Volume IIII, Issue 12
March 23, 2015
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Word of the Week: invitation |
Dear ,
Oh, spring... how can we not love the invitation it gives
us to pay attention to sheer, oh-so-transient loveliness? I spent the weekend retreating at The Well of Mercy, where this gorgeous budding was just beginning, to prepare myself for this Saturday's Spring Writing
Retreat.
I would love to have you come! (Details below.) And if you can't make it, I hope you will take some time to "write in" and "wallow in" in the coming of spring.
If you've been receiving this zine for a while, you've probably noticed that I offer a retreat as each new season arrives. I think of this as "writing in" the new season -- noticing, welcoming, savoring yet another chance to drink in its particular joys and beauties. Writing is a wonderful "attending" and "honoring" tool. And while the writing topics and genres participants choose vary widely, writings that reflect
the season make a great jumping off point.
And the wallowing? Many years ago, on a Sierra Club hike, I met a woman who lived smack in the middle of the mountains in Virginia, with views of nature that went on for miles in each direction. She told me that what she loved best about living there was the
opportunity to "wallow in the seasons." Yes, I thought, with that wonderful sense of recognition that comes when someone expresses something you've never articulated absolutely perfectly. That's just what I love to do.
So I invite you, dear , whether or not you can make it to Saturday's
retreat, to spend some time writing in and wallowing in this new spring, the only spring 2015 you will ever get.
Read on down for one of my very favorite spring poems ever, "Invitation Standing" by Paul Blackburn, and, of course, a prompt just for you. (You can save it for Saturday if you like.)
Long may you blossom!
Love and light,
Maureen Upcoming WordPlay
SPRING WRITING
RETREAT * please register soon - space is limited! (Writing as Renewal / Creating New Writing / Tools for a Writing Life) Renew and delight yourself. The Spring Writing Retreat is an opportunity to create new pieces of writing and/or new possibilities for our lives. Enjoy various seasonal prompts; they elicit beautiful material that can be shaped into essays, poems, stories, or articles. After a communal lunch, you’ll have private time which can be used to
collage, work with a piece of writing from the morning, or play with a number of other writing prompts and methods. You’ll take home new ideas, new drafts, and new possibilities. $97 includes lunch and supplies. WHERE: South Charlotte area. Details will be provided upon registration.
WHEN: Saturday, March 28th, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
TO REGISTER: To register securely online with your credit card, click here. To pay with a check via mail, email info@wordplaynow.com for instructions.
-----------------------------------------------------------------SPINNING WORDS INTO GOLD (Fulfilling Writing Dreams and Goals; Creating New Writing; Revising and Polishing Your Writing) Does writing fulfill you? Do you wish you were writing more? Jumpstart your writing life and learn to keep your words flowing. Learn specific techniques and exercises to create nonfiction, poetry and/or fiction. Whether you would like to keep a journal for your own personal growth, spin stories for your loved ones, or further a career as a professional
writer, experience the satisfaction of developing a writing practice that works for you—come spin words into gold. 
In the community room after our reading $594 for one week-long session, plus lodging and meals. WHERE: John Campbell Folk School, 1 Folk School Road, Brasstown, NC 28902
WHEN: Sunday, August 23rd through Saturday, August 29th, 2015
TO REGISTER: Call the John Campbell Folks School at 800.FOLK.SCH
(800-365-5724). More WordPlay opportunities here.
I encountered this poem of Paul Blackburn's in a contemporary anthology when I was 16 years old, and I have never forgotten it.
Paul Blackburn (1926-1971), known as a Black Mountain Poet because of his association with the Black Mountain Review, was a lyric poet, a translator of Provençal troubadour verse, and a dedicated organizer of poetry readings in New York in the late 1950s and 1960s.
The generosity and
open-heartedness that infuses Blackburn's "Invitation Standing" was apparent in his life and choices. Poet Clayton Eshleman once said of him that “Many, not just a few, but many poets alive today are beholden to him for a basic artistic kindness, for readings, yes, and for advice, but more humanly for a kind of comradeship that very few poets are willing to give. HE WAS AN ANGEL working for no
profit or big reputation gain to keep alive a community of poetry in New York City."
Invitation Standing by Paul Blackburn BRING a leaf to me
just a leaf just a
spring leaf, an
april leaf
just
come Blue sky
never mind
Spring rain
never mind
Reach up and
take a leaf and
come
just come
WordPlay Now! Writing Prompt This is WordPlay -- so why not revel in the power and potential of one good word after another? This week, it's "invitation." PROMPT:
Invitations are not quite so plentiful as spring leaves! But you (or one of your characters) have received plenty of them in your lifetime, yes?
Make a list of invitations received, the wanted and unwanted, the expected and unexpected. Pick
one of these invitations and turn it into a poem, essay, scene, story, etc.
Another idea -- write your own invitation to someone special, as Paul Blackburn does in "Invitation Standing."
And yet another, shared with me by WordPlayer Mica Gadhia: If you received a letter in the mail that held an invitation, what would you want it to be inviting you to?
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MAUREEN RYAN GRIFFIN, an award-winning poetry and nonfiction writer, is the author of Spinning Words into Gold, a Hands-On Guide to the Craft of Writing, a grief workbook entitled I Will Never Forget You, and two collections of poetry, This Scatter of Blossoms and When the Leaves Are in the Water. She believes, as author Julia Cameron says, "We are meant to midwife dreams for one another."
Maureen also believes that serious "word
work" requires serious WordPlay, as play is how we humans best learn -- and perform. What she loves best is witnessing all the other dreams that come true for her clients along the way. Language, when used with intentionality and focus, is, after all, serious fuel for joy. Here's to yours!
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