It’s been something—this year of 2020: the pandemic, the quarantine, the killing of George Floyd and the ensuing protests, the wildfires currently occurring up and down the west coast, the looming November election . . . It’s been a year of great challenges, and a year of hope for true and lasting change.  How will this year—and how will we—be remembered?  In this episode, Matt and Alvin read pieces circling the theme of remembrance, written before and during the Covid-19 pandemic.  Additionally, they share a summary overview of the situation for Underground Writing, as well as program updates, forthcoming projects, and great news about a just-announced grant.

LINKS OF INTEREST:

'Last Will and Testament' – Sherman Alexie 
'No Many of Them, It's True' – Gregory Orr (part of the “The World Has Need of You” collection)
'Orpheus and Eurydice: A Lyric Sequence' – Gregory Orr
'Poetry as Survival' – Gregory Orr
'Orpheus, Eurydice, Hermes' - Rainer Maria Rilke (translated by Steven Mitchell)

Hope in These Times:  e-deliverable writing worksheet

Underground Writing’s active writing workshops:

Mount Vernon Migrant Leaders Club in the Mount Vernon School District
Skagit County Community Justice Center
Skagit County Juvenile Detention
Skagit Valley Recovery Site (hosted by Brigid Collins)
YMCA Oasis Daylight Center


The Change list of suggested books 

Long Way Down - Jason Reynolds
I'm Still Here: Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness - Austin Channing Brown
The Vintage Hughes - Langston Hughes
Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison
The Winter of Our Discontent - John Steinbeck

Letters to a Young Inmate is in the home stretch, launching later 2020

Academy of American Poets
Community of American Magazines and Presses
National Book Foundation

COVID 19 pandemic
PNW wildfire smoke

Underground Writing: a literature-based creative writing program serving migrant, incarcerated, recovery, and other at-risk communities in northern Washington through literacy and personal transformation.