The Underground Writing Podcast

LINEBREAK is a single piece of student writing, offered as a pause during your daily life. We hope it will be generative of further creativity, perspective, and thought.

*A prefatory note. We recorded this episode on Monday, September 30, 2024. While in the process of recording it at a local college library, an “active shooter” event took place in the nearby vicinity—outside the library where we were located. The library and college went to lockdown, as did all the other schools in the area. The students and staff members all scrambled to locations inside the library—by walls, under tables, in offices, or, like us, in one of three side-area study rooms. In the seconds it took to grasp what was happening, I (Matt) saw a student walking around, unsure where he should go. He pointed at me, as I pointed at him through the glass window of the study room. I motioned for him to come inside. I turned off the light, and sat in the corner, my leg extending across the bottom inside of the door. The student sat across from me, also in the corner. He called his mom. I texted my family. We introduced ourselves. And what ensued was a wonderful conversation between Mason and me, two humans with about a two to three decade age difference, both caught in a situation with unknown variabilities and outcomes, getting to know each other, talking as a way to bring peace and calm amidst a fearful situation. Twenty minutes later—the situation under control—the library went off lockdown. Lights went back on. Mason and I stood up and shook hands and expressed gratitude for the time. If you’re reading this, Mason, thanks for the dialogue, for your willingness to share, and for your camaraderie in a time of danger.

On today’s episode, our featured student writing is, “Growing Up Is Not Easy” by Juli from our site with the Migrant Leaders Club in the Mount Vernon School District.

Migrant Leaders Club

Collaboration with artist and photographer, Marilyn Montufar. Thanks to Marilyn and the MLC for your work with us. Marilyn’s own website.

Migrant Leaders Club & Underground Writing travel to New York (2018) to watch Quiara Alegría Hudes’ new musical Miss You Like Hell.

Underground Writing’s photo-based NEWS page. (Hover over the images to access text, more information, and links to connected topics.)

Our website – Programs / News / Contact / Donations: www.undergroundwriting.org

You can send inquiries, or pitches for advertising, here: [email protected]

We’re repeating ourselves, but it’s good to say again . . . Listeners!—You can also help us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts or other outlets. And something new—we may even read some of them on the air. Podcast reviews help other like-minded folks find out about our show, as well as our broader work. Any help you can lend to this effort would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for listening, Friends. 

Safe journey . . . and take good care.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this first episode of Season 5, we talk about the reboot of The Underground Writing Podcast. Highlights include a catchup / overview coming out of the Covid era, a few updates regarding programs and collaborations, and a reading of "Ode to My Journal," a poem by Anthony, one of our students at our writing workshop site in Skagit County Juvenile Detention.

Show Notes:

Today’s featured writing is “Ode to My Journal” by Anthony, a student at our writing workshop site in Skagit County Juvenile Detention. You can support Anthony, and students like him, by spreading the word about our podcast, purchasing student writing anthologies and other merch in our online store, and making a donation to help our work continue – you can donate via our website’s secure donation portal here: https://undergroundwriting.org/donate

Our website: www.undergroundwriting.org

You can send inquiries, or pitches for advertising, here: [email protected]

Learn more about the Letters to a Young Inmate initiative via our website here:

www.letterstoayounginmate.org

The Sentences That Create Us: Crafting a Writer’s Life in Prison is a wonderful resource, Edited by Caits Meissner (a member of our Advisory Board). You can learn more about this book online here: https://pen.org/program/the-sentences-that-create-us/

More about our re/vision program can be accessed via our website here:

www.undergroundwriting.org/revision

Podcast Review, a Los Angeles Review of Books channel, published an article in April 2024 about top writing podcasts, and included us in the list for a third time. We’re beyond grateful to be included amongst such company. You can read Alice Florence Orr’s article online here: https://podcastreview.org/list/best-writing-podcasts/

We’re repeating ourselves, but it’s good to say again . . . Listeners!—You can also help us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts or other outlets. And something new—we may even read some of them on the air. Podcast reviews help other like-minded folks find out about our show, as well as our broader work. Any help you can lend to this effort would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for listening, Friends. 

Safe journey . . . and take good care.

:

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jen Bradbury, UW Teaching Writer, shares student writing from What No One Ever Tells You.

1. My Cell -Victor
2. I Won’t Front -J.S.
3. I Am Not What You Think I Am -Luciean
4. Nascar Dialogue -Josh
5. Survival -M.
6. We Sit Here Together -Students and Teaching Writers, in a circle, one line each

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

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Yesica joins Matt and Alvin in the park on a sunny day. She shares new work and updates us on her journey. Matt gives updates on workshops, events, and amplifying voices.

Podcast Review: Underground Writing

Dear America chapbook

The Change - Book Pipeline

Marilyn Montufar

Jacob Lawrence Gallery

Claudia Castro Luna

Letters to a Young Inmate

The War and Peace of Tim O'Brien

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

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We’re still here. Matt and Alvin read excerpts from DEAR AMERICA, the newest collection of student writing, packaged as our latest chapbook. They check in on the state of… everything, having made it into the new year. Matt gives updates on writing workshops and amplifying voices.

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.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Matt shares student writing from the e-workshops at the Skagit County Community Justice Center site.

1. Finding Hope (excerpt) - Garrett
   
2. Helping - C.
   
3. Seven Aphorisms - Michael
   
4. I Need You to Unlock Heaven's Door - Kyle
   
5. Being locked up - Leland
   
6. Fulfillment of Last Laugh - Joshua
   
7. My Answer - Brian
   

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.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To say that the Coronavirus has changed things is an understatement. The world is in a state of forced improvisation. Things have been quite different for us, too, during the quarantine. In this episode, Matt provides a summary overview of the situation for Underground Writing, program updates and adaptations, and shares new student writing created in response to the current COVID-19 era.

The Decameron – Giovanni Boccaccio

David Budbill

Lucille Clifton

Underground Writing News & Photos

What No One Ever Tells You

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.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.