8-Week: Exploration in Poetic Forms

In this generative course, we’ll explore poetic forms and traditions, both ancient and contemporary. We’ll examine the relationship between content, voice, and form by discussing the structural elements of poetry, such as rhythm, meter, metaphor, rhyme, and repetition. We’ll read and experiment with forms including the sonnet, villanelle, contrapuntal, pantoum, golden shovel, ekphrastic, erasure, ghazal, and haiku. Assignments will be generative in nature; no feedback or reading will be assigned, though example poems will be read and discussed during our classes.