Writing the Wound
Jennifer Espinoza and Nynke Passi will take you on a journey from writing the wound. They will share from their own work and offer suggestions and ideas about how you can explore difficult subject matter with various creative approaches to prevent getting locked in fight/flight/freeze/fawn mode or re-traumatizing yourself as you write. What are techniques to write about the inchoate when there are no words? What can you do when you feel your story is too impossible to write? How do you recognize when you are locking into trauma mode and how can you get out of it? How can you take care of yourself in the process of writing? Nynke and Jennifer know how to hold safe space for a journey to the difficult places in a manner that empowers, relieves, transforms, and redeems.
Joshua Jennifer Espinoza is a trans woman poet living in Southern California. Her work has been featured in Poetry, Denver Quarterly, American Poetry Review, Poem-a-Day, Lambda Literary, PEN America, The Offing, and elsewhere. Her full-length collection THERE SHOULD BE FLOWERS was published by Civil Coping Mechanisms in 2016. She also is the author of I’m Alive / It Hurts / I Love It (Big Lucks 2019). She holds an MFA in creative writing from University of California, Riverside, and is a frequent faculty and mentor in our MFA.
Nynke Salverda Passi is the director of this MFA program and co-chair of the English dept. She was born and raised in the Netherlands. Her work has been published in CALYX, Gulf Coast, Poetry Breakfast, Life & Legends, and more. Her poetry has been anthologized in Pandemic Puzzle Pieces and River of Earth & Sky (Blue Light Press), Carrying the Branch (Glass Lyre Press), and Oxygen: Parables of the Pandemic (River Paw Press). Together with Rustin Larson and Christine Schrum, she edited the poetry collection Leaves by Night, Flowers by Day.
About Soul Bone™ Literary Center
Soul Bone™ intersects writing with creative process, spirituality, social justice, and healing in tiny, winged courses that lift the spirit.
“You two made a fabulous team! Your master workshops on Writing the Wound and Writing toward Healing inspired me to create my own poem concerning a traumatic incident. I had trouble writing about it, but this time, with your positivity and support, I came up with something. I think what really did the trick was y’all saying that all of us have different traumas and it’s ok to feel how we feel. I am so grateful for your supportive space and your grace. You both have an incredible creative energy that is phenomenal to be around (even on Zoom).”