About this project

There is no way home;
home is the way.
-Thich Nhat Hanh

For me, a poem is less an object and more a path, an invitation to a kind of awareness. I find that reading and writing poems is a practice of listening—to rhythm and sound, image and figure, to resonance found in the small and familiar, like the rings inside a tree echoing out from its initial seed.

Within a poem, things shift. We’re asked to look more closely at the world and our lives, often in ways we haven’t before. By the end of a good poem, our perspective is opened, our sense of self widened to include more of what we might normally assume is separate. We listen to what is present and, from there, soften the bounds of separation, revealing a truer, deeper sense of who we are. Poems are doorways, paths of return to this truer self.

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I began Spontaneous Poems in the summer of 2021, during the first year of my MFA, as a way to connect directly with people through poetry. At a local farmers’ market, I’d set up a small folding table with my Olympia Traveler De Luxe typewriter and compose on-the-spot, custom poems on a topic of each person’s choosing. I’ve decided to move the project online in the hopes of reaching even more.

What I’ve loved about this project is how it dissolves the typical barriers between writer and reader. No need to wait weeks or months for a publisher to accept a poem or manuscript, nor to wonder about a reader’s response. Sharing and connection are immediate and intimate, as each poem is written specifically for its reader, on a subject that matters to them.

When choosing a topic for a poem, folks often simply tell me about a situation in their lives, or a feeling, fear, memory, dream, goal, grief, joy, curiosity, confoundment, or other experience. They’ll often ask for poems to honor occasions such as weddings, funerals, birthdays, graduations, and anniversaries. It’s always an honor to be trusted to meet such moments with a poem, and I am deeply humbled each time someone sheds a tear or asks for a hug. It isn’t me, the poet, they respond to—it is the poetry, the poem they needed or wanted, the poem that speaks what they feel but can’t say.

Because poems are written in the moment, I must listen closely to what each person needs or wishes for. Not only through what is said, but through what lives beneath it. My background in Buddhist practice has helped shape this way of listening, and I appreciate the opportunity to deepen and share it with others. I believe each of us carries particular gifts, and that our work is to cultivate and offer them, so that they may become gifts for others, too.

Since beginning this project, I’ve written hundreds of poems on countless topics, each meant to bring solace, perspective, wonder, and joy to its specific recipient. Since that first summer, I’ve completed my MFA and am now a lay minister in training through the Bright Dawn Center of Oneness Buddhism. My work is shaped by contemplative practice and the belief that poetry is a way of coming home to ourselves just as we are. Not “fixing” ourselves or escaping our lives, but meeting the world with greater openness and care, recalling our potential for awakening, connection, and joy.

Home is not a destination, but a path we walk each day. Poetry returns us to it, again and again.

How it works

Name a topic, and I’ll create a custom, typewritten poem and mail it to you.

You don’t need to know exactly what you’re looking for. You might:

  • describe something you’re moving through, healing from, or working toward

  • share a question, curiosity, or uncertainty

  • name a grief, joy, or memory you can’t quite put into words

  • request a gift for someone you love, or to honor a particular occasion

  • or simply tell me where you are in life and what’s on your mind.

Of course, you’re also welcome to ask for a specific topic or theme.

Whatever you offer, I’ll listen closely and write a poem in response, meant to meet you where you are. Each is typed and mailed as something you can hold and return to, a reminder that the path home is the life you are already living.

Feel free to order again and again. I’d love to keep writing poems for you as you grow and journey through life.

Order a poem