A Blog of Seattle Arts & Lectures
In a new initiative at Writers in the Schools, our WITS writer corps is being joined by two apprentices, Brian Dang and Amy Hirayama, who will further their K-12 creative writing education skills with direct experiences in WITS classrooms. Amy and Brian will additionally be working as WITS Writers-in-Residence this school year—Amy at Evergreen High […]
Here is to my Parents my two grandmothers too, who do so much for me in everything I do. Here’s to my ancestors. The ones before me The ones who paved the way so I could be whoever or whatever I want to be. Here is to my friends. My BFF’s My Ride or Dies Friends Forever no matter where […]
Enormous appreciation to Mita Mahato, the talented Seattle-based artist who provided the artwork for the most recent WITS anthology, Gliding Between the Land of This and That! Mahato is a multi-media artist working at the intersection of cut paper, collage, comix, and poetic experimentation. She is a career educator, a board member with Short Run Seattle, and currently is the Associate Curator […]
i don’t think i’m good at grieving. not my dead friend, not the versions of me that i’ve grown out of, and especially not the life i had before. i’ve been sitting here for thirty seven minutes trying to write. my h key is broken and there are tears on my cheek and my back […]
prayer is when you’re fourteen years old riding the bus home from a protest that ended two hours too late and the cops running after your friends because when you’re sitting in that bus seat humming the lines to the song you were singing but didn’t learn an old woman will sit next to you […]
by Gabriela Denise Frank Throughout time, the powers of poets have been hailed as nothing short of mystical. Poets are seers and oracles. They treat with gods, muses, ghosts. Their carefully crafted lines conjure images that, to readers and listeners, incarnate ephemeral ideas into forms solid enough to see and touch—at least by the mind. […]
Remember to Read, To be in a different body, able to do anything, Remember to escape your worries, leaving your world behind you, Doing the impossible, Remember to fly through every dimension, having no limits, You can fight dragons, and do things you would never be able to do in your world of reality, Remember […]
by Gabriela Denise Frank “If you’re going to have to figure out new things, artists are a good group to be with,” Alicia Craven, SAL’s Director of Education, noted. “They’re inventive, creative, and open to seeing possibilities that a more linear thinking pattern might not allow for.” Alicia was speaking about her colleagues—the cohort of […]
Every year, Seattle Arts & Lectures’ Writers in the Schools (WITS) program holds the Elaine Wetterauer Writing Contest to celebrate the wisdom, creativity, and heart captured in student and teacher writing. The theme for this year’s contest was “On Earth, We’re Briefly Gorgeous,” inspired by the award-winning novel of upcoming SAL speaker, Ocean Vuong. On Earth We’re Briefly […]
Roberto Contreras, of Licton Springs K-8 School, read this poem to open our 2020/21 Poetry Series event with Alberto Ríos on Friday, May 28, 2021. Written during the 2019/20 school year with WITS Writer-in-Residence Arianne True.