Showcase: When Words Are True + Love Stories + Castles In The Air

Edited by Sarah Frideswide

Hi everyone, I’m Sarah Frideswide. I’ve been a writer all my life. I started writing at the age of six at night, in secret, because I couldn’t sleep, but being awake in the night brought consequences if I was caught. So I had a secret creative self who came alive in those silent hours. I’d hide the evidence of stories and poems behind the wardrobe when I was finished.

Out of this forbidden practice has come a life of varied and interesting adventure. When I look back, I can see how, in both direct and indirect ways, my writing life has shaped and influenced my decisions, who I’ve met, where I’ve gone, what I’ve done. I had no idea the power of my decision to write when I was a small child; hiding who I really was in order to stay safe. But I’m here now, a published writer who no longer has to hide; one who has discovered that writing and creativity has the power to bring hope into other people’s lives.

That’s why this month’s Showcase theme is about choices which have led to unexpected healing. Right now, the world around us is dark and unstable. Yet most of us carry within us a great light – we just need to learn how to ignite it. Then it not only brings warmth and light to our own souls, but to others around us as well. Many times, we find that our inner light is lit unexpectedly when we’re busy looking in another direction. Small decisions can lead to great healing we don’t always see coming. Writing and publishing those stories has the power to bring hope to others as well.

To stay with the topic of writing, this week we have pieces which reveal the healing power in words, stories and in the act of writing itself. Kicking us off is young writer Emma Cowling with her poem about journaling.

When Words Are True

Blank pages are blank no more,
The pages call out to me, as I exhale my thoughts.
The ink listens, needing no reply.
The sentences loosen the knot in my stomach.
Tears dry faster when words are true.
Feelings scattered on the page come to life,
Each scribble becomes a pattern,
A work of art. It shapes my day.
The journal sees me with kinder eyes,
Pages become a foundation.
My hand is an artist, my heart is a poet.
Wounds are bandaged by words,
Holes are stitched by drawings.
Because tears dry faster when words are true,
And my experiences travel with me, seeing another day.
I close the journal, feeling a little more whole,
With stitched-together seams in the soul.

© Emma Cowling, 2026

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From journaling, we move to a joyous poem about how words, stories and poems live inside a person before they’re expressed, or even if they’re never expressed. This poem buzzes with the excitement of possibilities. It shows all of the unmade creative decisions alive in a person.

Love Stories

Oh, the delicious chill
Tingling along my spine
When I think of
The words
I haven’t told you yet
The stories
I haven’t invented for you yet
The landscapes
I haven’t displayed for you yet
The sweet little nothings
I haven’t poured into your ear yet

Oh, the delicious thrill
Running on my skin
When I think of
The books
I haven’t read yet
They say 770 is a life maximum
I could read boxes
If they reminded me of you
Of your itinerary and experiences
Of your manners and habits
Of your faults and annoying ways

Oh, the delights
The wonderful nights
The amazing anticipation
Of filling the blanks
Of a life we’ll never have
Through travelling words
And silent conversations
The gentle sounds
Of vowels and consonants
Mingling for you
Then for you and me

What will it be?
Science-fiction or fantasy?
Romance or poetry?
It is not about genres
We can be anything we want
Reinvent ourselves
A precious form of freedom
Let your words fly to me
Envelop and caress me
A love story it is
Written with the words of passion

I want to be an open book to you

© Isabelle Audiger, 2026

Connect with Isabelle on Instagram: @isabelleaudiger

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In this piece of life writing, Jo Renton traces a journey from a childhood shaped by her mother’s songs to the adapted dreams of adulthood, and shows how those dreams can unexpectedly find their way into reality later in life.

Castles In The Air

When I was a small child, my mother used to sing to me. She didn’t have a large repertoire, but one of her songs was the old music hall number, Daisy, Daisy, Give Me Your Answer Do. Another was, I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles. They might well have been castles in the air we were singing about.

As I grew older, I found I was able to keep the two aspects of my life, facts and fantasy, in separate compartments. I didn’t fashion elaborate futures for myself. If I enjoyed something, I’d stay with it as long as possible, and if I didn’t, well, those things fell by the wayside. Making do, seasoned with an active imagination, did the rest. Fortunately, I found that I enjoyed school and, as I couldn’t think of anything else to do, I stayed there, passed my exams and landed up at university. This wasn’t the fulfillment of a long-cherished dream. It just was.

Many things came easily for me. I met a handsome German law student while on a working holiday and married him three years later. I loved travel and languages, so that was ideal as far as I was concerned. We wanted a child, and ended up with four of them; all healthy, bilingual and wonderful. Then later on, when the children were older, I saw much of the world with the oil-tanker captain I’d married, several years after my first marriage ended. I’ve been as far south as Ushuaia and the Beagle Channel. I’ve been as far North as Svalbard, East to Hong Kong and Thailand, and as far West as Hawaii, where, on one occasion, I found myself welcoming first class passengers from the QE2 in Hawaiian fashion with a lei of fresh flowers around their necks.

Life is a landscape, and what I’ve described is the sunlit hills. Of course, there were valleys of tears, but they’re not the parts I wish to dwell on. I remember the wonderful parts. My castles in the air are memories, rather than dreams.

But wait! There is one dream I can share. My mother was a clam as far as my father was concerned, except for telling me in an unguarded moment that his name was Donald and that I was half-Canadian, but that was it. I could delve no further. So it was only at her wake my aunt told me his surname. It was now realistic to search for him, which I did. Two years later, my half-brother Roger was giving me a huge bear-hug at Toronto airport. My father had died years before, but I had the opportunity to meet so many Canadian relatives that, by the time I got back to England, I was feeling more Canadian than British! But the Canadian Embassy in Trafalgar Square, London, while very interested in my story, especially the First Nation part, told me that I had absolutely no chance of obtaining Canadian citizenship. My parents would have to have been married and, even then, you had to be under 21 to apply, which I wasn’t.

That particular castle had to disappear, and for the ensuing 20 years, I succeeded in making it do so. Then, just last week, my son phoned me from Germany and told me the Canadian citizenship laws had changed and that, if I could authenticate my family links, as one of a cohort of war babies, I would definitely be in line for full Canadian citizenship. Of course, this particular castle has come too late in my own life to change anything for me, and probably for my children too. But for one or more of my ten grandchildren, it might be the dream they were not aware of until now. So, having sent in the necessary documents, we’re all waiting with bated breath for the next development.

This particular castle in the air has been resurrected and has had new life breathed into it. It is now a beacon shining golden in the sky.

© Jo Renton, 2026

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From secret notebooks to resurrected castles in the air, this month’s writing reminds us that small choices can carry healing far beyond what we first imagine. I’ll have more fabulous pieces for you next week — and don’t forget to submit your work if you’d like to see yourself on the page.

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You can hear great new ideas, creative work and writing tips on Write On! Audio. Find us on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Google Podcasts and Spotify. Type Pen to Print into your browser and look for our logo, or find us on Podcasters.Spotify.com.

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