Nature Poetry Workshop with Ann E. Wallace

Four Saturday classes during National Poetry Month
April 1, 8, 15, 22 from 11am-1pm on Zoom
Enrollment capped at 16 participants

This is a Members-Only Program
REGISTRATION IS NOW CLOSED

When we write as poets about the natural world, we must slow down and open our senses, tuning into all that we see, hear, smell, touch, and feel. As we sink into nature’s rhythms and mysteries, we reflect on our role within the environment. When we shine a lens on the life around us, whether through the smartphone cameras we all carry in our pockets now, with graphite on paper, or through the language of poetry, we are likely to respect, care for, and even love that which we are seeing. And, we may just see ourselves reflected back in that lens.

Nature Poetry is a generative workshop, in which participants will learn different poetic forms and methods for observing the natural world. Each workshop session will highlight a poetic form or style, beginning with reading and discussion of model poems by contemporary or well-known poets. Participants will then write together, drafting a nature-inspired poem of their own in that tradition. Writers will be encouraged to share their work aloud and to complete and/or revise their drafts for the next class.

In weeks two through four, participants will have the opportunity to share finished drafts with the class for focused feedback through workshopping.

Poetic forms to be introduced in the workshop may include–but are not limited to–short form/variations on haiku, ode and praise poems, haibun, elegy, how to poems, and persona poems. Instruction on literary devices and poetic techniques will be woven into each lesson.

About the instructor: Ann E. Wallace, PhD, is Poet Laureate of Jersey City and Professor of English at New Jersey City University. A lifetime gardener, she is host and co-producer of Saturday Morning Poetry for the New Jersey Native Plant Society Hudson County Chapter. Her writing and teaching, though often focused on illness and trauma, are infused with nature, hope, and an appreciation for the life found in unexpected spaces when we slow down and look. She is author of the poetry collection Counting by Sevens (Main Street Rag, 2019), and her published creative work and media appearances can be found at AnnWallacePhD.com. You can follow her on Instagram @annwallace409.