SNS | 8-31-24
Join us online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading
Featuring: Natasha Dennerstein & Armin Tolentino
Theme: Insomnia
(scroll down for writing prompt)
Hosted By: Hollie Hardy
Saturday, August 31, 2024
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)
Online Event
Free Admission
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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: 840 1543 8755
Passcode: 508391
Author Bios
Natasha Dennerstein was born in Melbourne, Australia. She has an MFA from San Francisco State University, and her poetry has published in many journals internationally, including The North American Review and Spoon River Poetry Review. Her collections Anatomize (2015), Triptych Caliform (2016) and her novella-in-verse About a Girl (2017) were published by Norfolk Press in San Francisco. Her trans chapbook Seahorse (2017) was published by Nomadic Press in Oakland and is now available through Black Lawrence Press. Broken: A Life of Aileen Wuornos in 33 poems was published in 2021 by Be About It Press. Her latest book, Apps Poetica was recently released from The Los Angeles Press. She lives in Alameda, California, where she is a freelance editor.
Armin Tolentino is the author of the collection We Meant to Bring It Home Alive (Alternating Current Press), winner of the 2018 Electric Book Award. He served as poet laureate for Clark County, WA from 2021-2023. He is a phenomenal clapper, a passable ukulele player, and a bumbling, but enthusiastic, fisherman. More info at: armintolentino.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, August 24, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.
Write-In Details/ Sign Up
August Writing Prompt: Insomnia
This month’s theme was inspired by the line, “What keeps you awake at night?” from Laura Newbern’s poem “Black Forest”(see below), but I couldn’t resist the concision of “Insomnia.”
I’m not a good sleeper. I stay up late, defiantly resisting rest like a child refusing a nap. When I do finally sleep, I often toss and turn and wake up every hour of the night, whereas my partner falls asleep the moment his eyes close and rarely wakes before morning.
Nighttime is like another country. Full of sounds and sometimes snacks, strange thoughts elbowing in. What keeps you awake at night?
Your challenge this month is to write a poem (or 3-minute prose piece, scene, monologue, song, etc) inspired by insomnia, or late nights, or being up past your bedtime.
SOME IDEAS:
What do you do when you’re not sleeping (but should be)? What thoughts, songs, snacks, pains, politics, worries, to-do lists, bedroom gymnastics, books, shows, chores, drinks, doom scrolling, Instagram posting, etc. fill your nights?
What are the shapes, shadows, sounds, smells, textures, images of your house or neighborhood at night? Does it feel different in shadows? What can you see and hear from your window?
Depending on the safety of your environment, perhaps take a night walk. If outside doesn’t feel safe, walk around your home like a stranger in the dark, noticing things newly.
In what ways is dreaming and waking blurred in the small hours? Perhaps let some of the dream into to the poem, and some of the dailiness that came before.
What is the feeling of insomnia? What is the cure?
Think of a time when you couldn’t sleep or stayed up super late. What kept you up? What was on your mind? Something worth poeming about?
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
Black Forest by Laura Newbern
On Insomnia by Fran Lock
“At night, she’d turn into a beastwoman” by Rosa Chávez (translated by Gabriela Ramirez-Chavez
Full-Length Portrait of the Moon by Alice Oswald
Insomnia by Rynn Williams
Insomnia & So On by Malachi Black
Insomnia by Susan Hahn
Insomnia by Jon Loomis
Insomnia by Dana Gioia
Tonight Insomnia by Edward Kleinschmidt
The Soundscape of Life Is Charred by Tiny Bonfires by Max Ritvo
How To Cure Insomnia by Hollie Hardy
NOTE: The SNS writing prompts will soon be integrated into my subscription service, Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets. Learn more and sign up for weekly prompts!