Writing

 

Assignments

Due Wednesday, 1/11

• Convert 1 prose piece you wrote in class into a poem of verse.
• Describe 1 walk you take in the next 24hrs in as much sensory detail as possible.

Due Thursday, 1/12

• Convert your free write of the Otter Creek Gorge walk into verse.

Due Monday, 1/16

• 3 poems for workshop, in order of priority.(Note: 1 poem must be additional to any of those assigned/prompted by me; 2 poems can be revisions of assigned/prompted writing.)

Due Tuesday, 1/17

• Convert your partner’s prose walk description into a poem. (Include the prose version after your poem.)
• 1969 Weybridge Road: two poems
• Go for a walk and write 1 haiku in reflection. (See Basho.)
• Select your favorite line from the readings and use this as the 1st line to a poem.

(Any of these can be included as 2 of your 3 workshop poems. Remember to title all work.)

• 1 Reading Response.

Due Monday, 1/23

• 3 poems for workshop, in order of priority — Please print a hardcopy for me, stapled or clipped, including your name, and leave it in the box outside my door by 5pm Monday. 

Due Tuesday, 1/24

• 1 Reading Response
• Poem: Write a poem in which you are walking through a specific city, either in memory or imagination. Refer to as many details in the cityscape as possible.
• For O’Hara’s Lunch Poems, read the entire text with a focus on: Music, A Step Away From Them, Song, The Day Lady Died, Personal Poem, Rhapsody, How to Get There, A Little Travel Diary, Steps, Saint Paul and All That
• [Optional prompts: Select a poem from the readings about a city that’s important to you and write a response to it, placing yourself within that same city; Write a self-portrait in _____ (city); Write a poem about 1 physical aspect of a specific city]

Due Monday, 1/30

• 3 poems for workshop, in order of priority.
• Look back at your notes from our Norske Trail hike with Bill McKibben. Select 5 nouns you recorded, and use them repetitively (at least 2-3x each) within a single-stanza poem in the epistolary form (letter addressed to someone). (If you missed the walk, do this with notes from a previous walk.)      [Can be included among your 3 or extra.]
• Go on a walk this weekend, even if you just pick up the TAM from campus. During the walk, select 1 object in the landscape: a specific tree, a physical structure, a detail on the path. Reflecting on that object (in and of itself and as it’s positioned within a specific context), write a self-portrait.     [Can be included among your 3 or extra.]

Due Tuesday, 1/31

• Reading Response

Due Friday, 2/3

• Final Portfolio (see details below)

 

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In-Class Writing

1/10:

On an index card, write the autobiography of your life as a walk through memory.

In 2nd POV, take the reader on a walk through your hometown.

Write the memory of 1 walk that was meaningful for you in your life.

With a first line, “The best thing is to walk” (Chatwin), discuss why (or why not).

1/11:

After our walk along the Otter Creek Gorge, write about your experience, noting at least one external image and one internal thought.

1/12

After our walk at 1969 Weybridge Road, create lists: sounds, images, smells, tactile sensations, thoughts, questions, bits of shared/overheard dialogue, things that feel far from here. Write a poem incorporating as much of these materials as possible. (Then go home and write another poem from the same catalogue.)

1/17

Write down the name of one of your most favorite places; make this the title of a piece in which you walk through that place, not in memory but in the present.

Exchange favorite lines from the readings with a partner and write a piece using the borrowed line as a springboard.

1/19

After our TAM walk, free-write. Then write a list of all possible titles you’d give a poem about the walk.

1/24

New York School prompt

1/25

Freewrite after our walk with Bill McKibben along the Norske Trail.

1/31

5-line poem:

i. setting

ii. what you think

iii. what you say (opposes what you think)

vi. shift outside the immediate scene

v. question

2/1

Cabin Workshop: 1) Along the snowshoe to the cabin, write a line every 5-10 minutes of walking, composing a poem en route; 2) 5-line poem (above); 3) select 1 object from the walk — describe it from the perspective of someone who’s just suffered a major loss; describe it from the perspective of someone who’s just reunited with a loved one (don’t use 1st pov; create pov through description); 4) Crumble your favorite poem and throw it into the woodstove fire, then attempt to rewrite it from memory.

2/2

Writing w/John Elder along the TAM trail: 1) Write about a landscape from memory; 2) Write about this place in relation to the landscape from memory

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Portfolio Requirements:

Select 10 poems to include in your portfolio.

These can be the 10 you feel are your best, and/or the 10 that are most representative of your work and growth as a writer during this term. 8 of these must be revisions, 2 can be new poems from your final week (or additional revisions); for exceptions to this ratio, please discuss in conference. You may include any of the poems revised from in-class writing or weekly workshop submissions.

Presentation:

Consider how all of the poems work together as a whole to represent your writing this term — find the arc in your collected 10 poems, presenting them in an order that is thoughtfully considered. Your first poem and your final poem and the order of poems between shouldn’t be random, but rather carefully selected.

1. Present the 10 revisions at the front of the portfolio, paginated and bound by a clip or staple. You must include a cover page with a title for the entire collection (really think about a title representative of the work you’ve produced, don’t just call it “Poems” or “Walking”), your name, and date.

2. Present the 10 original drafts in the same order as the revisions, preferably the copy with my comments, also bound by clip or staple. Include a 1-paragraph explanation for each poem, attached above each original, addressing the changes you made from the original to the revision.

3. Write a 2-3 pg. self-reflection tracing your development as a writer across the course.

Here’s an opportunity to discuss your work critically and share what you’re most proud of, where you see your writing going from here, what you struggled with, what you enjoyed, what you learned about yourself as a writer this term. Evaluate your strengths, points of growth, ways in which you’d like to continue pushing your voice/style, what your work says about you right now as a writer, how you see your portfolio of 10 poems (the process of selecting these, what your portfolio shows about you as a writer), future projects you’d like to pursue, etc. I’m also curious to hear how the specific theme of walking (and actuality of walking) has influenced your writing or your creative process, if at all, and likewise how the readings of this term have impacted your own poems. Which poem spoke the most to you out of them all? Is there anything you feel more confident in doing now that you’ve reached the end of this course? What habits or strategies were most helpful to your writing process and productivity? Point to at least 1 new idea you’ll take away from this term. Anything else to tell me?