A Blog of Seattle Arts & Lectures
By Matt Gano, WITS Writer-in-Residence It’s been an incredible journey working as the WITS Writer-in-Residence at The Center School. My partnership with the esteemed Jon Greenberg along with scores of talented students over the years helped to shape me as a teacher and has inspired a lifetime’s worth of creative lessons and poetic ideas. After […]
By Danielle Palmer-Friedman Katherine Boo is not just a reporter—she’s a sponge. When she’s working on a story, she spends months, sometimes years, thoroughly documenting the lives of families living under extreme inequity. She meticulously records, never disregarding any detail for being too inconsequential. After Boo has gathered the histories, hopes, and abhorrences of the […]
By Greg Stump, WITS Writer-in-Residence A few years ago, I was browsing in a used bookstore when I came across a slim little offering from 1955 called Oodles of Droodles, by a cartoonist named Roger Price. The book is a compilation of minimalist doodles, each one paired up with a jokey title caption that […]
Whitey’s on TRAPPIST-I inspired by Gil Scott Heron Recently, NASA discovered 7 earth sized planets orbiting a single star 40 light years away One. Another black woman has crumbled to take a bullet in record time again. There is no spaceship named after her. We forget she had a name outside of bulk order eulogy. […]
By Rebecca Hoogs, SAL Associate Director Once upon a time, we might have thought of ourselves as a series that featured mid-to-late career poets. But, when a poet like Danez Smith comes along, two books into their career, well, you change the rules. This is a poet we’ve been waiting for, and we didn’t want […]
With and Without With my father carrying me to the orphanage home. Without me knowing what was going on. With my cousins wailing in the distance. Without a thought of leaving home. Without a thought of never seeing my family again. With that of a flying thing I never knew existed. With sitting next to […]
This essay is part of a series in which Poetry Northwest partners with Seattle Arts & Lectures to present reflections on visiting writers from SAL’s Poetry Series. Danez Smith reads at 7:30 pm tonight, November 26 at Broadway Performance Hall. Tickets will be sold at the door! By Luther Hughes 1. I used to own a plant, or […]
Only available through the New Year, SAL’s 4-Part Flex Pass makes an ideal gift for the reader or writer in your life. A Flex Pass will get you four SAL tickets to use any way you like. There are so many options: See four different lectures. Bring a friend to two events. Get a group of four together for a […]
By Alex Madison, WITS Writer-in-Residence In honor of the season, I thought I’d share a lesson I’ve taught seventh graders at TOPS K-8 during my two years with Writers in the Schools—it involves strange, bumpy, warped, and moody autumn gourds. I use these gourds, plucked from the QFC produce section, to teach my students how […]
By Danielle Palmer-Friedman, SAL Volunteer When I asked Seattle Civic Poet Anastacia-Reneé (she/they) why I should go see Danez Smith (they/them) speak on November 26, she had this to say: “Get your life together and get to the reading.” She shared with me Danez’s poem “alternate names for black boys” and added: “If you still […]