january 2025
welcome to we the soil
dear reader,
i never imagined that i would prioritize creativity the way that i have the past couple of years, but i also don’t give myself enough credit.
even when i was working 60-70 hrs/wk as a middle school teacher in Seattle, i met with a writing group at Elliott Bay Book Company on Sundays and—every now & then—dropped some precious coins to attend a workshop at Hugo House. the poet Ben Yisrael was in our writing group and offered me my first paid poetry gig: to read as a feature for a poetry reading series that he hosted at the Northwest African American Museum. looking back, i see more power in those moments than i did then, and i’m grateful to carry more testimonies of creative community five years later.
what about you? can you remember a time when you showed up for your art despite— maybe through the hardest of times? what about a time when someone else helped you get back to your creative self or helped you remember that there is value in your creative journey?
i started this newsletter because i realized (through a few conversations and extensive research) that teaching artists need more ways to get the word out about their offerings. there are also many artists & writers who budget for workshops and are always looking for new ways to approach their work, new teachers/mentors, and more connection. some of us, would go as far as to say that we depend on workshops for the bubble of structure, accountability, and inspiration that they provide. that is definitely true for me as a stay-at-home parent who struggles to show up for my writing with consistency.
and then there’s the undeniable alchemy of writers & artists showing up for their work together.
you know what i don’t hear often enough? i’ll say it to you: thank you so much for making what you make and for the ways it brings you closer to yourself and—simultaneously, almost miraculously—to all of us looking to witness each other more deeply.
below you will find twelve opportunities to connect with your creative work in community. a couple of these i recommend from personal experience, so let me quickly share:
i’m in this year’s SOLAR YEAR cohort (a friend recommended it to me), so i attended the first session in December and—i am telling you—emily had me at the first guided meditation. i was moved by the language and the way it pulled me into my purpose. registration is still open thru January 14.
funny story: i was reading an edition of Literary MagNet (in Poets & Writers) about Saba Keramati’s publishing journey that mentioned Narrative Shifts. i didn’t even finished reading it because i looked them up and saw that it was the last day to apply for their Summer 2024 Digital Residency. i locked myself in a room for a couple of hours, got the application submitted, and ended up being awarded a scholarship! The Seventh Wave does not play about community, and the Narrative Shifts curriculum is rich and expansive.
lastly, feel free to forward this newsletter to any of your people who might find it helpful.
for more making
for more depth
for true living
with love,
yo
upcoming workshops
SOLAR YEAR: an orbit for your book/creative project with emily brandt
A radical & embodied communal space to sustain your book (or other creative) project that includes prompts, somatic practices, discussion, progress sharing, creative structures, gentle accountability, and culminating celebration
When: Wednesdays at 7pm ET every 4-5 weeks for one year (December 2024 - December 2025)
Where: Online
Cost: $525 - $975
Indigo & Inspiration with C. Elyse
A combination theme-based craft workshop/write-in for BAME/BIPOC women creatives.
When: Saturdays, 3 - 5pm PST *Drop-in friendly
Where: Online
Cost: $7.65 - $10 per session
Rêverie with Pascale Côté
A 90-minute creative retreat to daydream and reimagine the structures of our creative lives, practices, and businesses—away from the noise of self-reinvention that often surrounds us at the start of a new year.
When: January 10, 10am ET
Where: Online
Cost: $11-33
Devotion with Pascale Côté
A 4-week creative accountability series designed to help you make progress on a project that’s been lingering on the shelves of your creative mind—free from external pressure, hustle culture, arbitrary deadlines, and performance metrics. Each session begins with a curious conversation about a weekly theme, a grounding practice, and a creative warm-up before we dive into working alongside one another. Themes include: reimagining success, turning potential into reality, navigating shifts and pivots with resilience, and advocating for the greater good.
When: Mondays, February 3 - 24, 11am ET
Where: Online
Cost: $55 for four weekly 90-minute sessions, with recordings available for participants who cannot attend live
The Multiverse of Self: Embracing Our Infinite Identities with Talicha J.
A 6-week generative workshop series that dives into the many layers that make you, you—from your beginnings to your dreams, your everyday life to the possibilities you’ve yet to imagine. Each week focuses on a different part of self, using poetry to ask questions, hold space, and honor the infinite versions of who you are.
When: Wednesdays, January 22 - February 26, 8-10pm ET / 5-7pm PT
Where: Online
Cost: $150 Early Bird Option ends January 15, $30 Drop-In Option Available
Mythologizing the Self with Alisha Acquaye
A 6-week writing series filled with original writing prompts, nuanced discussions on Black myths, magic and afrosurrealism, and the opportunity to build community with brilliant and eclectic writers. This upcoming iteration will explore themes such as: social and systemic myths, superstition, monsters, spells, dreams and doppelgängers.
When: Mondays, January 6th - January 27th, 6-8pm EST
Where: Online
Cost: $333 with partial scholarships available for Black trans and nonbinary writers
Tears of the Gods: Flowers, Death, Grief, + Shapshifting with Mara June
A year long creative cohort exploring folklore and myths of flowers and plants as they relate to death, grief, and shapeshifting. This class primarily focuses on Greek myth and European folklore. Participants will explore their own process of shapeshifting and story-telling in grief and relationship with plants, creating and sharing creative writing and art inspired by the plants we meet and themes we explore each month.
When: most Thursdays, 2-4pm ET
Where: Online
Cost: $1000 until January 12 with code ANEMONE25, Scholarships available
Poetry as Belonging: A Beginners 4-Week Workshop with Jamila Osman
This poetry workshop for cultural workers, poets, and dreamers will explore the powerful role of poets and artists to speak to the myriad experiences of migration and movement, dislocation and disenfranchisement. As our news feeds are inundated by a singular story of what it means to be a migrant, we will explore the poetics of the third space, and what it means to find and forge home in unlikely places. Through the close reading of work by poets like June Jordan, Mosab Abu Taha, José Olivarez, and others, we will use poetry as a vehicle for exploring our personal mythologies of home and our shared dreams of belonging.
When: Thursdays, January 30 - February 20, 4 - 6pm CST
Where: Online
Cost: $148.00
Braided Prose with Allison Darcy
In works of braided prose, short sections of seemingly distinct story threads interweave to become one cohesive narrative. "This is what I love about all braided things," writes Brenda Miller in her essay, "A Braided Heart," "the fact of their separate parts intersecting, creating the illusion of wholeness, but with the oh-so-pleasurable texture of separation." This class will explore the power and techniques of the braided form, focusing on how to choose, pace, divide, and connect the threads of narrative to create a piece of writing that comes together into something more than the sum of its parts. Looking at both fiction and nonfiction examples from currently working writers like Jenny Offill, Carmen Maria Machado, and others, we will study and experiment with the braided form to create new works of our own.
When: Fridays, January 17 - February 21, 11am - 1pm ET
Cost: $349 - 615 Sliding Scale
The Five Universal Rhythms with DS Waldman
In this six-week, in-person workshop we will acquaint ourselves with the five universal rhythms: Chaos, Legato, Staccato, Lyrical and Stillness. We will explore examples of these rhythms in poetry, music and dance, and most importantly—we will write and workshop poems corresponding to each of the five rhythms. We will read poems by John Ashbery, Ann Lauterbach, Francine j Harris, John Murillo, Carl Phillips, Basho and Joyelle McSweeney. We will listen to music by Cardi B, Keith Jarrett, Korn, Harold Budd and Twista, and we will watch dance performances by Alvin Ailey and Martha Graham and others. We will discuss how to modulate and define a poem’s rhythm through sentence structure, syntax, rhyme, assonance and alliteration and how to generally conceive of rhythm as a vast and varying tool in one’s poetic tool kit.
When: Sundays, March 2 - April 6, 2–5pm ET
Where: 144 Montague St, Brooklyn
Cost: $445 (you might consider applying for a Brooklyn Poets Fellowship)
Narrative Shifts The Seventh Wave Digital Residency
Narrative Shifts is a genre-agnostic writing program that includes seven sessions over seven weeks, centering specific aspects of craft that any writer, reader, or thinker could wield both on and off the page.
When: March - April with Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday cohorts
Where: Online
Cost: $895, Scholarships and payment plans available
Fabric Collage Workshop with Mahdiyyah Muhammad
Inspired by the current exhibit Fantastical Streets: The Theatrical Posters of Boris Bućan, we’ll use patchwork, fabric alchemy, upcycling and hand sewing to explore the history of African contributions to repurposing materials and how Bućan incorporates cultural motifs into some of his poster work.
When: February 7th, 2 PM
Where: Poster House, 119 W 23rd St, NYC
Cost: Free & Open to the public
