A few weeks ago, a few Long River members hosted an activity at the KUBE Creative Writing workshop for middle school students. We gave each table a bunch of materials, including copies of famous poems, song lyrics, pages from old LRRs, newspapers, magazines, and the like. The students were told to read through the material, underline some phrases, and pick favorites. Once they pick their favorites, we instructed them to write some kind of mashup or inspired sentence on the green sheets of paper we provided. The groups went on to share their green papers with each other and come up with a master poem made from all the individual poem fragments.
At the end of the activity, as my friends and I walked around collecting our materials, I found myself struck by the poignancy of the green paper fragments. They seemed abstract and specific and very, very real. I collected a stack, and as part of a guerrilla art project, I posted them in unobtrusive spots all over the art building. My hope is that the disconnected sentence pieces will strike a chord and maybe inspire one of the artists in the building. Plus, I got some really cool photos. Take a look.
