Event

POETRY OF WITNESS

This workshop will meet the following Sundays: February 11, February 18, February 25, March 4, March 18
TIME/LOCATION: 12 PM 2 PM at Bowery Poetry located at 308 Bowery
INSTRUCTOR: Michael Collins

The goal of this class will be to explore the craft of poetry, specifically in one of its many essential roles, bearing witness -- either by recording direct experience or through acts of compassionate imagination. I don't think I need to explain to anyone why this particular approach to poetic craft is important in our current social and political situations. In times such as these, we need more empathy for those who are "different" -- apparently, anyway -- in one way or another, from "us." We need more poets for this movement! Therefore, this class will aim to welcome newer poets with accessible lessons, invite those who have gotten out of the practice of writing to return to a writing community, and help all participants who value diverse perspectives to hone their visions into poems. Sessions will include discussion of model poems and related generative writing and guided exercises, and workshop.

Michael Collins poems have received Pushcart Prize nominations and appeared in more than 70 journals and magazines. He is also the author of the chapbooks How to Sing when People Cut off your Head and Leave it Floating in the Water and Harbor Mandala, as well as the full-length collections Psalmandala and Appearances. He teaches creative and expository writing at New York University and the Hudson Valley Writers Center and is the Director of Studies at Why There Are Words Press and curator of the New York City branch of the national Why There Are Words Reading Series.