Ritual Writing: A Poetry Workshop for Seniors with Steven Sher

How can we deepen the creative source from which we draw? Writing ought to start at the writer’s core, with a clear vision, drawing from the deeply familiar and life-guiding themes, and building a “personal mythology” while creating personal ritual.

In this workshop we will explore ways to become more “receptive” as poets, develop tools to elevate craft to match our “vision” of a poem, examine how to recognize and unify slant/voice/patterns in drafting a poem, and look at editing strategies to maximize the poem’s effect and select its optimal form. There will be in-workshop exercises, weekly assignments and work on participants’ poems.

Steven Sher is the author of 14 books including, most recently, Grazing On Stars: Selected Poems (Presa Press, 2012) and The House of Washing Hands (Pecan Grove Press, 2014). He has taught writing for more than 35 years at many universities, workshops, festivals, writers in the schools programs and his poetry and prose have appeared in some 350 publications around the world.