On Creativity: School’s in Session

Photo by Cortney Ellis

Ok, fellow creatives types....I have a few questions for you today.

For me, fall always means increased learning, energy, and reflection. School is back in session (I teach English at various universities here in Columbus, including a fine arts school), and I constantly learn new things about writing, analysis, and creativity while teaching.

This morning, I was thinking how much I would appreciate a specific kind of course. In my creative work, I always feel comfortable doing the day-to-day work of thinking and writing (especially the generating-new-work part). But once I have the work (like the writing I’ve been creating through this blog), I find it challenging to figure out what to do with it. Organizing manuscripts/collections and developing projects with a larger scope is something I’d love to learn more about. I wish someone could teach me about this--I’d love to take a class in this specific topic.


This made me wonder: as creatives, we are heavily invested in learning and new ideas. What classes or workshops would you sign up for in a heartbeat? What specific skills and processes would be valuable to explore, for you (in your art)? What would you want to focus on and learn?

Thanks, in advance, for your thoughts....

Rentable Skeleton

Rentable Skeleton

Takes all of three minutes to name him
today: Jasper. He’s been Wilbur and Fred
and Roger, Bill and Eugene. As soon as
he’s wheeled out for a new class, each week,
the students want to make him their pet.
They choose what to call him, pushing
him around the room like a mop in bucket.

Some behaviors cannot be helped.
See a skeleton, make him a name.

Bunny

Bunny

The stuffed bunny
approximates
what, not a rabbit,
real, running
from your backyard
into the woods,
so terrified is it of you.
Your plaything
bunny is your buddy,
your comrade
of the dreamy acres
and leafy shade.
Even before you thought
to look for one
creature to understand
you, you found
a soft body to fill with
life and to follow.

All Things in Their Place

All Things in Their Place

All the places that sprawl and thrive
without your supervision, without you,

you cannot count them, but you can
know they are there. The bookstore

crowded with jewel-toned stalagmites,
striped on one side with pale yellow,

the pages. The seawall you would walk
along, the school on the right, the park

where owners would unclip the leashes
from their dogs so they could run

with other dogs, panting and snorting
with dog-laughter. The cubbyholes

and mailboxes that have held your
name, your pens and letters and bills,

your coffee shop, your corner store,
the rocks above the beach gone slick

and green, the ones you’d slide
your eyes over on your way home.

That arched gray door, spray-painted
one morning with a pink, drippy heart,

above which, the next week, someone
added, “Your,” and the next day,

no words, only a gray door. Now, still
gray, and passers by and traffic flowing

past it easily, like every person driving
past Dealey Plaza, heading to work.

Soon, Boats

Soon, Boats

The future, now:
fog. The bottoms
of trees cocooned
in cotton batting,
the water’s glass
tabletop boatless,
fingerprintless.
What could happen
is vapor, air, oldest
pieces of land
veiled. Soon, boats,
maybe bridges,
maybe the death
of the water, or
hundreds of children
running, whooping,
shaking the afternoon
from the morning.
But now, only this
shore, water and pines
and fog that do not
know you.