SAL/ON

A Blog of Seattle Arts & Lectures

Category: Writers in the Schools

“Hemlockwing,” by Cordelia Christian

Hemlockwing In my sleeping, midnight wings unfold they are ragged, dusty, like the silencing cobwebs that stir in my breath the darkness is my mooring my ship is the resurrection of a lost dream though that heart was long ago discarded still beating arms ornamented with red-brown feathers mottled with blood I am the sparrow, […]

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sharpened pencil header

WITS Voices: Simple and Complex

By Nikkita Oliver, WITS Writer-in-Residence We find ourselves in the midst of hard times. They are nuanced and complex and yet simple all at once. Most of us can agree hate is not a valid political platform. This part is simple. Nonetheless, we are confronted with a new administration who seems to prefer hate and […]

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wolf header

As Soon As You Say This Word: Wolf – El Lupo – Ôkami

By Sierra Nelson, WITS Writer-in-Residence Does the word Wolf move differently than El Lupo? Do we experience anything different in our bodies when we say the Russian word волк (pronounced “volk”) compared to the Japanese word 狼 [おおかみ Ôkami]? I was excited to explore these questions of language and translation in my WITS residency, working […]

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WITS Voices: “Black Lives Matter is…”

By Daemond Arrindell, WITS Writer-in-Residence the skin stays silent  it is our blind eyes that give them voices or take them away On Wednesday, October 19th, Seattle Public Schools put their foot out there in a pretty public way. Faculty, administrators and parents at numerous schools throughout the greater Seattle area showed their support of […]

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pastel-drawn heart

WITS Voices: Holding 67 Hearts

By Laura Gamache, WITS Writer-in-Residence On my ninth day with fourth graders at Broadview-Thomson, I asked the kids to take out their hearts, and hand them in to me. I had drawn each heart on red copier paper before our second meeting, after the teachers had expressed doubt the kids could reliably draw them themselves. […]

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“Lantern” by Myhanh Wong

Lantern You’re sitting in class. The teacher drones on and on. On her desk sits a lantern. Decorative yet functional. You think of the different scenarios of why you would use that lantern. In your mind you travel forward in time with that lantern. You’re sitting in a bunker, waiting for nothing to happen. The […]

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“A Few Blades of Grass” by Zainab Al-Bahadli

  A Few Blades Of Grass I was born to a seaglass house Softened by the rough edges of the sea, Chipped and clouded though it was I was born. Upon my birth I shattered it Gripping a dagger and a forget-me-not. I was born in a well Filled to the brim with gold paint […]

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Henry Smith

“Books” by Henry Smith

Books Go inside a book. That would be my way. Let someone be a perfect person that never gets in trouble. The letters pour off my pages trickling into my head. Inside is a mystery slowly unfolding. Inside is what my imagination feeds on.

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5 Questions: Peyton Mann, WITS Intern

Somehow, well before September 22nd, Seattle always lets you know that summer has come to an abrupt end (that is, if it ever started to begin with). This has left many SAL staffers with a familiar, lingering guilt: our summer reading lists metamorphose into suspiciously similar-looking fall reading lists, we recount couch-time that should have been sun-time, and some of us even sadly begin our knitting projects. None […]

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