“Nature’s silence is its one remark,” wrote Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk. But what language might that silence contain? In this workshop, we’ll take up the practice of writing in the voices and perspectives of the non-human. Everyday objects, plants, animals, elements, words, ideas—what might they say, if we listen? This playful practice delights the imagination, builds empathy, and sparks humility—something all humans, especially writers, would do well to develop. We’ll read inspiring examples and follow prompts to create lines of our own, in voices not our own.

Colleen Morton Busch is the author of Fire Monks: Zen Mind Meets Wildfire, a work of nonfiction published by Penguin Press and selected by Publishers Weekly, the San Francisco Chronicle, and Barnes and Noble as a best book of the year in 2011. Her poetry collection, Smolder, won Ex Ophidia Press’s 2025 Richard-Gabriel Rummonds Poetry Contest and was published in June 2026. 

Her work spans genres and has appeared in a variety of publications, from Orion, Tricycle, Lion’s Roar, Wild Hope and Yoga Journal, where she was a senior editor, to HuffPost and the Washington Post, and numerous literary magazines, including Poet Lore, Willow Springs, New Orleans Review, MĀNOA, The Bellevue Literary Review, and elsewhere. 

She grew up in the Midwest but lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. A lay-ordained Zen practitioner, she currently serves as board president at Berkeley Zen Center. You can find her public talks at berkeleyzencenter.org/author/colleen-busch and on their Youtube channel. 

You can follow her on FaceBook and Instagram at ColleenMortonBusch, or on her website www.colleenmortonbusch.com.

Smolder is available from Ex Ophidia Press and Asterism.