WRITING ON THE DOOR: Poetry Intensive with Michael Kleber-Diggs

AFTER THE INITIAL DRAFT: REVISION AS POETRY PRACTICE

Sometimes poems arrive as if sent from somewhere else, leaving poets to feel as though they’re lucky transcribers. Usually, our process includes revision. Revision is seen as many things — practical process, spiritual practice, a private interrogation, a community affair. In this workshop we will focus on revision as part of poetic practice. Among the questions we’ll consider are: what should poets think about when writing the initial draft? How might poems progress after the initial draft? How do you know when a poem is “ready?” Workshop time will be used to draft poems, and participants are encourged to bring previously-written drafts to revisit in the workshop.

Class meets Monday, August 7, 9 am – 4 pm. Breaks will be scheduled. Individual consultations with the teaching artist will be scheduled for Tuesday, August 8.

Class size: Maximum 12. Minimum 5.

Member discount: Members of Write On receive a 10% discount on all classes and workshops. To become a member, please click here. To receive the discount, members must log in to the website using their unique password and enter member10 in the promotion code box. The code is case sensitive.

Teaching Artist: Michael Kleber-Diggs is 2023-2025 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow and a poet, essayist, literary critic, and arts educator. His debut poetry collection, Worldly Things (Milkweed Editions 2021), won the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize, the 2022 Hefner Heitz Kansas Book Award in Poetry, the 2022 Balcones Poetry Prize and was a finalist for the 2022 Minnesota Book Award. His essay, “On the Complex Flavors of Black Joy,” is included in the anthology There’s a Revolution Outside, My Love: Letters from a Crisis, edited by Tracy K. Smith and John Freeman. Another essay, “There Was a Tremendous Softness,” appears in A Darker Wilderness: Black Nature Writing from Soil to Stars, edited by Erin Sharkey (Milkweed Editions, 2023). Since 2016, Michael has been an instructor with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop. He also teaches Creative Writing in Augsburg University’s low-res MFA program and at Saint Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists. His work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net and has been supported by the Minnesota State Arts Board, the Jerome Foundation, and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council. Michael is married to Karen Kleber-Diggs, a tropical horticulturist and orchid specialist. Karen and Michael have a daughter who is pursuing a BFA in Dance Performance at SUNY Purchase.