Beginnings, Openings, Origins: A Poetry Workshop

Description

This workshop is for writers interested in reading and writing poetry. No specialized knowledge is required. 

Limited to 12 participants.

With the goal of generating new writing, this workshop group will examine beginnings, openings, and origins. We will look at a variety of works with specific attention to opening lines, sentences, and stanzas/paragraphs. What draws us into a work? What kinds of expectations are set up and how are they met or surprised? We will also consider our own writing origins and sources, look at our inspirations, and ask when do we start a poem? What blocks us? Which writing habits are helpful and which ones can we dispel? Together, we will deepen our understanding of how we shape our interior/exterior worlds into writing through exercises/prompts and discussion.

Participants can expect weekly readings, in-meeting prompts, and optional “homework” exercises. During each meeting we will discuss readings, share exercises, and write. Starting in week two or three, participants will be welcome to have their writing workshopped by the group once throughout the session. (Being workshopped is optional, but all participants will be expected to give feedback to work submitted to the group.) 

The reading list includes work by Ocean Vuong, Carmen Giménez Smith, Chen Chen, Cameron Awkward-Rich, Noor Naga, Donika Kelly, Marylin Chin, Doyali Islam, Franny Choi, Emily Xie, José Olivarez, Diana Khoi Nguyen, Fatimah Asghar, and others. Readings will be provided each week via links.

Upon registration, please email one page of your writing, or one poem that you are excited to share, and 3-5 sentences about why you are interested in the workshop to the QWF Workshops account, with the subject line “For T. Liem.”