"Ekphrastic Magic" Exhibition at Revela'T Analog Photography Festival 📄🖊📸

Super excited to have poetry in the awesome collaborative "Ekphrastic Magic" photo-poetry project curated by the fabulous @amyjasek @filmshooterscollective in the international Revela'T Analog Photography Festival, currently running in Barcelona! Check out the festival website for excerpts of the excellent work in the "Ekphrastic Magic" exhibit as well as a listing of other fine photographers/photographic exhibits now on view in Spain and on their Instagram @revelatfestival .

More details about the exhibit: “The Film Shooters Collective is proud to present ‘Ekphrastic Magic’: an interdisciplinary project bringing together thirty FSC members and thirty writers. In it / Ekphrastic Magic, the private world of the photographer becomes the solitary walk of a poet, and together they create a new, unique universe, welcoming in the viewer to bring their own experiences to their personal interpretation of the work. The photographs range from 35mm and 120 film to instant film and even tintype; the images and words are as diverse as the artists who made them.”

To celebrate, I thought I'd post this film photo I took this summer on #kodak #kodakfilm with my #35mmfilm Canon camera. Can't resist glasses, violets, and reflections.

NaNoWriMo 2021

I'm looking forward to NaNoWriMo in just a few weeks. I'll be writing each day of November, although probably in different genres and different projects and likely less than 1500 words a day (shaking up the rules a wee bit is part of the fun, right? 😁). Still, participate by writing each day I shall. 🙌🖊📄

Cheering on my fellow writer peeps who are either definitely going to participate or who are thinking about it. If you want, drop a line below about the project you want to write/work on.

A Marvelous Microfiction Anthology 🤗📕

Thrilled to have my work included in this anthology of rad 50-word stories among so many awesome flash fictionists.

The book will officially drop in November by Vine Leaves Press @vine_leaves_press , with pre-ordering now at Amazon.

But this book for your writing, for your favorite writer, and/or for your fiction class or workshop--they'll love it and find inspiration for their own flashes.

Relaunch: Renewed! 30 Affirmation Cards

After redesigning the box of my Portable Muse Cards this summer, I crafted a new box for a second printing of my Renewed! 30 Affirmation Cards, too. They’re now up for sale at my Etsy and all set for great new homes. Ta-da!

Get your cards and more info at: WritePathProductions (my Etsy store).

Amazing Music: Friday, September 17th: Link 🎶🎼

So honored that several poems from my collection, This Passing Fever, will be set to music and sung during this amazing performance.

Please tune into the livestream next Friday, September 17th at 8:15 Eastern or 7:15 Central. The livestream link:

Recital Hall Webcast | Department of Music and Theatre (iastate.edu)

My Poems Set to Music and Voice! 🎶🎼

I’m super excited to announce that selected poems from my collection, This Passing Fever, have been set to music and voice by the incredibly talented composer and musician Jodi Goble and will be performed by an array of professional vocalists and musicians at Iowa State University on Friday, September 17th at 7:30 pm (Central)/ 8:30 pm (EST).

Through the magic of the interwebs, there will be a livestream which I will link closer to the date. Mark your calendars now—I’ve heard clips and these folks are amazing and first-rate! It’s an honor to have them perform my work.

Portable Muse Cards: Relaunch! 📓🖊

One of my fun summer projects has been this box redesign of my Portable Muse cards. This time, I used my own photography for the box front and back and chose another, clearer font. Ta-da! The Portable Muse.

Same great prompts to get your Muse moving! The perfect gift for you and the writers in your life.

More deets below:

“Are you a creative writer whose Muse has gone into a sputter? Wondering: "What should I write about today?" Or are you a teacher with a classroom or workshop filled with eager scribes who need fresh prompts? Wonder no more!


What are they?
• A series of 30 prompts on handy-dandy, beautiful cards. One varied prompt per card. Some include quotations, some situations, others a title or a setting.
• Sure to inspire fiction, essays, poetry, and more!
• Very portable! Slip into your pocket, purse, backpack, or tote and carry them with you to write in cafes, waiting rooms, on your commute, or wherever the day takes you!”

Check out these and other fine products at my Etsy store: WritePathProductions.

Prose Poem Published 🖊📓

Wonderful news! My prose poem, “Return to Beck,” was published at Cerasus Magazine, a fantastic international literary magazine out of the UK. (Props to my fellow Gen Xers and ’90s babies in the house. 😎✨🎸)

Check out the many fantastic artists in Issue #2, submission guidelines here, and read on for a small excerpt from parts of four stanzas in my piece:

“Return to Beck” excerpt:

I look down this very long set of rectangular tables pushed together and there is Beck, dressed like the ’90s, singing along to Beck. And I walk past him, also singing Beck, thinking: “Keep it cool. Pretend this is just a normal thing, Beck sitting here, singing his own song”…

Beck never made eye contact (cool customer); he just went about his business, giving off 100% Beckness. The Beckness was just real-life rolling off of him, down the tables, and people milling around but nobody saying this was any big thing, this was just the same old Beckitude, any day of the week. And I was trying to keep my stuff together. Sure, I could mill around, I could keep it cool…

I took down some fizzled balloons, some soggy streamers wound around my bare arms, outside the party, outside the door, but didn’t see the trash can, didn’t see anybody, so I turned back to Beck, walked back in. There he still was, being all 100% Beck, Beckalicious, Becktastic. He hadn’t moved….

I was trying to keep it together, “just keep it together,” and walking around him at the terribly long tables and him not making eye contact, and the ’90s were back but we had nowhere to take them. So Beck kept singing Beck, Beckifically, and the Beckness was all around, 100% authentic, the ’90s were oozing…

For the entire, much longer prose poem, check out Issue 2.

Photography for Writers Class 📸

Looking for a fun online class this month? I’m teaching Imagery Power: Photography for Writers that starts next Friday, July 16th.

Just a few spots left—reserve your place today. I’d love to work with you. 📸 Learn more here.

My Photo in J. Mane Gallery's Current Show 📸

Marvelous news: my photo, “Flew the Nest,” won an Honorable Mention place in the current “Extraordinarily Ordinary” show at J. Mane Gallery that started today and runs through August 8th.

Check out the amazing art in several media, including sculpture and paintings, as well as scroll through to see a few of my other shots that I submitted for the theme.