Creativity is non-acceptance, wonder, rebellion
“But I don't shut up and I don't die.I liveand fight, maddeningthose who rule my country. For if I liveI fight,and if I fightI contribute to the dawn.”― Otto Rene Castillo There is a poem stuck to the door of the small room where I work and write, and it's by Otto Rene Castillo. It's about... Continue Reading →
Here are a few of my own poems, written in moments of nostalgia, sadness, and anger. -Tamara Pearson A well-contained crossness she was so silencedher broken glass ragewas sandsitting as little hillsin the landscapes of her feetshe stayed a mother and wifewell after the man and children were goneunable to pronounceher needsNo one, no place,... Continue Reading →
Mexican movements create artistic, poetic, powerful, and creative posters to build events and support causes. A lot of symbolism and references to Indigenous culture are used. Below are just a few of some of the awesome posters used by organizations over the past year. No fearful, nor obedient, nor submissive - It's women's time Unity... Continue Reading →
Yassin is a Palestinian writer living in Israel, and her poems are youthful, raw, and sincere. I've picked three that I particularly loved, and you can find more prose and poetry on her blog. No wonder we throw stones On the morning of 12th August,My house was razed to the groundIn Silwan, where I was... Continue Reading →
With the pressure to get all the many many tasks done and with most people writing on the side, on top of actual paid work, it can be very easy to slip into task mode as well while writing. We only have an hour or two and we want to get as much done as... Continue Reading →
Like everything with writing, creating powerful metaphors comes with lots of practice, and more hard work and crappy writing than most people are comfortable with. Metaphors are not spontaneous bursts of genius.
Jorge Madrid is a Honduran activist whose opposition to current right-wing president Juan Orlando Hernández saw him receiving death threats and having to flee the country. He was also a student leader when then President Manuel Zelaya was overthrown by a coup in 2009. He says the stealing of the elections in 2017 and direct... Continue Reading →
Obligatory apathy: We live in a society that despises any sign of caring about just how bad things are for most people. The planet is corroding and smoldering, and time and resources are going into nuclear weapons and sending humanity into its own carefully prepared hell. The unequal global economy is efficiently stimulating the starvation... Continue Reading →
A Dead Sun - by Bejan Matur I peel night from the dead sun's flesh and like a scarf wrap it round my head The graves of children - by Bejan Matur So – we died. We flitted out of darkness. Beaches bore witness, as did the tiniest of stones. Night and stars streamed above us where... Continue Reading →
It can be nice, and freeing, to move away from the typical (overused, cliche) plot points of murder, marriage, affairs, and winning, to just honing in on a single, strange moment. I like these moments because they are so humanising, and precisely because they can counter the Hollywood cliches about life and what is exciting... Continue Reading →
Ghosts in stories tend to represent a single person - a child who died young or was killed, whose presence continues to haunt her family, the victims of a serial killer who haunt a house, a woman killed on a highway who scares passing drivers. For me, a non-believer in ghosts, I see these as... Continue Reading →
Warsan Shire's poems are angry and they argue and rage and weep. As fighting poems should. A British poet, born to Somali parents in Kenya, Shire's poems have been read at rallies, and in homes and not-so-homes. She writes about people who are made invisible in society - often refugees, migrants, and other marginalised groups.... Continue Reading →
The purpose of this exercise is to have some fun, play with those creative juices, and get them flowing for ideas to come. We're going to use someone else's poem though, so the product coming out of this obviously can't be used elsewhere: but in the process of doing this exercise or afterwards, who knows... Continue Reading →
Trump called the people here rapists. White people in the US think it's legit that Mexican migrants work there for less, doing the hardest work, with no rights. You know the story, but do you hear about the resistance to the narrative, to the demonisation and discrimination? Does the media tell you what Mexicans, and... Continue Reading →
Ages ago in 1991, Sinead O'Conner refused to participate in the Grammies, because the music industry, "(has) created a great respect among artists for material gain - by honouring us and exalting us when we achieve it, ignoring for the most part those of us who have not." That is, in an industry oriented towards... Continue Reading →
Often talking about or thinking about opposites has a similar psychological effect to telling people not to think about something (they won't be able to help thinking about it). Here, I am suggesting you create (ie describe) a character that is the exact opposite of you-with all your complexity of faults, strengths, and strange habits.... Continue Reading →
Not only do cliches tend to reinforce the status quo and stereotypes, they are also pretty boring. Here is an exercise to practice doing without: 1) Chose a any word... eg love, old, sky.. 2) For the word, list the 6 most obvious associated words. Eg Love: romance, heart, couple, kiss, date .. Old: wrinkles,... Continue Reading →
While without a doubt we often write for ourselves, our writing that we want to be read is speaking out to others with a message, fighting for a cause (even if that cause, in the case of conservatives, is to maintain the status quo). There is a lot of stuff out there about keeping your... Continue Reading →
resistance words 