 Karina Del Rosario. My students call me Miss Karina. Thank you for joining me. I am a cultural worker and visual teaching artist. Now, you might not be familiar with the term cultural worker. What is that? Well, basically, in addition to using visual art, I also use other things like poetry or writing to build community. I think stories can help us connect with each other. And I especially like it when stories can go along with a picture or a piece of art. A lot of times we think about that phrase, a picture is worth a thousand words. So we're gonna kind of play with that idea. We're not gonna use a thousand words, but we are gonna use words in a process that's called ecfrassis. Ecfrassis is basically a fancy word to say that we're using literary description for visual art. So we're using words to describe in a poetic way or a literary way an image that we're looking at. So for today, I'm gonna use the image that is important to me and it's an important place to me and it's Chief Self Trail. I had made a collage out of it the last time. So the Chief Self Trail photo and then here's my fun little collage of it. Okay, so what you're gonna need today is either a picture or a collage or artwork of a place that's really important to you and you'll need a notebook or piece of paper and also a pen. So you can use my picture of the Chief Self Trail as an example if you don't have one handy or you can get a picture right in front of you. But as long as you're following my voice and my instructions I think you'll be able to write beautifully about this place. So let's take a look at this image of the, that's in front of us, the Chief Self Trail. Take a look at all the different parts of it. What I'd like you to do is pick one object or character from your picture. Just one. Think about which one stands out to you or is interesting to you. Now what I'd like you to do is open a page in your notebook and you're gonna do some brainstorming. So for brainstorming we're just gonna come up with words and not judge them right away, right? But I want you to think of some specific words. I want you to think about what this object that you picked from your picture, what is it doing? Come up with verbs or adverbs for what your object is doing. Come up with about five to seven words, okay? So I'll give you a moment to think of those words. Now sometimes I will get stuck, I'll come up with three really fast. But I'm asking you to come up with five or even seven words just to push yourself a little bit more, okay? So you might be surprised, but I chose the electrical tower from my picture. And then the words that I came up with were standing, towering, rigidly, rigidly is an adverb, powering, connecting, zapping, extending and reaching. So I actually came up with eight because I kind of got on a roll after a little while, okay? So now the next thing I want you to do is that thing you chose to write five to seven action words about verbs and adverbs, can you imagine that you're that thing? You're that character or object from your picture. Now this time what we're gonna do is as we're picturing ourselves as that thing, I want you to ask yourself, how are you feeling? What are you feeling as that object or character? Here's an opportunity for us to use our imagination and maybe some empathy to try to imagine what it's like to be that thing. Okay, so this time maybe come up with three to five feeling words. So take a moment to do that. So the words that I came up with as an electrical tower that would capture how I'm feeling being this electrical tower on top of a hill, tired, bored, longing, hot and alert. So those are some examples of feelings that I'm having as an electrical tower. Now what we're gonna do next is use these notes, use these ideas to come up with a short poem or a short story about with the main character being the object or character that you chose. So the main character in my short story or poem is gonna be the electrical tower. I'm going to use it in the first person. So it's the electrical tower who's gonna be speaking in my short piece. But take a moment to write on your own, using your notes, using your verbs and adverbs and your feelings. And it could be, if you wanna make it a poem, it doesn't have to rhyme. The only thing that I challenge you to do is to use sensory words. Sensory descriptions. So what does it sound like in that place in your picture? What does it smell like? What does it look like? If you could touch anything in that picture, what would it feel like in your, to touch? And this one's kinda weird. What could it taste like, you know? So go ahead and take a few moments to write a short story or a poem about that thing in your picture that you've chosen. And I'll share you mine in just a moment. Like I said, I chose electrical tower as my main character for this piece. Here's my poem. Standing apart from you, I can hear you crackling and buzzing. I wanna turn to you, but I have to stay here, connecting others, powering their conversations instead of our own. My wires burn from energy pulsing within from the hot afternoon sun. I long to turn to leave our post and join everyone else strolling on this path. So there's my poem as an electrical tower. I hope that you can be inspired to come up with your own poem and maybe you can do that to any place that's important to you. Give yourself a chance to imagine being someplace, being something else and use your own creativity to come up with something that sounds good to you. All right, thanks again for joining me. Again, I'm Ms. Carina Del Rosario, cultural worker and teaching artist.