Resources for Creative Troublemakers

On my website, resources for creative troublemakers could refer to a lot of things. But I’ve set up this page to be the home base for a few specific offerings to my fellow artists; not because artists are special, but because they are often who I find myself in community with—and I believe that we need to both go to the work and take the work to where we already are.

WHAT CAN ARTISTS DO? Virtual Event Notes and Report-Back
The full meeting notes, slides, and resource document from the virtual workshop exploring specific, practical ways artists can support organizing beyond our art + many inspiring, real-world examples.

MEETING THE MOMENT: Political Poetry and the Anthemic Impulse
A virtual, asynchronous class for poets, writers, and creative communicators of all kinds interested in language as a tool for creative resistance, truth-telling, and narrative-shaping. The listed price for access is $20, but it is free for literally anyone who wants in (just share your email address in the scholarship form).

LET EVERY WORD BE A WRENCH IN THEIR MACHINE: Writing Prompts
Writing prompts and visioning exercises for poets, songwriters, storytellers, and other creative communicators looking to meet this moment. Because art won’t be enough to win, but we won’t win without it.

SPARK YOUR WRITING: Ideas for Getting Inspired and Starting Your Own Writing Practice
Because it isn’t just about the art we create; it’s about the community we build around that process. This resource is full of ideas and writing prompts for those looking to start a writing circle, creative accountability circle, or other collective effort.

Calls-to-action for everyone, not just artists

This page is set up to be useful to people who do identify as artists, but it’s also true that sometimes, the most powerful thing we can do is take our artist hats off and find ways to show up as neighbors first. A few links related to that:

• A half-page handout specifically about getting ICE out of MPLS in 2026: this is what I share with people who want to get involved, or donate, or just support our community in this moment. I hope the handout itself can be useful, but also: the reason it’s a handout is that you can make copies and share them yourself too!
  • A few quick links:
    • Monarca for “upstander” trainings
    • Stand with MN database of opportunities to give/share/donate
    • Defend612 for plugging into hyper-local rapid response stuff
    • MSPwhistles for whistle-related resources
    • The Immigrant Defense Network for general resources (note: there are MANY other organizations doing aligned work in MN; this is not a list of all of them; just five quick links to start with; we shout out more in the notes from our event.)
• A zine on “finding your political home” and taking those first steps into activism, especially for people who are brand new. This one is also printable, foldable, and shareable.
• Resource Hub: Activism and Organizing – lots more here.

A few MN voices

In the zine version of this page, which I print out as-needed and update/change whenever I want, I also shout out some local art & writing that people interested in all this stuff might want to check out. It goes without saying that there is a LOT more than this.

• SEE MORE PERSPECTIVE – Salt of the Earth
• Ollie Schminkey – Land of 10,000 Lakes
• Muna Abdulahi – The poem is Good
• Carl Atiya Swanson – They Tear-Gassed a Baby
• Tish Jones – The Children Are Watching
• Kyle Tran Myhre – Discourse (Let Your Heart Be a Whistle)
• Trung Le Nguyen – Just before Christmas, I got a puppy
• Essays + other writing by local artists:
  • Bao Phi in Time Magazine
  • Danez Smith in Harper’s
  • Shannon Gibney in the Star Tribune
  • Naomi Kritzer’s blog on How to Help: Twin Cities Residents

A few more related links

If you’re interested in art, activism, and all the places they overlap, there’s a lot more on my site to explore:

• Resource Hub: Activism and Organizing
• Resource Hub: Spoken Word + Slam Poetry
• My anti-authoritarian sci-fi poetry book, Not a Lot of Reasons to Sing, But Enough
• A lecture I gave on how growing into an arts practice mirrors diving into activism and organizing
• Five Activist Resources Artists Can Share at Our Merch Tables
  • ICE out of MPLS handout
• My entire newsletter is kind of built around art/activist intersections

The zine version of this page is really meant for me – just a quick and easy thing I can edit as needed and share with people at events and appearances. But I will also link the PDF file here, in case it can be useful to you, or you want to adapt it and make your own.