thoughts, literary thoughts

I thought of "rumination" and "pondering". But the first is less common, and the second has negative connotation.

the reason for my choice is that خواطر are things that come to your head. But we cannot translate the expression like that so I decided to go for literary ideas.

As far as I know, and based on my specialization (i.e. literary criticism), خواطر is 'prose'.

By the way, although I have written a number of academic papers on the history and categorization of pre-modernity, modern, and postmodern literature, I have never seen, read, or heard of such a category/classification named 'literary thoughts', 'literary reflections', 'literary ideas', nor 'literary meditations'. Such direct-translations are by no means conventional.

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Note added at 1 day22 hrs (2006-07-15 13:24:54 GMT)
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Nesrin:

Not one of your very valid references, Nesrin, presents خواطر as a literary genre; on the contrary, the common notion is like تأملات في الأدب rather than 'خواطر أدبية'. 'Prose' is used by default rather than its subgenres when the materia is too ambiguous to be categorized, and when the context is literature, it exactly indicates what we call خواطر; i.e. not non-fiction, not poetry, and yet not suitable for any subgenre [although, quite a number of خواطر may be categorized based on style as 'stream of consciousness', or based on content 'diaries', 'journals', etc.]

New litrary theories settle this by grouping everything under the category 'text', and moreover, some philosophies reject any subcategorization of 'texts', further broadening the term to include painting, film, and practically every property/expression/trace of man. In Arabic, many PO-MO writings, including mine, use the term سرد to eleminate categorizations/classifications. However, 'narratives' is the equivalent term for it. 'Prose' grew more and more narrow, leaving its former 'signified' [i.e. نثر] in schoolbooks and classic academia, while acquiring a new 'signified' as a free-writing.

Incidentally, نثر underwent the same transition in Arabic; only this time without acquiring any new signifieds. Practically, it became a term used by non-professionals, children schools, and any shallow or pedagogical introduction to literary genres.

Outside literature, خواطر may be put simpy as تأملات = reflections, contemplations http://www.gawaher.com/index.php?showforum=299.html

it's just the term many a blogger use to designate their online writings. it's more informal and unsystematic as a manner of writing to compare it with "reflections".