The goal of this workshop will be to generate as many new lines of poetry (or prose) as possible. Rotating through nine different stations, you'll be presented with various exercises for writing single lines or poetic fragments, these can serve either as seeds for new work or as lines you might use when revising old drafts. Hopefully the verse or prose lines generated in this workshop will carry you throughout the week, and even after yhou leave the conference. Be sure to bring along a notebook, as well as drafts of pieces you're stuck on or having trouble revising -- you'll use these at one of the stations! Space is limited for this workshop.

This generative workshop will use Joe Brainard’s experimental memoir I Remember (1970) as a jumping off point for us to create our own lists of memories and tangents that are prefixed with the phrase, "I remember…” Our discussion will then focus on the importance of proxemics and space and how these factor into a work—poetry, prose, film, photography—and writers’ recollections of it. This workshop is not genre specific. Hopefully participants walk away not with a finished draft of a single piece, but rather with a collection of fragments formed from memory, a long list of beginnings for them to explore in their writing later on.

In this workshop we will continue our discussion from Tuesday's lecture -- Devotional Acts: Locating Transcendence in Poetry and the Cinema of the Avant-Garde -- about the connection between poetry and the cinema of the avant-guard. We will begin by watching Larry Gottheim's Fog Line (1970) before exploring the trance films of Maya Deren and Jean Cocteau, and the (Soma)tic Poetry Rituals of CAConrad. We will then take a walk outside before reconvening to experiment with writing towards a transcendental/devotional practice. 

In this generative workshop, we'll discuss as well as practice some fresh methods for accessing and assembling the truly wild in our writing. We'll look at poems by Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Yuki Tanaka, Kimiko Hahn, and Muriel Leung. We'll engage with perspective shifts, dream logic, apocalyptic gods, bees who ask burning questions. We'll experiment with weird substitutions, odd juxtapositions, and other types of freaky arithmetic / alchemy. Bring (or bookmark, then pull up on your device) an article from your local newspaper (or any local newspaper). It can be an old piece, perhaps an archival one if the paper no longer exists. Consider what you are haunted by and how you might yourself one day haunt.

In this generative workshop, we'll discuss and practice methods for both radical compression and imaginative expansion in our poems. Specifically we'll experiment with traditional Japanese syllable forms, including the tanka, drawing inspiration from the short, aphoristic poems of Victoria Chang's The Trees Witness Everything. Then we'll turn to "The Swan", a new, longer poem of Chang's, as a model for how we might deliberately digress into startling discovery. 

Do they exist? If they do, can they be as good as the poems that wreck us? Can a happy poem wreck us? And how can we avoid sentimentality or is that a risk we just need to take? In this generative session–spread over 2 days–we’ll look at Ross Gay’s essay “Joy Is Such a Human Madness” (from his collection The Book of Delights) as a compass for our discussion and a starting point for writing about/from/through happiness, joy, and pleasure. Within the genre of happy poem, we’ll think about poems that celebrate love, sex, community, and connection of various kinds. We’ll examine some model poems by Ross Gay and others, including Czesław Miłosz, Derrick Austin, Jane Wong, Nikky Finney, and Yanyi. Come prepared to engage in jubilant experimentation.

For this generative workshop, we'll play with a form that seems to be all about restriction: a poem where your name is the source of all the language you can use. That is, the only words you can use are those made from rearrangements (partial anagrams) of the letters in your name. How can such a restriction lead to a wealth of possibility? We'll look at two very different examples before undergoing a step-by-step process to build words, then lines. 

In this two-part seminar, we'll discuss poem sequences by Yuki Tanaka and Michelle Pe*N*aloza. We'll talk about the formal choices that sustain these sequences, that allow for narrative expansion and thematic cohesion as well as lyric compression / explosion. In particular, we'll focus on how these works propel us through time, both backwards and forwards. And we'll examine the role of the sentence, which these two poets use in very different, idiosyncratic ways. Let's also keep in mind how we can read/thing about these sequences as long, single poems. Although there won't be enough time for us to write our own sequences, at the end of the session I"ll invite everyone to create and share with the group a take-home writing prompt inspired by these texts.

This generative poetry workshop will excite, nurture, and inspire participants in their poetic practice. In the first part of the session, we will read some poems on the theme of broken things; in the second half, we will read poems about, and have a short craft talk on, the poetic element of anaphora. The workshop will be guided by poems by Ross Gay, Roger Reeves, Silvina López Medin, Joy Harjo, Alicia Mountain, and Mihaela Moscaliuc. Our session time together will include audio and video of the poets performing their work, so we can enjoy hearing the authors’ words in their own voices. Over the course of the session, participants will draft some new poems, stimulated by provided prompts, and will have the opportunity to share their work in an encouraging, inclusive, supportive environment. Participants will leave this workshop with more poems and prompts to keep the inspiration flowing after the course is completed.

Why, I thought I was just reading a paragraph or two, but, by golly, methinks I glimpsed a little sliver of eternity.

                         - James Tate

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Join me for this generative workshop (including audio and video) in which we'll read and discuss recent flash fiction and prose poetry, touching on techniques and craft elements which help them each succeed. With the help of prompts inspired by the examples we'll read, you'll begin some new pieces and have the opportunity to share if you wish! Writers at all levels and in all genres are welcome. Write in your usual groove or try out a different one. This will be a safe place for us all to deepen our relationship with our craft and also to experiment! After our time together, you'll be sent off with more short form fiction and prose poetry and prompts to help keep you writing after the course is over.

Swing on by for this generative workshop that will excite, nurture, and inspire us in out poetic practice. In the first part of this session, we'll read poetry with coffee in it, and in the second half we'll read poetry and have a short craft talk on the simile. In the workshop we'll be guided by poets such as Yalie Kamara, Kwame Dawes, Ellen Bass, Monica Cure, Luciana Arbus-Scandiffio, and Jane Wong. Our time together will include audio and video of the poets performing their work, so we can enjoy hearing their words in their own voices. Over the course of the session, you'll draft some new poems stimulated by original prompts, and you'll have the opportunity to share your work in an encouraging, inclusive, supportive environment. Writers at all levels and in all genres as welcome. After our time together, you'll be sent off with more poems and prompts to keep the inspiration flowing after the course is over. 

A generative poetry session with poems and original prompts to help us get going writing poems! We'll enjoy inspiration, including audio and video, form poets such as Susan Nguyen, Maya C. Popa, Vievee Francis, Cleo Qian, and others. I'll provide a handout with poems and prompts we use in class, plus a bunch of others for you to enjoy and be further sparked by to write new poems!

Join in a generative poetry workshop that will excite, nurture, and inspire us in our poetic practice. In the first part of this session, we'll read poems on the theme of goodbye, and in the second we'll read -- and have a short craft talk on -- short poetry. Guiding authors include j. harris, Kelly Gray, Matty Layne Glasgow, Maggie Smith, Jess Weitz, and lucille clifton, with audio and video of the poets performing their work so we can enjoy hearing their words in their own voices. Over the course of the session, you'll draft some new poems in response to prompts and have the opportunity to share your work in an encouraging, inclusive, supportive environment. After our time together, you'll be sent off with more poems and prompts to keep the inspiration flowing. 

Swing on by for this generative poetry workshop that will excite, nurture, and inspire us in our poetic practice. In the first part of this session we'll read poetry with the sun in it, and in the second half we'll read -- and have a short craft talk on -- apostrophe poems (nothing to do with the quotation mark!). Guiding authors include S.A. Leger, Corey Zeller, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Natalie Diaz, Liza Katz Duncan, and Taylor Syas, with audio and video of the poets performing their work so we can enjoy hearing their words in their own voices. Over the course of the session, you'll draft some new poems in response to prompts and have the opportunity to share you work in an encouraging, inclusive, and supportive environment. Writers at all levels and in all genres are welcome. You'll leave our time together with even more poems and prompts to keep the inspiration flowing after. 

A generative poetry session on the craft of using juxtaposition to help us find our poems and to energize our poems when they arrive. We'll enjoy inspiration including audio and video, from poets such as Arda Collins, francine j. harris, Marcelo Hernandez Castillo, and others. I'll provide a handout with poems and original prompts we use in class, plus others for you to enjoy and be further stimulated by to write new poems!

This generative poetry workshop will excite, nurture, and inspire participants in their poetic practice. In the first part of this session, we will read poems on the theme of the sky; in the second half, we will read poems about, and have a short craft talk on, the poetic element of leaping. The workshop will be guided by poems by writers such as Tracy K. Smith, Christina Pugh, Christopher DeWeese, James Tate, James Wright, Philip Schaefer, francine j. harris, and Dara Barrois-Dixon. Our time together will include audio and video of the poets performing their work, so we can enjoy hearing the authors’ words in their own voices. Over the course of the session, we will draft some new poems, stimulated by provided prompts, and will have the opportunity to share our work in an encouraging, inclusive, supportive environment. Participants will leave this workshop with more poems and prompts to keep the inspiration flowing after the course is completed.

We will think about the voice in different genres and mediums, going beyond the traditional understanding of the reader's voice at a Poetry Reading *TM* and thinking about how we can -- and do -- develop and individuate our voices through a panoply of other embodied formats that are not generally considered to be part of the poet's cultically "Authoritative Voice". These include poetry "talk pieces", screenplays, monologues, stand-up comedy, the academic lecture, the social media post (e.g. poems written & formatted for the Instagrammable screenshot, epic captions from authors), the Notes app screenshot, and memes.

Are you a haptic-addicted dopamine lover who craves quantifiable achievements and progress bars? Do you struggle with the delayed gratification of the writing process? If so, this two-part workshop is for you! A games journalist and former game developer are here to share their strategies for gamefying creativity, one dopamine hit at a time. 

This generative poetry workshop is intended to illuminate the expanded potentials of working with hybrid forms, including but not limited to: auto-fiction, experimental poetry, auto-theory, and writing that incorporates visual arts. Participants are encouraged to consider how hybridity can reshape their own work in ways that inspire new lyric iterations.

In this nonfiction workshop, the first session will be spent generating "datasets" -- following the format used in The Stone Loves the World -- and writing along the line between prose and poetry while looking at moments in the life of a person who is important to you (friend or family). The idea is to work backward through time, creating a set of moments involving that person. each dataset cannot run longer than seven lines, but you can write up to ten of them. The first dataset is a recent moment, and the last is the first time you met the person or your earliest memory of them. The second session will be devoted to feedback and discussion. 

This generative workshop will use the four-beat couplet form, inspired by the work of poet and librettist Ellen Goodman. In the first session, participants will select two or three words from a randomly generated list to create a four-beat line; the group will vote on their favorite, and that will become the first line of everyone's piece. The second, third, and fourth lines of the piece will be generated in the same way, after which point everyone will continue on individually, keeping to the four-beat couplet meter and making use of some of the other words from the original list (the more, the merrier). The second session will be devoted to feedback and discussion. This workshop will be limited to 14 participants.

In this generative fiction workshop's first session, we will collectively vote on and choose a first sentence for a short short story (options randomly mined from a published text). Then each writer will develop a potential second sentence, and the group will vote for their favorite; a third and fourth sentence will be added the same way. Once everyone has the same first four sentences, each participant will write their own story from there--with the stipulation that somewhere in the remainder of the piece, at least two of the sentences that came in as second-favorites must be incorporated. For the second session, we will bring our stories back to the group for reading and discussion. This workshop will be limited to 14 participants.

In this generative fiction workshop's first session, we will collectively vote on and choose a first sentence for a short short story (options randomly mined from a published text). Then each writer will develop a potential second sentence, and the group will vote for their favorite; a third and fourth sentence will be added the same way. Once everyone has the same first four sentences, each participant will write their own story from there--with the stipulation that somewhere in the remainder of the piece, at least two of the sentences that came in as second-favorites must be incorporated. For the second session, we will bring our stories back to the group for reading and discussion. This workshop will be limited to 14 participants.

In this generative workshop, participants will be asked to excavate themselves and their characters to get at the core of who they are. Writing prompts will be paired with excerpts of work by established writers, including poet Airea Dee Matthews, poet and scholar Bhanu Khapil, and master writer Jamaica Kincaid. Writers can expect to leave with substantive explorations of what matters most to them and their characters. (Note: There is a second workshop of the same name. They are thematically connected, but attending the two in sequence is not required.)

This workshop introduces the bop and the cento as forms built through repetition and borrowed language. Participants will study how refrains, quotations, and existing texts can be reorganized to create new meaning & expand the voice of a poem.

This workshop explores ekphrasis not just as description but as a transformative dialogue between text and image. Participants will confront how language can dissolve, reframe, or radicalize the visual, pushing beyond mere representation into interpretive and affective territory. By engaging with dense, layered poetic and prose examples, and through provocative prompts, students will practice evoking the ineffable qualities of visual art in their writing.

This workshop engages participants to think about environmental poetics not merely as a record of nature but as an active interrogation of place, ecological grief, and our complicity in environmental transformations. Writers will explore nuanced responses to ecological crises, practicing poetic strategies that blend sensory perception with critical reflection to create deeply resonant texts.

Lists have made their way from ledgers, journals, and refrigerator doors into literature in a whole catalog of ways. This will be a generative poetry workshop that uses examples of the list as literary tool and form. We will get a feel for its powers by looking at different instances and schemes of the litany, series, register, inventory. How can poets develop their powers of description? How can poets deepen and broaden their sense of compression, fragmentation, and even discursiveness as lyric intimation?

Why are figures from myth so seductive for poets, and how do poems use them without sounding rusty and outdated? How can we responsibly and imaginatively use myth? In this generative poetry workshop, we’ll look at various model poems and discuss a few reasons why poets keep returning to myth. Then you will innovate a tale or two of your own with different writing exercises and prompts. It will help you think not just about myth, but allusion in general as a dynamic element of craft.

Survival is a perpetual act of storytelling, a composite assembly of memory and instinct that forms our perception of “the real,” of what is known. Creativity runs deeper than planning and outlining; it runs deeper than the known. The most electrifying images swim up to us from the dark unconscious. They obey no logic, they keep their own light. When we let the Unknown into our writing, we let the unconscious speak through us. This is a generative workshop for all, gleaned from exercises picked up over the years. With a series of writing prompts, participants can descend into an organically unfolding work by engaging the senses and the imagination.

When we let the spirit  of the unknown into our writing, we let darkness speak through us. This two-part workshop, grounded in nature, will be an exploration of generative exercises to enliven the senses and engage with the unconscious. The first session will be generative. The second will include a sharing of our work with each other after a week in the Adirondack woods. 

This workshop will be spread  over two days: the first to define the "poetic journal", offer examples, and assign "homework"; the second to workshop poetic journals that participants have generated.

There's nothing better than the feeling of euphoria at the peak of a great brainstorming session. In this workshop, you'll spend 3 hours (1 hour before lunch, then a break for lunch, reconvene for 2 more hours) doing just that via a series of idea “shells” designed to have you fill in the blanks and go to task on answering why. During the last hour of the workshop, you'll spend time with “novel structure shells” implementing ideas into what could be a full-length book.

Part resuscitative experience, part story starting seance. There's nothing better than the feeling of euphoria a the peak of a great brainstorming session. This workshop is split into two distinct parts to generate that feeling; the sessions don't rely on each other, so attending both in sequence is not required. In the first part, bring anything in progress and stalled out and let's try some strategies to revive it. After a break, get your creative impulse set on new possibilities via a series of idea "shells" designed to have you fill in the blanks and go to task on answering why. 

This workshop will focus on adapting short stories into screenplays with a focus on dialogue. Questions that will be asked and discussed include: How does dialogue contribute to a short story? How can communication in a short story contribute to its adaptation into a screenplay? During the workshop, we will discuss examples of short stories and their film counterparts. Workshop participants will then write one scene based on a short story.

This workshop will focus on adapting short stories into screenplays. Questions that will be asked and discussed include: What can be te difference between adapting a short story and adapting a novel into storytelling for film and television? What are the considerations for adapting a short story? During the workshop, examples of short stories and their film counterparts will be discussed. Participants will be invited to write one scene based on a short story.

This workshop will focus on creating new short stories, including flash fiction, utilizing prompts and brainstorming strategies. The workshop will also include an approach of creating and/or clarifying goals and intentions regarding writing regarding revision. Questions that will be asked and discussed include: How can a writer build from an initial draft of a story and/or story idea? What are the goals of the writer regarding creating the short story and how can one revise work to align with one’s goals and intentions? During the workshop, participants will have the option of bringing their own short story excerpts that could be reviewed and discussed (the first two pages or the first page, double-spaced). In addition to the workshop, a 45-minute individual consultation (optional) would be scheduled and provided to review and discuss each participant’s short story, strategies for generating a story, and each writer’s creative and professional goals. This workshop is limited to 10 participants; 10-page maximum (double-spaced) for consultations.