This course introduces students to the essential elements, strategies, and techniques for writing poetry and prose. Through a focus on Black feminist, queer, and diaspora poets from marginalized identities, this course also seeks to illuminate emergent styles and experimental methods in poetic writing, in other words: hybrids. This class aims to teach students traditional approaches to poetry and prose while exposing them to alternative styles of writing. Students are encouraged to develop new modes of poetic expression that mix and meld emergent techniques as well as imagine entirely new forms. We will explore the work of Black feminist literary classics like June Jordan, Lucille Clifton, James Baldwin, and Audre Lorde, diaspora poets like Ocean Vuong, Fatimah Asghar, Yrsa Daley-Ward, and Kazim Ali, as well as up-and-coming local poets like Alan Pelaez Lopez, Ra Malika Imhotep, Tongo Eisen Martin, and fahima ife. By the end of the course, students will have a portfolio length collection of edited poems suitable for submissions to poetry contests, chapbook prizes, writing grants, and other types of artist competitions. Students will learn constructive, effective methods for critiquing and improving their writing practices via activities such as collective readings, free writing, class discussions, small group critique sections, and one-on-one peer review. Suitable for writers of all stages and experience levels. You will be guided with prompts, examples, and collective feedback sessions.

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