Scribente Maternum, in partnership with CityLit Project and The Clifton House of Baltimore, will host its first in-person event, the “Write Like a Mother Retreat” for every writer who identifies as a mom, October 20-23, 2022, in Baltimore. Also, this retreat is presented in conjunction with this year’s special edition of the CityLit Studio VII: Writers on Craft, Creativity & Community with memoirist Ada Calhoun and poet Remica Bingham-Risher.

This unique, Baltimore-focused event will provide time to write, time in community with other writer-moms, and time for movement and meditation. Writing craft facilitators include Tyrese Coleman, author of How to Sit, Ada Calhoun, author of Also a Poet: Frank O’Hara, My Father, and Me, and Remica Bingham-Risher, poet and author of Soul Culture: Black Poets, Books, and Questions that Grew Me. Attendees will also flex their creative muscles through a visual journaling exercise with Towson University art professor Amanda Burnham. They will experience creative movement and meditation with actress, storyteller and beloved Baltimore resident, Maria Broom, among other mediation and movement with facilitators Ana Rodney, Jaree Cottman and Emily Souder.

The goal of Scribente Maternum is to embrace the tensions that exist between parenting and writing: the exhaustion from being the on-call parent, along with the creative inspiration kids provide, and the reckoning that creating while mothering toddlers, teens or adults, is heart and hard work. While this is Scribente Maternum’s first in-person retreat, the women-led organization has successfully offered events for writer-moms since 2020. Founded in the midst of a global pandemic and racial unrest, CityLit Project’s executive director, Carla Du Pree, and co-founders Rachel Berg Scherer (Midwest Writing & Editing) and Elizabeth Doerr (Doerr & Co) knew they needed a space in which they could ground their writing while honoring their role as parents of young and adult children.

Learn more about Scribente Maternum and purchase tickets for “The Write Like a Mother” retreat at www.scribentematernum.com.

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Don’t let cost be a barrier.

The Clifton House is sponsoring FIVE retreat spaces for Black writer-mothers from Maryland. Apply here.

The deadline for funding is available until the close of business Wednesday, October 5, 2022:

Maryland residents: Request a professional development grant from MSAC to cover the cost of your retreat investment.

Or apply for full or partial funding through our You Deserve to Be Here fund, no matter where you live.

The deadline for funding is available until the close of business Wednesday, October 5, 2022.