poems on Darkness and Light
Sweet Darkness
David Whyte
When your eyes are tired
the world is tired also.
When your vision has gone,
no part of the world can find you.
Time to go into the dark
where the night has eyes
to recognize its own.
There you can be sure
you are not beyond love.
The dark will be your home
tonight.
The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.
You must learn one thing.
The world was made to be free in.
Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.
Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn
anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive
is too small for you.
How the Light Comes In
Jan Richardson
I cannot tell you
how the light comes.
What I know
is that it is more ancient
than imagining.
That it travels
across an astounding expanse
to reach us.
That it loves
searching out
what is hidden
what is lost
what is forgotten
or in peril
or in pain.
That it has a fondness
for the body
for finding its way
toward flesh
for tracing the edges
of form
for shining forth
through the eye,
the hand,
the heart.
I cannot tell you
how the light comes,
but that it does.
That it will.
That it works its way
into the deepest dark
that enfolds you,
though it may seem
long ages in coming
or arrive in a shape
you did not foresee.
And so
may we this day
turn ourselves toward it.
May we lift our faces
to let it find us.
May we bend our bodies
to follow the arc it makes.
May we open
and open more
and open still
to the blessed light
that comes.