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This is imagination school.

Poetry Forge offers workshops and writing opportunities all year round. You can view our calendar of current offerings and subscribe to our newsletter to receive early access and the most updated information. You can also follow us on Instagram @poetryforge where we share some of our favorite poems and inspirations and scenes from the seacoast of Maine. Get in touch anytime if you have questions.

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Many Lanterns

Sparks to illuminate the poet’s path

Wayfinding and poetic guidance in the form of a 21 part series where devoted reading, writing, and reflection will lead to a substantial body of new work in progress, and deeper trust in your creative process. Our theme is Radiant/Darkness. This course is asynchronous and available anytime.

Details Here

Mountains and Rivers

November 27-December 11, 2024

Sit like a mountain, write like a river. Guided meditation and writing practice to support your creative and inner life. Offered by meditation teacher, poet, and artist, Susa Talan (Open Door Meditation Community), and poet and teaching artist, Holly Wren Spaulding (Poetry Forge). Our themes are Wakefulness, Reality, and Community.

Details Here

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The Casual Union of Working Poets

February 7-December 11, 2025

An affinity group for poets and secret poets, and an alumni club for Poetry Forge writers where we write together, revise our work, share from work in progress, and even submit the best of it for publication. The CUWP is where we explore what's possible in a supportive community of committed practitioners.

Details here

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Oceans Without End

This course will return in Summer 2025.

A summer practice period for poets and secret poets offering a slow, sultry approach to writing through the season and a creative project to focus your attention during the lazy, hazy days of June and July. All levels.

Details here

For a Meadow

This course will return in Spring 2025

For a Meadow: 13 Ways to Seed a Wildland of Poems. Guided by the themes of sowing and cultivation, we will explore the practice of writing as a way of imagining and creating a world of fertility, possibility, and little beauties. Taught asynchronously online by Holly Wren Spaulding. All levels.

Details here

Every so often we bring back these favorites
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Other Doors

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Other Doors: X Ways to Revise a Poem provides essential lessons in the art of revision, helps you become more confident in your ability to edit your work, and prepares students to submit their work for publication in literary magazines and journals. This course is a pre-requisite for anyone who would like to take A Body of Work, which is Holly’s annual manuscript incubator.

Details here

Poetry As—

A workshop series offering shared space for new writing, vital conversations, encounters with guest artists and authors, and guided writing experiences with your host, Holly Wren Spaulding.

Poetry as Astonishment, Poetry as Listening, Poetry as Beauty, Poetry as Grief Ritual, Poetry as Unknowing, Poetry as Pathfinding, Poetry as Refuge, and Poetry and the Sacred are our themes in 2024.

Details here

A Body of Work

This course will not be offered in 2025. Check back in 2026.

A manuscript incubator where you receive support, mentorship, and feedback as you develop your first poetry chapbook manuscript. ABOW is a good fit for those who have assembled enough poems to begin thinking in terms of a collection. It is recommended that the student complete Other Doors: X Ways to Revise a Poem or another revision focused course, before joining ABOW. Applications open in November for the follow year’s cohort.

Details here

Infinite Imagination

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A process lab for new writing and creativity where we explore the uses and pleasures of prolific iteration while undertaking experiments that involve committing to our obsessions, exploring echoes, and embracing swiftness and looseness. Students will conceive a small project based on their findings in the lab. Online. Space is very limited.

A Secret Life

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A Secret Life offers a gentle framework for how to listen, imagine, and steward the creative call of something personally significant: an art project that matters to you. In this special winter workshop series you will be supported in a process of finding freedom, space, and confidence to materialize your secret life and a secret project in any media.

Author Holly Wren Spaulding appeared as part of the Coffee With the Author series at the Glen Arbor Art Center in July 2023.

Creative Advising & Manuscript Feedback

Holly takes on a limited number of private clients each season for creative advising and feedback on work in progress. At present, these sessions are only available to members of the Casual Union of Working Poets and students enrolled in A Body of Work.

Reach out if you have questions or wish to book time together via phone or Zoom.