A writing workshop for parents who have children living
with chronic health issues
SAVE THE DATE:
SUNDAY, MARCH 20, 2016
12 noon – 4 pm
Seattle, WA
contact me for more information: su************@****jm.org
Events & Workshops
Below you'll find my posts about upcoming and past events and workshops. Also see descriptions of my workshops.
I’m Done Falling
This could be the anthem for the entire session of Teens Writing from the Heart of Illness & Healing.
This is the cover of the anthology of the teen’s writings. After 8 weeks of reading and writing prompts in which a diverse group of students gradually opened up about the health issues they deal with, through their writing, we gathered them into this final version. They were a reticent group to begin with, or perhaps, just more reserved overall than the previous two groups, and they came from the eastside of Lake Washington, Beacon Hill and the central area in Seattle.
The poem from which the title was taken was written by a senior in high school. It was actually the last thing she wrote, written surprisingly quickly from a prompt on the second to last session that my co-teacher, Aaron Counts provided. The prompt started as a way to get them to write a brief biography of themselves in 24 words. In each successive version they had to reduce the “biography” by half, eventually whittling it down to one word. Then, they were to take that one word and write a poem from it. Falling is the name of the poem and I am including it (but not the author’s name) here.
Falling
Falling into a dark hole.
Someone catch me,
don’t let me fall.
Catching myself fast
to try and land on my feet.
Maybe falling feels better,
not knowing where I’m going
Fear, discomfort, curiosity, darkness.
I’m done falling, I landed on my feet.
I made it, but I’m not done,
I never am.
For a copy of this anthology or any of the other two, please let me know. I am especially happy to get them into the hands of anyone working with chronically ill kids in any setting..
Graduate School again? Poetry and Healing
I have begun an MFA in Creative Writing through Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is a low-residency program that I attend on campus, twice a year. In between I read, write and submit my work to a faculty mentor. This first semester I had the privilege of working with Rafael Campo, MD. and poet. Rafael is well known as a doctor who works primarily with oncology and HIV patients. He is also well known for his poetry and his unique teaching program in the medical school at Harvard University.
In his course at Harvard Medical School (HMS) Rafael exposes medical students to writings in a diverse array of literature. In his own words he says: “Medical students and house staff, as well as their medical faculty supervisors, find Art + Humanities @ HMS an invaluable resource in renewing their commitment to medicine, by stimulating their personal growth, mirroring their own life experiences through the lens of diverse peoples, and offering an alternative discourse of empathy and mutual respect to counter the growing cynicism in our profession.”
My work this past term was not only to read a range of poets and essayists who write about illness, the body, healing and language and write both poems and essays myself, but also to choose a variety of readings and create writing prompts for a class called Poetry and Prose Rounds held at the U of WA. I taught this course in conjunction with a professor of nursing, Josephine Ensign, who started it a couple of years ago. I had gone to the original workshop and found it very stimulating. The people who attended were from a variety of health fields. We again offered it to anyone in the health science field.
I will write more about the readings and prompts for Poetry and Prose Rounds, though some of that information is already available if you click the link for the class, above.
In addition, I also taught the third round of Teens Writing from the Heart of Illness & Healing and you can read about that and read some of the student’s work under another blog post.
The Healing Art of Poetry Reading
Seven kids from the workshop Teens Writing from the Heart of Illness & Healing read a selection of their poems the other night to crowd of parents, friends, community members, medical doctors and staff at Odessa Brown Children’s Clinic in Seattle. They read with power and conviction and wowed everyone in attendance. Parents were surprised at the strength and insightfulness of their words, at the deep emotional clarity and risk-taking. The audience was supportive and appreciative and I think the teens themselves were proud and maybe amazed, at the effect their words had.
Here are a few excerpts from their work:
from Lost
I’m lost in my mind spinning around.
I’m lost in my memories still to be found.
I’m lost in my heart deep inside.
I’m lost in my smile so sweet and kind.
I’m lost in my past I’m lost in my present.
(Elijah Jones)
Where I’m from smells of fresh-baked bread
and rosemary rubbed between
warm hands.
I’m from dancing like drunk people
on the altar platform
twirling through
Christ is born
and Christ is risen
from Rejoice! and the corners of creation.
I’m from the perfect
is the enemy of the good
and good enough
is never really good enough….
(Kat Santarelli)
from Sickle Cell
…Constantly in hospitals accompanied by televisions and books
as best friends
tears became my voice, fear was my only choice
at the age of eight.
I was given opportunities to only be turned down
as the pain arised and the devil tattooed the word, “demise.”
my life had reached it’s point…
(Laelah Ndifon)
You can find the full body of their work in the chapbook Based on a True Story: Just Beyond the Gate,
available through the Online Store.
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