“The dry, undramatic accent of the Midwest had her longing for the slow, thick drip of Southern speech,” writes Brian Gresko in “Singing the Sublime: A Profile of Donika Kelly,” published in the November/December issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, about how Kelly “leans into the soundscape of her youth, bringing her family forward as characters and voices within her poems” in her new collection, The Natural Order of Things (Graywolf Press, 2025). Taking inspiration from Kelly’s journey back to her youth, think about the voices and language of a time or place from your past that you long to hear again. Write a short story that incorporates these voices—the diction, syntax, cadence, and grammar—into the world of your narrative. Where does your character encounter this soundscape? Is it spoken by a stranger in passing or by someone who becomes an important part of the plot?

In “Man Ray: When Objects Dream,” a new survey exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, among the many works on display are over fifty of the artist’s “rayographs,” photograms made in the early twentieth century by placing objects on or near light-sensitive photo paper that is then exposed to create dramatically silhouetted images with high contrast. In these works, everyday objects—a comb, bottle, lightbulb, eggbeater, key, and wrench—become defamiliarized through Man Ray’s manipulation of placement and movement, capturing what poet Tristan Tzara described as the moment “when objects dream.” Browse through some of the rayographs and select one image that particularly resonates with you. Compose a poem that imagines the dreams in your chosen image. In your deciphering of the objects, ask yourself what do they dream?

Is hate ever the answer? In her new book, Hate: The Uses of a Powerful Emotion (Verso Books, 2025), translated from the German by Jackie de Pont, journalist and author Seyda Kurt reimagines hatred and proposes the use of something she calls “strategic hate” that can be deployed to fight against systems of oppression for a more just and equitable society. This week consider your own relationship to hatred—whether as a fleeting emotion or a simmering state of mind—and write a two-part personal essay. In the first section, describe a time in your life, or a specific situation, in which you felt hatred or a desire for vengeance. Then, write about your perspective on the possibility of channeling that hatred into a more positive direction. How can this corrosive emotion be pointed toward the purposes of more tenderness and care?

Justine Triet’s 2023 drama film Anatomy of a Fall chronicles the aftermath of a mysterious death as the protagonist’s husband falls from the window of their Alpine chalet’s attic. Their eleven-year-old visually impaired son finds his father dead from the fall. Amid questions of the possibility of an accident or a suicide attempt, the protagonist is indicted on charges of homicide and a trial follows. Throughout the film, it is never made clear what exactly happened. Instead, the narrative meditates on themes of biases inherent in individual subjectivity. “Sometimes a couple is kind of a chaos and everybody is lost,” says the main character. Write a story that revolves around the chaos caused by the unknowability of a dramatic situation. Perhaps it’s a classic case of he-said-she-said or an incident with no direct witnesses and only bits and pieces overseen or overheard. How do your characters deal with the fallout of never knowing what truly transpired?