Tag: words

Free poetry parties, workshops in Balboa Park!

Poetry lovers! All sorts of activities await you in San Diego’s wonderful Balboa Park!

Free to the public and open to anyone at least 18 years old, these Balboa Park Poetic Programs celebrate creativity and the power of the written and spoken word. The three ongoing programs are: Poetry Party, Otherwise Improvise, and Poetic Legacy.

Poetry Party is a fun event held on the first Friday of every month from 3 to 5 pm in Balboa Park’s Santa Fe Room, at 2150 Pan American Road West (across from the International Cottages). The description on one flyer: Read your favorite poetry, listen, or make the scene. Be bold, adventurous, and experience the power of the spoken word.

Otherwise Improvise is held on the 1st and 3rd Wednesdays of every month from 2:30 to 5 pm in the Balboa Park Senior Lounge (located in the Casa Del Prado). Be creative! Have even more fun!

Poetic Legacy is a workshop that involves readings and discussions of contemporary and historic poets. Taking prompts from featured poets, participants are then encouraged to write their own poems. This program takes place on the last Friday of every month, from 3 to 5 pm in the Balboa Park Senior Lounge.

The next Poetic Legacy workshop will be held August 29th and will feature poet Naomi Shibab Ney, recipient of numerous honors and awards for her work. In 2019 the Poetry Foundation designated her the Young People’s Poet Laureate for 2019–21.

Want more information concerning the Balboa Park Poetic Programs? Email SLemire@sandiego.gov.

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Nine short stories during Comic-Con.

Comic-Con is magic.

Dreams gather, take shape, become tangible. Fantasies launch into the world as seeds in the wind.

Comic-Con is also a hotbed of self-promotion. So please excuse me. Here I go…

Do you love to read works of fiction that contain unexpected twists?

Here are nine very short stories I’ve written over the years. You can find them on my website Short Stories by Richard.

These seeds in the wind await your click:

One Strange, Shimmering Dream

Father’s Paintbrush

A Distant Place

Their Dream

Unheard Words

One Magic Bubble

The Bone Artists

A Secret Junkyard

Final Real Magic

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If you’d like to view my coverage of Comic-Con so far, which includes hundreds of cool photographs, click here!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

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Inspiration at West Otay Mesa bus stop!

Inspiration has been painted on a fence near a bus stop in San Diego’s southern West Otay Mesa neighborhood.

A beautiful mural containing a butterfly, flowers and words of wisdom can be found above the bus bench on Del Sol Boulevard directly across from the Del Sol Market. It was painted by @msrosi619.

You can’t change your situation, the only thing you can change is how you choose to Deal with it!!!

Stand together and love one another.

Spread your wings and dare to fly!!!

Just in case you have forgotten today– You matter, You are loved, You are worthy, You are magical.

Be the change you want to to see in the world. Smile always. Love, MS. ROSI

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Holocaust survivors speak at La Jolla library.

You have an extraordinary opportunity. Holocaust survivors and their family members have been speaking all year at the La Jolla/Riford Branch Library. See the above schedule. The next speaker will be at the La Jolla library on Tuesday, May 13.

The second floor of the La Jolla library is currently hosting the exhibition RUTH: Remember Us the Holocaust, which recalls the horrors of a nightmarish period in human history that no one should ever forget.

I blogged about this exhibition several years ago when it was showing in Chula Vista. See those photos here. I’ll be blogging about the current exhibition in La Jolla (which is even more powerful) shortly.

Meanwhile, please spread the word. Holocaust survivors will continue to recall their personal experiences the second Tuesday of each month. Bring your friends. This is incredibly important.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Four short stories about possible ghosts.

Have you ever seen a ghost? Or something bizarre and inexplicable that you thought might be a ghost?

I’ve heard stories from various people over the years about ghostly experiences, including weird encounters at San Diego’s Whaley House, said to be the most haunted building in America. (You can read several of those stories, told by Whaley House Museum docents, by clicking here.)

I love to write bits of very short fiction. A couple days ago I published a short story about a possible ghost sighting.

I’ve written four of these “ghost” stories over the years. If you’re someone who enjoys thought-provoking tales and possibly a slight shiver, you might enjoy reading them.

Unheard Words can be read here.

Ghost Wind can be read here.

Backward Man is found here.

And the very, very short story that I just completed, Touching a Ghost, which in fact might not concern a ghost, can be read here.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share this!

Unhoused students write Odes to Common Things.

Unhoused students at Monarch School in Barrio Logan have written powerful words concerning their life experiences. Their many compositions (each an ode to a common thing) are collected in a series of published books. Several volumes of Odes to Common Things are available at the San Diego Public Library.

Today I noticed that the big video screen near the Central Library’s entrance was cycling through some of these thought-provoking odes. I stood there reading, and lifting my camera to take a few photographs.

The Monarch School serves homeless youth–unhoused kids who live in shelters, motels, single room occupancy housing, double- or tripled-up with other families, at camp sites, in cars, or on the streets. Monarch School is the only comprehensive K-12 school in the U.S. developed specifically to serve unhoused students and their families.

Would you like to read words that might move you–words written from the heart by youth who hope to lead a secure and happy life? Yes? See the availability of the Ode to Common Things books at the San Diego Public Library by clicking here.

Ode to Memories, by Derek. …I carry memories of my life–in my head, my brain, my heart. They can be beautiful. They can be scary…
Ode to Cats, by Fabian. …My cats make me feel happy, comfortable…Cats go to heaven…
Ode to Basketball, by Deveyon. …It makes me better able to work with new people, to make new friends…basketball is what I have.
Ode to Ice Cream, by Jaylen. …What’s good is its coldness, its sweetness, its flavor. It’s as sweet as a championship and as joyful as a party.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

Journey among poems, walking in City Heights.

When I visited the Lunar New Year celebration in City Heights last weekend, I was surprised to find hundreds of words affixed to a stretch of 44th Street behind Officer Jeremy Henwood Memorial Park. (It’s the alley-like street between the City Heights Library and Recreation Center, and the sports fields of City Heights Park to the east.)

I hadn’t recalled seeing this public art before.

I found a detailed article concerning the unique outdoor installation. The project is titled Memoria Terra and is intended to last for five years. The art debuted last summer.

Artist Shinpei Takeda and five young writers composed poems that tickle passing feet. The poems regard the history of this very diverse community (with its substantial immigrant and refugee population), social issues and gentrification.

As residents make their personal journey, they are also encouraged to gaze down at the abundant words to create their own poem.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

What your heart knows near a Carlsbad beach.

Walk down to the beach in Carlsbad and you might find wisdom.

The walkway at Rue Des Chateaux Beach Access has a bench. Words shine on a plaque above the bench.

Mary Hoffman – In Loving Memory

Listen to the wind, it talks.

Listen to the silence, it speaks.

Listen to your heart, it knows.

The beach is reached in a few steps. The place is beloved by locals, said to offer amazing sunsets.

The Rue Des Chateaux Beach Entrance is located near 2445 Ocean Street, where the street curves inland away from the water. A sign by the sidewalk indicates the public beach entrance.

It’s a beautiful place your heart knows.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

Mysterious sculpture at Hollister and Conifer!

Do you know anything about this mysterious sculpture in San Diego’s South Bay, at the intersection of Hollister Street and Conifer Avenue? It’s a few blocks north of the Palm Avenue trolley station.

I haven’t walked this way in a long time, so I don’t know when the sculpture appeared. I took these photos last weekend.

Who created this fun artwork? Why are farewells painted in various languages? Why, on its back, is there a seemingly contradictory message Please No Art?

Two yellow hands on the mysterious sculpture appear to be cleaning while splashing drops of water. Could this have been a sign that once stood at the exit of a carwash? I’m racking my brain for an explanation.

Leave a comment if you happen to know anything!

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

Stargazer at SDSU celebrates Kumeyaay culture.

Stargazer is the title of a sculpture located in San Diego State University’s Campanile Mall, not far from the Koester Memorial Sundial. Which seems appropriate. Our sun is the nearest star.

The sculpture was created by artist Johnny Bear Contreras, who is a tribal member of the San Pasqual Band of Mission Indians in northeastern San Diego County. Through his award-winning art he is dedicated to keeping the Kumeyaay heritage alive and thriving. The Kumeyaay people have lived throughout the San Diego region for many thousands of years.

On the Stargazer plaque, Johnny Bear Contreras speaks the words: “Come listen with us, there are stories to be heard. Come and gaze at the stars with me, they are always there.” The word Stargazer, in the Kumeyaay language, is Uwiiu kwellyap kurr.

The public art is part of the SDSU Kumeyaay Living Land Acknowledgment project, which seeks to instill a deeper appreciation and celebration of Kumeyaay history, art and culture.

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.