When I asked Tabitha if she had any advice for readers, she kept it simple. “Get a notebook. Keep it by your bed. See what happens…”
If you sit down with Tabitha Parker-Theiss ’26, you’ll quickly realize that art — whether through music or writing — is not just something she does but a fundamental part of how she experiences the world. A junior, Parker-Theiss balances her honors English major with an honors history minor and navigates an intense yet enriching academic workload. Despite her commitments, she’s even considering adding religion into the mix. Yet, when it comes to her artistic practice, she doesn’t hesitate. She’s all in.
“I’ve been playing violin since I was five years old,” she said, almost offhandedly. Violin has been so constant in her life that it feels less like a skill and more like an extension of herself. From an early age, her parents guided her to explore her musicality. On campus, she plays in both the Swarthmore College Orchestra and the Lab Orchestra, a space where conducting students can hone their craft. She’s also part of the Fetter Chamber Music Program, where she’s played duets, trios, and, now, a full-fledged string quartet. Music is embedded in her routine, her relationships, and her identity.
And then, for Tabitha, there’s writing — which she delved deeper into later, but with just as much passion. Tabitha took multiple creative writing workshops and published pieces in “Small Craft Warnings”, Swarthmore’s literary magazine. Right now, she’s immersed herself in a directed poetry project under professor Ruba Ahmed’s mentorship. The project is a poetic exploration of dementia, inspired by her step-great-grandmother’s battle with Alzheimer’s.
“I’m trying to show, through poetry, how the loss of cognitive function might look,” she explained. “I want to explore what it’s like to lose parts of yourself, to be aware of that loss, and what it means for the people around you [to contend with or make sense of that loss]”
For Tabitha, storytelling isn’t just about capturing experiences — it’s about understanding them. “Writing is a way of building empathy,” she said. “This project lets me relate to my grandmother, [and to try to access her headspace.]”
Tabitha is fascinated by narrative poetry and drawn to how it merges storytelling with lyricism, or makes sense of complex emotions through structured expression. Her work is still in progress, but she plans to continue writing into the summer and even possibly pursuing an honors thesis.
While music and writing might seem like separate realms, Tabitha deeply intertwines her modes of artistic expression. She doesn’t just want to pursue them side by side — she wants to find a way to fuse them. “I don’t know what that would look like yet,” she admitted, “but it’s something I’d love to figure out.”
Though she’s not rushing her post-graduate plans, she’s considering an MFA in creative writing. Whatever happens, she’s certain that music and writing will always be a part of her life. “Even if my career isn’t artistic, I want to keep creating,” she said. “I just can’t imagine my life without it.”
As a fervent optimist, I asked her whether she thinks art can heal the world. She paused, then said something that I was initially unprepared to hear, but found undeniably grounding. “I don’t think art can heal the world,” she said thoughtfully. “It’s a nice idea, and people say it a lot, but I think art can help us understand the world. It can help us process things, explore how we exist in an injured world. Maybe it can heal individuals, or at least make life more bearable.”
That’s when I realized how deeply Tabitha embedded art into her praxis and life philosophy. For her, art, beyond mere exhibition, is fundamentally about bridging gaps — between people, between perspectives, between personal and collective experiences. She sees it as a tool to help us recognize that others might navigate the world differently. “That’s how you build empathy,” she says. “By realizing that other people don’t experience life in the same way you do.”
As we segued into art forms and privileges, we rapidly recognized that not all art is accessible to everyone. Writing, she believes, is one of the most accessible art forms — “All you need is a pencil and a piece of paper”— but music, especially classical music, is a different story.
“Classical music is expensive. Lessons, instruments, even just access to the right spaces — it’s not something everyone can just pick up,” she explains. “And historically, classical music has been really exclusionary, both in terms of race and class.” But Tabitha is hopeful that things are positively shifting, “I think the discipline is changing. People are finding ways to make it more inclusive, to mix classical music with other genres and break down those barriers … Even since I was a kid, classical music has changed a lot — for the better. It’s becoming more open, more accessible. And writing evolves constantly, especially with technology.”
Art is always evolving, and Tabitha loves watching it shift. She’s particularly excited about how different art forms can combine in transformative ways. “People are mixing things up more — blending music with visual art, writing with performance. It’s a really cool time to be making art!” And I agree.
When the conversation moved to her inspirations, she quickly uttered, “Patti Smith,” before laughing a little. “I know that’s kind of a cliché answer, but she’s just incredible.” Tabitha first encountered Smith through her memoirs — “Just Kids” and “M Train” — and was captivated by her reflections on friendship, art, and what it means to be a young creative. “She’s fearless,” Tabitha said. “She’s not afraid to make mistakes publicly, and I really admire that.”
Still on narrative poetry, I asked how Tabitha captured the relationship between art and mental health. On that note, she was really reflective. “I wouldn’t say there’s a direct, traceable link between my art and my mental health,” she said. “It’s not like, ‘I write when I’m sad.’ But writing is a great way to process things. Sometimes, when life happens, it’s nice to write it down.” She recently came across a poem by Pablo Neruda titled “Ode to a Large Tuna Fish,” which centers around a tuna fish in a market. The subject was something mundane, but could transform, through writing, into something extraordinary. “That’s literally all it’s about,” she laughed. “But it reminded me that you can write about anything. It doesn’t always have to be about the ‘big stuff.’ Sometimes, you just write about a tuna fish.”
I enjoyed my conversation with Tabitha and her advice as someone who has spent her life balancing disciplines, finding beauty in complexity, and using art to make sense of the world. Whether reflected through violin strings or poetic lines, Tabitha Parker-Theiss constantly finds herself in motion, creating, exploring, and, most importantly, building empathy — one note and one word at a time. She invited us to create and share even if no audience is present — just for the sake of putting thoughts on paper. We never know where our imagination can lead us.
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Tabitha credits her professors at Swarthmore with shaping her artistry over the years: “Professor Ruba Ahmed, for poetry — she’s been amazing. Moriel Rothman-Zucker, who helped me write one of my favorite pieces ever. And Andrew Hauze in the music department — he’s just fantastic.”
