Tag: poetry workshop

Zoom into Poetry for November?

Zoom
~ sojourningsmith ~ Leave a comment

For the past two months I have been running two creative writing groups each week, meeting up for Zoom on Thursday evenings and Saturday mornings. I have five in each group which is a good number to allow everyone to share their week, read out what they have written during the session or as ‘homework’ and receive feedback. My gut feeling was to never have more than six people in each group; that was confirmed by the pilot workshop participants when I did a trial run in July.

Due to other committments one of the participants cannot join the four weeks of poetry workshops from November 1st. So I now have a space on Saturdays, Zooming from noon to 2pm Irish time. And if you think that is early, tell that to Susan in Canada who joins us at 7am her local time!

The Zoom workshops will be held on Saturday, November 7th, 14th, 21st and 28th. The workshops include emailed support materials, inspiring videos, in session exercises and sharing of work in progress. The workshops cost €45/£41 and can be paid via Paypal.

Message me with your email and I will forward full details and nab that space fast!

Remember in November. The Celts thought that memory was the author of poetry.

Participants in the Zoom workshops will have the option of joining the free creative writing labs in December where we will workshop work in progress from the autumn workshops. These are not open to people who have not previously attended a Word Alchemy workshop.

Here in Ireland we are back into Level 5 Lockdown. We are back to staying within our 5km form home for exercise ; the only journeys from home are for groceries, medical appointments, work and education (primary and secondary schools remain open, as do creches and childcare facilities). Everything else is closed for six weeks. Most people are working from home.

It seems I was a bit of a Cassandra when I looked into my crystal ball and saw that virtual workshops were the way forward through autumn and winter. Small enough to be safely held spaces, where people could get to know one another and give constructive feedback and encouragement. We also have a laugh. My husband, banished to the other side of our cottage, often asks if I am running a laughter yoga class instead of a writing workshop!

Creative activities are good for our all round well-being – mind, heart, and spirit. Keep creating art this winter!

Featured image Photo by freestocks on Unsplash

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Zoom into Your Creativity

~ sojourningsmith ~ 3 Comments

It is raining hard. We are getting a preview of the seasonal curve down into the dark autumn and winter here in Ireland. The low cloud demands that I have on the electric light even though I am writing this at 10am. Some folk have problems with the dark part of the year, when daylight hours are in short supply. In a damp island climate, there can be weeks when the only motivation to stir outside is to be at service to the dogs’ commands. Yet, these dark months are also creativity’s gestation.

Into the wild landscape of imagination

As much as creativity demands solitude, it also thrives with periods of collegiality. We can spark off each other. We can encourage one another to keep going when self-doubt creeps in. Also, it good for the heart and soul to have a laugh with a group of people who are makers.

CREATE – COLLABORATE – CELEBRATE

I make with words and have facilitated face-to-face workshops for the past six years as Word Alchemy. I usually magic up poems, but I have also worked in creative non-fiction, mostly with Sagewoman magazine over ten years, and written short fiction. Covid-19 has spurred me to take my workshops of small groups of no more than eight participants online. To allow for how wonky people’s work and life patterns are in this pandemic, I am offering a weekday evening course (which allows for some North Americans to join us in Ireland) and a Saturday midday option, so that you need not miss a session because life or work has intervened. We all need to be a bit flexible these days. Except about keeping a social distance and wearing masks when indoors and cannot keep our distance.

We can co-create and collaborate in the Zoom Room this autumn!

In September I am hosting an Introductory workshop I call Pick n Mix, where each week we have a taste of a new genre. During October we will spend dive into short fiction writing. After the clocks go back, November’s dark days will offer four weeks when we can gestate many poems.

If you are interested in participating in these workshops, please register your interest in the form. Pick n Mix is basically full, but one more could fit. There is already one person registered for Short Fiction in October. So please bag your space now.

I look forward to welcoming new faces in the group, along with students who have returned year after year, carving out a space in their schedules for creative expression and companionship. The Pick n Mix groups (so far) includes participants from the East Coast USA, counties Fermanagh, Cavan, Leitrim and Galway. The Short Fiction group already has someone from County Tyrone in Northern Ireland signed on. We are a hospitable lot here in Ireland.

I am sure that you may have questions. Let’s have a conversation.

Bee Smith
Bee Smith invites you to join with other creative colleagues in her Word Alchemy workshops on Zoom

Off to Tir na nÓg

~ sojourningsmith ~ Leave a comment

It never fails to surprise the process as I keep this daily poetry practice to create the published Poetry Daily. I arrived home from a more than twelve hour long day trip with my fellow Marble Arch Caves Global Geopark guides at 9:30 last night. Meanwhile, I am due to begin teaching a poetry workshop in just over an hour and a half. (Cue my routine anxiety thinking “whatever can I teach about poetry except to just keep at it?!”) When I began my morning writing I was sure I was going to write about THIS, but what emerged on the blank page was THAT. THIS will probably come along over the next week as the trip to Uisneach was rich in inspiration and imagery. Uisneach is the the mythic and mystical centre of Ireland from the Neolithic age. We are talking pre-history here, when the oral tradition ruled and the ogham alphabet would not emerge until the early medieval period.

For those unfamiliar with the concept of Tir na nÓg, this was the land of the forever young of the mythic race of early Irish inhabitants, the Tuatha dé Danaan. Some said it was beyond the ninth wave of the ocean.

Beyond the Ninth Wave

I am always the foreignor
on the bus, no matter what country,
rolling around the sound
of the syllables I am hearing
from snatched conversations,
handling them like a found
pebble on the ocean's strand,
or the shell put to hear
sing the ninth wave's eternal echo.

 
 Copyright © 2019 Bee Smith. All rights reserved.