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Sema is an evolving experiment in group attention & community-making across form, place, & time. Initiated in 2018, Sema has taken the form of a poetry-focused organization in Boise, Idaho, a virtual space for interviews with writers, and a series of experimental conversations on grief.







Podcast



0 / Sema


About the podcast.



1 / Loss, Being a Therapist, & Intergenerational Grief w/ Ann O’Leary Young


A conversation with Ann O’Leary Young, M.S.W., LCSW, my mother, on the early deaths of her father & brother, how grief passes through families, and being a therapist.



2 / Writing, Detachment, & Ritual w/ Rushi Vyas


Poet Rushi Vyas on writing after sudden & unexpected loss, the wisdom of detachment, and ritual as a tool for healing & decolonization.



3 / Boise, Friendship Loss, & Time w/ Tyler Brewington


Poet Tyler Brewington on place, grief rhythms, the comfort of geologic time, and the link between friendship & formation of self.



4 / Bridge + Practice


Reexamining episodes 1 -3 + somatic practice.



5 / Newborn Loss, Place, & Deep Grief w/ Cedar Brant


Poet & botanist Cedar Brant on newborn loss, the role of place in healing, and erasure of self in deep grief and parenthood.



6 / Adoption, Potentiality, & the Loss of Unknowing w/ Erinrose Mager


Writer, editor, & teacher Erinrose Mager on the unknowingness associated with adoption and parental estrangement, the interplay between potentiality & failure, and ritual as a presencing force.



7 / Ambient Loss, Having Children, & the Necessity of Storytelling w/ Camille T. Dungy


Writer & professor Camille T. Dungy on loss as a continuous presence, cross-generational relationships, and climate crisis.









8 / Relationality, Embodiment, & Suicide w/ Mairead Case


Writer, teacher, & editor Mairead Case explores relationality in life & after death, embodiment, and grieving & writing about suicide.