- This event has passed.
You must be your own absence, with fifty percent deity.
You must ask, why this song, this seeing.
— Dana Levin, “Working Methods”
“What are your obsessions as a poet?” asks instructor Lisa Gluskin Stonestreet. “When you read, what is it that draws you to a poem, makes it resonate for you? How can you pursue that spark and let it have its way with your poems?"
This one-session remote workshop is designed to help you explore the topical, structural, and stylistic aspects that make your work your own. We’ll start with the idea of poetic obsessions, using a page from Richard Hugo’s The Triggering Town as a jumping-off point.
“Participants should bring 10 pages of poems to class,” Lisa says. “We’ll draw on these, using formal, sonic, and visual exercises and discussion to generate a range of raw material for new work, revealing both commonalities and untapped possibilities. We’ll also engage with the work of contemporary poets, to inspire new directions and help you embrace your role in the ongoing poetic conversation.”
About The Writing Salon's Remote Classes
Due to concerns about the spread of COVID-19, The Writing Salon has moved all onsite classes with an April start date to a remote learning format. You will be able to participate in live class meetings via Zoom videoconference. To attend classes, you'll need a phone or computer and access to the web. You can participate in the class from wherever you'd like, whether on your living room couch or in your home office. Before your class meets, you'll receive an email from The Writing Salon with more information about Zoom and your remote class. If you have any questions about remote learning, please don't hesitate to reach out to us at hello@writingsalons.com.
Lisa Gluskin Stonestreet is the author of The Greenhouse (Frost Place Chapbook Prize) and Tulips, Water, Ash (Morse Poetry Prize). Her poems have appeared in journals such as Blackbird, Kenyon Review, Plume, and Zyzzyva, in anthologies including Nasty Women Poets and The Bloomsbury Anthology of Contemporary Jewish American Poetry, and online at Poem-A-Day and Poetry Daily. In addition to leading workshops at Portland’s Literary Arts, Seattle’s Hugo House, and The Writing Salon, she hosts the Portland reading series Lilla Lit and Literary Bingo and works as a freelance editor of poetry and nonfiction. Before fleeing northward in search of writer-friendly rents, she taught in UC Berkeley’s Post-Baccalaureate Writing Program.
- Live Zoom Meeting: Saturday, April 25, 10:00am-1:00pm