Weekly Wide-Awake #52

[The Stage is on Fire] is a page-turner in which, much like life, there are no easy answers and yet each step of the journey yields insight and hope. This work of heart must not be missed!

Melanie Faith

Creative Writing Teacher, Essayist & Poet.

Katie Steedly’s first-person piece [The Unspeakable Gift] is a riveting retelling of her participation in a National Institutes of Health study that aided her quest to come to grips with her life of living with a rare genetic disorder. Her writing is superb.

The Society of Professional Journalists

In recognition of receiving the Dateline Award for the Washingtonian Magazine essay, The Unspeakable Gift.

I thank you … It is the authenticity of your “class notes”; and it is the delicacy and skill with which you present the nuances of classroom life and the actuality of your students’ and fellow teachers’ lives.

Maxine Greene

Philosopher and Education Scholar

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Continuous Living. The “S” Sound. Grants. Celebrating Ada Limón.

Living the Comma #24

Fuchsia funnels. Remembering. Celebrating Ada Limón.

More than the fuchsia funnels breaking out/ of the crabapple tree, more than the neighbor’s/ almost obscene display of cherry limbs shoving/ their cotton candy-colored blossoms to the slate/ sky of Spring rains, it’s the greening of the trees/ that really gets to me. When all the shock of white/ and taffy, the world’s baubles and trinkets, leave/ the pavement strewn with the confetti of aftermath,/ the leaves come. Patient, plodding, a green skin/ growing over whatever winter did to us, a return/ to the strange idea of continuous living despite/ the mess of us, the hurt, the empty. Fine then,/ I’ll take it, the tree seems to say, a new slick leaf/ unfurling like a fist to an open palm, I’ll take it all. — Ada Limón, “Instructions on Not Giving Up”

Dear Writer Friends,

This is National Poetry Month and I want to talk about poetry. I want fuchsia funnels to break out of crabapple trees. I want green skin to grow over whatever winter did. I want to be the slick leaf unfurling like a fist to an open palm. Poetry is attention. Poetry is prayer. Poetry is instruction on how not to give up.

Writing can be a key to the strange idea of continuous living. That is balm. That is healing. That is peace. Continuous living is wearing prayers like shoes. (Thank you, Ruth Forman.) Continuous living is imagination making empathy possible. (Thank you, Maxine Greene.) Continuous living is living the comma. (Thank you, Virginia Highland Church Writing Group.)

Read the entire post here.

MONDAYS ARE FREE EXERCISES 211-215

The “S” Sound. Work. Letting Go. Moments. Cartography.

EXERCISE 211: EMBRACE TWO CONSTRAINTS

sound occurs

Write a 150-syllable poem in which the “s” sound occurs at least thirty times.

Baby peaches sprout in Spring. Singing from/ blossoms. Already smelling like sweet newness,/ like sacred beginning, like sincere faith,/ like subtle breath into a future that/ knows grace and faith and courage. Every year/ blossoms swirling and seeking and soothing/ and sparkling. The sturdy tree knows the truth./ After winter snow comes Spring. From roots there/ are buds. We survive deep frosts and harsh storms./ Stubborn fruit becoming sticky, soft, and/ spectacular. Delicious. I wait in/ prayer. Safely. Sincerely. Serenely. The/ earth spins surely on its axis. My head/ spins swiftly searching for center. I blink/ and breathe and bend. I patiently and dil/igently and vigilantly watch./ Welcome Spring. Welcome blossom. Welcome peach.

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Spit and Spaghetti #16

Pitches from Wind and Wall

CR Sustainability — Grant Writer

[A portion of the cover letter sent to CR Sustainability.]

I have written successful grants and proposals throughout my career. As a program evaluator, research associate, and contractor, I have participated in the entire grant cycle — from all sides of the funding table. Past successful grants, proposals, and reports have included those to the United States Department of Education, state education and public health agencies, and foundations of varying scope and size. Specific to sustainability-related funding, my experience — across the fields of public health, education, and workforce development, for example — equips me to creatively garner funds for CR Sustainability.

Read entire post here.

Thank you. Ada Limón.

Instructions on Not Giving Up. How to Triumph Like a Girl. Wonder Woman.

How to Triumph Like a Girl

I like their lady horse swagger,
after winning. Ears up, girls, ears up!
But mainly, let’s be honest, I like
that they’re ladies. As if this big
dangerous animal is also a part of me,
that somewhere inside the delicate
skin of my body, there pumps
an 8-pound female horse heart,
giant with power, heavy with blood.

From Ada Limon’s “How to Triumph Like a Girl“

We are tired. If we do our work, we are tired. If we put one foot in front of the other, we are tired. If we pay attention, we are tired. For so many reasons, we are tired. We need to reconnect with our power right here and now.

We must summons our inner lady horse. We must call her to the post. We must remember we are giant with power and heavy with blood. We must remember we are genius machines that know we are going to come in first. We must remember there is a time for it all — time to be hungry, angry, lonely, and afraid. We must hold those times close to our big eight pound hearts and know we are more than all that. We must run our race, and when we succeed, move about ears up with lady horse swagger.

Read entire post here.

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