Year-Long Poetry Apprenticeship with Hieu Minh Nguyen

A poetry collection is a curated itinerary, a map through obsessions—our only compass, a constellation of questions. We’ll work together with the goal of completing a full-length poetry manuscript, ready for publication. This means generating new work, refining individual poems, shaping and workshopping manuscript drafts, and honing our close-reading skills to provide meaningful feedback. We’ll read and discuss books by contemporary poets, analyzing craft elements and the book structure. Guest writers and editors will join us to share insights on the artistic process and the path to publication, helping us navigate both the creative and professional sides of poetry. We will work together, build together, obsess together to give your book the life it deserves. 

Students will have one month of independent study time between the final summer meeting and the start of the fall cohort meetings (August 20-September 16) and between the final fall meeting and the start of winter cohort meetings (December 10-January 9); this time is to be used for independent writing time, focusing on aspects of craft your teaching mentor feels will help your development as a writer; deep reading, of your own work as well as books outside of the cohort reading list that will benefit your writing; one to one meetings with your teaching mentor; writing group meetings with your cohort members.