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What kinds of things have you brought home this summer? With this “Summer Quartet” blog series, I’ve been challenging myself to bring home some haiku from my summer outings and add prose to develop them into the haibun (prose + haiku) form. Poetry amateur I may be, but I’m enjoying this summer hobby. ~~~ The... Continue Reading →
What do you bring home from your summer outings? Postcards or mugs? Photos or sketches? Leaves to press and stories to tell? This year I’ve been challenging myself with something unusual (for me). I’ve been bringing home haiku. Bear with me: I’m no poet. But I find those three short lines make the haiku form... Continue Reading →
I don’t believe creative block is limited to artistic work. Simply managing to live our lives can require all kinds of creativity and leave us facing many versions of feeling stuck. I’ve felt it when facing organizational projects, gatherings of people (have I mentioned I’m an introvert?), house cleaning, degreasing my bike chain, and visiting... Continue Reading →
I’m trying to imagine myself among those gathered to hear Qohelet speak. (Qohelet, Koheleth, the Preacher, the Teacher – different translations of the Bible refer to the author of Ecclesiastes in different ways.) Would there be any other women there, and would we even have opportunity to experiment in the ways Qohelet says he experimented,... Continue Reading →
Does a story (or any other creative work, for that matter) need to evoke hope if it’s to be life-giving? Or liberating? Or beautiful, true, or otherwise “good”? I’ve been pondering this since a conversation with colleagues a while back. As I’ve mentioned, I’m in the middle of something called the Religion, Spirituality, and the Arts Seminar (RSA),... Continue Reading →
What if I told you that all your efforts amounted to no more than a mere breath? And not even to a deep and life-giving breath, but only the weak vapor of an exhale? Hevel – breath. It’s the Hebrew word the King James Bible translates as “vanity.” More recently, Robert Alter has translated it as “mere breath,” like... Continue Reading →
Callie J. Smith 