In her sermon at the beginning of the series on Creation, Pastor Kris reminded us that as reflections of God, we are also creative. She went on to demonstrate that the act of creation can be both a response and an antidote to stress.

Each week since early July, The StarTribune has published excerpts from an anthology of creative responses by black voices to this stressful season. You can read and see these and other excerpts from A Moment of Silence, which include essays, poetry, and photography at https://blackmnvoices.com/.

I appreciate the series in the paper because it reminds me to continue uplifting justice and change and to seek understanding of experience outside myself. It also inspires me to work on my own acts of creation. I live so much in my head that I often forget that having an idea is not the same as applying it. I need to create something from that idea—a poem, a letter, a picture, a conversation, or even a blog post.

Since my July 3 post, I’ve collected pages of links to resources, mostly books, of course, that sound inspiring, but the list is now so long, it’s overwhelming. Here’s the honed-down version: 

  • If you have responded to an online petition, you may already receive a weekly ACTION JUSTICE CHANGE reminder from https://www.change.org/  Whether I take up the specific suggestions or not, I am nudged to some meaningful action.
  • I have two hope-filled books on my nightstand and one on my to-buy list:
  • Book of Delightsby Ross Gay. I love this description from The Attic: “We live in dark times. Agreed. But despair contains seeds of a better future, and Ross Gay is the perfect gardener — a poet, a teacher, a visionary — seeding your soul.”
  • Seize Your Life: How to Carpe Diem Every Day,Jasmine Brett Stringer, local influencer. “I would recommend this book to anyone who feels stuck and wants to break free from the everyday mundane expectations we’ve all placed on our own lives,” says Goodreads member, Misty Germano
  • A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster, by Rebecca Solnit
  • Here are links to intriguing lists to diversify your shelves:
  • 7 Books to Read in Honor of the 30th Anniversary of the ADA  
  • Take a look at the #midlibfaves20 spreadsheetsto see the books that librarians were talking about halfway through the year.
  • Self-help books by Black authors    
  • 9 translated graphic novels about inequality
  • Online, you can find and read no end of short form literature. One source for these is Open Culture, which “brings together high-quality cultural & educational media for the worldwide lifelong learning community.”  The Decameron Projectprovides 29 free short storiesfrom acclaimed writers such as Tommy Orange, Margaret Atwood, and Victor LaValle.
  • You can now purchase books online from the Twin Cities’ first Black-owned bookstore: Black Garnet

Jan Myers