SNS | 1-25-25
Join us online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading
Featuring: Rebecca Foust & Bianca Alyssa Pérez
Theme: Mirrors
(scroll down for writing prompt)
Hosted By: Hollie Hardy
Saturday, January 25, 2025
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)
Online Event
Free Admission
Sign Up in Advance to Get on the Open Mic List
The theme is optional | Time limit is not optional
Please plan ahead and keep your reading to 3 MINUTES MAX
Scroll down for monthly writing prompt
Join Event on Zoom
Meeting ID: 819 4126 2676
Passcode: 005075
Author Bios
Rebecca Foust’s most recent books are YOU ARE LEAVING THE AMERICAN SECTOR (Backbone Press 2024) and ONLY (Four Way Books 2024, starred review in Publisher’s Weekly). Her poems won the James Dickey Prize, and the Fischer Cantor Prize in 2024, and the New Ohio Review Prize in 2023, as well as the Pablo Neruda, James Hearst, and Poetry International prizes in recent years. New poems are in recent issues of The Common, Iowa Review, POETRY, Ploughshares, and Southern Review. Other recognitions include fellowships from The Frost Place, Hedgebrook, MacDowell, and Sewanee, and a Marin County Poet Laureateship where Rebecca’s program, “Poetry as Sanctuary,” featured readings by local immigrant poets. Reach her at rebeccafoust.com
Bianca Alyssa Pérez (she/her) is a Latina poet, educator, and editor born and raised in Mission, Texas – a small southern town bordering MexRebecca Foust’s most recent books are YOU ARE LEAVING THE AMERICAN SECTOR (Backbone Press 2024) and ONLY (Four Way Books 2024, starred review in Publisher’s Weekly). Her poems won the James Dickey Prize, and the Fischer Cantor Prize in 2024, and the New Ohio Review Prize in 2023, as well as the Pablo Neruda, James Hearst, and Poetry International prizes in recent years. New poems are in recent issues of The Common, Iowa Review, POETRY, Ploughshares, and Southern Review. Other recognitions include fellowships from The Frost Place, Hedgebrook, MacDowell, and Sewanee, and a Marin County Poet Laureateship where Rebecca’s program, “Poetry as Sanctuary,” featured readings by local immigrant poets. Reach her at rebeccafoust.com, Facebook, X, and BlueSky.ico. She holds her MFA in Poetry from Texas State University, where she also teaches and coordinates the MFA in Creative Writing program. She was the 2022-2023 Clark House Writer-In-Residence in Smithville, TX. Her chapbook, Gemini Gospel, is published with Host Publications. She serves on the Board of Writers' League of Texas and Abode Press. She is also the co-host of the horror podcast, Basement Girls, with writer, Steph Grossman. Find more chisme at her website: biancaalyssaperez.com
Write with Friends! Register for The Write-In!
LET’S WORK ON THE THEME TOGETHER!
Join me the week before SNS, on Saturday afternoon, January 18, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.
Write-In Details/ Sign Up
January Writing Prompt: Mirrors
As January offers its symbolic, annual fresh start, many of us take time to reflect on the previous year, set goals for the year ahead. Mirrors offer literal and metaphorical reflection of ourselves and the world around us—in nature, in our homes, bodies, hearts, actions, politics, and in the stories we tell ourselves.
Your challenge this month is to write a poem, story, or prose piece (3-minutes or less) inspired by mirrors and/or their reflections.
SOME IDEAS:
Describe a visual reflection, what is seen in a mirror, what is reflected in a body of water, your face close up, mirrored sunglasses, the exterior of a skyscraper, a sunset on fire.
A mirror or palindrome poem—forms that repeat in reverse midway through or repeat across two columns like a Rorschach (see Rita Dove and Natasha Trethewey poems below for examples of each)
Self-reflection or self-portrait
Reflections on a political landscape
Dear Mirror, or Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, or a monologue from the mirror’s point of view
The infinity effect of mirrors reflecting and reflecting forever (see “Resting Gently on Her Unibrow” below)
Or something else! As ever, the theme is optional—an invitation, not a requirement; feel free to interpret loosely or ignore. Below are some poems on our theme to inspire you.
FOR INSPIRATION
Night Mirror by Li-Young Lee
Mirror, Mirror by Tom Healy
Mirror at Shallot by Jameson Fitzpatrick
Mirror by Rita Dove
Moon Mirrored, Indivisible by Farid Matuk
Mirrors at 4 a.m. by Charles Simic
Mirror by Jack Stewart
Mirror by Max Garland
Myth by Natasha Trethewey
Sunset, Loon Lake by Rebecca Foust
Huge Mirrors by Matthew Sweeney
RESTING GENTLY ON HER UNIBROW
by Baruch Porras Hernandez
She had several self portraits in which she painted an object on her forehead.
If it was a small painting of her husband, it would be titled, Thinking of Diego.
If the object was a skull, it would be titled,
Thinking of death.
Oh Frida, if only I could be a small image on your forehead
resting gently on your unibrow, with a small painting on my forehead
of a doughnut.
It would be titled, Frida, Thinking of Baruch, Thinking of a Doughnut,
and at the top of the doughnut, where the doughnut’s forehead would be
between the sprinkles, a small painting of Frida Kahlo,
and on her forehead, a small painting of me, and on my forehead,
a small painting of a doughnut, and so on, and so on, forever, and forever,
and forever, and forever.
Write More: If you like the SNS writing prompts, consider signing up for my subscription service, Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets. Learn more and sign up for inspiration, accountability, and community!