Workshop

After missing all of last week's classes on account of the flu, I came back just in time for today's poetry workshop. I felt like it was the perfect way to dive back into class after being absent because it included everyone in a personal commentary of each other's poems. Anyone could contribute, and everyone benefitted from the feedback.

I enjoyed reading a refreshing variety of poetry. I read the poems before class and discovered that the more poems I read, the more ideas began coming to me for my own poetry. This inspiration became a steady flow after I got warmed up. A certain poet's form, diction, theme, voice, or other quality would give me ideas of what to try differently with my own poetry. I had to pause every poem or two in order to scribble down an outline, a few details, or a theme for another poem.

In class, I got to hear other poet's comments and constructive criticism that I wouldn't think of on my own. I didn't say much because I was busy writing down other people's comments and because I didn't have much to point out. I think listening to this feedback was good not only for the poets in question but for everyone, since most criticism can be applied to our own poems as well.

Todays productivity does frighten me a little. Two poems per class period means it could take us 11 classes for one workshop. Still, I hope we can make it through everyone's poem in a timely manner. I can't wait for the next workshop. I brought a blank verse poem illustrating death to this workshop, so I plan on writing and bringing a rhyming poem to the next one.

--Jessica Murphy