"Best workshop taken since 1985. I'm declaring my writer's block officially over." -Kris Demien
Recent Workshops
Participants of A Poet’s Rhythm doing the glorious work
"For the first time in my life I woke up on Monday thinking of poetry instead of work." -Suzy Harris
A Poet's Rhythm, Spring 2019 (SOLD OUT)
(Dissidents: Cecilia Vicuña & Osip Mandelstam)
8 glorious weeks. Small class size. 5 in-person meetings (February 17, February 24, March 17, March 24, and April 7) to read together, generate work inspired by two luminous, daring writers, and commune with each other. Cecilia Vicuña (Chilean poet, visual artist, and activist against Pinochet’s regime) and Osip Mandelstam (Russian Jewish writer and activist against Stalin).
Weekly online supplemental materials to keep momentum and spur discussion. A final reading salon to celebrate your creativity and inspire you to continue.
Get insights into your writing and further your practice while cultivating one of the most beautiful community’s around.
Spring 2019 Session: February 17 - April 7, 2019
$259 Register here.
Thanks to Claudia's recent fellowship with the Black Earth Institute and this special Poet's Rhythm's focus on dissidents, she will be offering one scholarship that pays for the full class tuition to a new student who has never studied with Claudia before and may not have the financial means to otherwise do so. Email Claudia to apply.
Poetic Personal Essays (SPOTS AVAILABLE)
In this six-week class we’ll craft a personal essay using poet-essayists such as Ocean Vuong, Maggie Nelson, and Dan Beachy-Quick as inspiration in terms of form and method. This class will help you break out of the narrative ruts afflicting many new essayists and allow your writing to flow from a deeper, truer place where everyone’s inner poet dwells.
April 27–May 30, 2017 (6 sessions)
Thursdays, 7:00 p.m. –9:00 p.m.
Class meets at Literary Arts, 925 SW Washington
Instructor: Claudia Savage
for writers at all levels
Limited to 10 students--SIGN UP!
SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE: Scholarships pay for the entire class tuition. To apply, email Susan Moore, Director of Programs for Writers, at susan@literary-arts.org with your name, contact information, and list three classes in order of preference. Please note that preference is not guaranteed. All scholarships are subject to availability.
CLASS LIAISONS: All classes have one liaison position. Liaisons receive free tuition in exchange for light duties before and after each class meeting. Contact Susan Moore at susan@literary-arts.org for more information.
Past Workshops
“Deflecting Violence Through Poetry: A Workshop for High School Students and Teachers” at The Portland Book Festival
A Poet's Rhythm, since 2015
An 8-week Sunday workshop with Claudia that allows you to embrace the poet's life through experimentation with form and craft, discussion about your own artistic life and the works and lives of various poets, generating text in-class collaboratively and individually, learning how to give and receive critique, and discovering the poetic rhythm that works for you. (This workshop is deliberately small so that participants can be challenged and supported fully by the instructor and their fellow participants and really play.) Past workshops have covered the work of Morgan Parker, Ocean Vuong, Christian Wiman, G.C. Waldrep, C.D. Wright, Brenda Hillman, Eileen Myles, Li-Young Lee and Hala Alyan, among others. Fall 2018’s theme was: Refugees and Exiles. Located at Savage Arts in Montavilla, Portland.
Writing the Body: A Somatic Workshop and Exploration
Use somatic (body-focused) sensory rituals and practices to discover new ways to express your story on the page. Explore and combine each of the senses, writing both poems and prose. Experiment with form and content to deepen your writing practice. Leave class with a suite of four body-centered pieces. No poetry or prose experience necessary.
Deflecting Violence Through Poetry: A Poetry Workshop for High School Teachers
How can poetry actually help students deal with the violence in our modern world–wars that have been happening since they were born, violence in the schools, the rise of nationalism, sexism, and racism, and threats on social media and media in general? The poet has always been feared by fascists and those in power for good reason. In this class we’ll discuss three ways that you can help your students create art that feels meaningful and gives them back their voice. We will tackle issues of hypocrisy (through blackout poems and found poems), explore methods utilized by activists to oppose those in power (like Chilean poet Cecilia Vicuna against Pinochet and Morgan Parker against sexism and racism in American popular culture), and we’ll learn how to give love back to the forgotten in our lives through praise and persona poems. Together we will explore poets who inspire and methods that will get students writing and sharing. Originally taught at The Portland Book Festival at the Portland Art Museum.
Poetic Personal Essays
In this four-week class we’ll craft a personal essay using poet-essayists such as Ocean Vuong, Maggie Nelson, and Dan Beachy-Quick as inspiration in terms of form and method. This class will help you break out of the narrative ruts afflicting many new essayists and allow your writing to flow from a deeper, truer place where everyone’s inner poet dwells.
Complete a Poetic Series
Poetic series are at the heart of many poetry books. Inspiration can flow from and around this central place. This 6-week class will focus on the creation and completion of a poetic series (8-10 poems) for a micro-chapbook or as part of a longer work. Through poetic discussion about poets who have successfully created series and pointed generation, we will craft our own poems and support each other in this effort. All in 6 short weeks. New poets and those poets currently working on a larger book welcome.
Complete a Micro-Chapbook
This 6-week class will focus on the creation and completion of work for a micro-chapbook (8-10 poems) through generation and focused critique, reminding us of the power of working towards a goal in community. How do you write in series? How do you put together a small book? We will explore various forms, read relevant poets, make work to fit our individual projects, learn a few ways to bind work (for self-publishing options), and learn about publishing opportunities, all while supporting each other with deadlines and encouragement. Make something just for you or to put out into the larger poetry world. All in 6 short weeks. New poets and those poets currently working on a series welcome.
Recapturing the Sensual: Poems of Food and Memory
Food is often our deepest connection to each other--from our first taste of mother's milk to grandma's summer peach pie to a lover's spicy shrimp. What lingers after a gathering of friends or family is the feeling that was evoked through the chance to nourish one another. We remember the way it felt to feed our child their first spoonful of a meat pie, a recipe passed down six generations. How it felt to watch an elderly parent eat something that brought back a moment from her youth. Or, the beauty of watching aunts fold tamale after tamale, laughing and joking into the night. In this workshop we will write poems that allow us to recapture that moment of deep sensuality and relationship. Throughout the workshop, we will generate new work, listen to each other, and allow the poems of poets such as Wanda Coleman, Lauren Camp, Cecilia Vicuña, Gary Soto, Olga Broumas, Li-Young Lee, Yusef Komunyakaa, Clint Frakes, and others to return us to our bodies. Participants will generate work and learn tools to take home that incorporate every sense--taste, smell, touch, sight, and sound--in order to inhabit that moment when our bodies and spirits felt equally fed.
Monthly Workshops, ran from 2015-2017
Always wanted to try poetry? Or, do you need an afternoon to enliven your practice? Join Claudia the third Sunday of each month for a drop-in generative poetry workshop that will focus on play, discovery, and thoughtful discussion. We'll generate, laugh, and listen. Discover the joy of your own unique poetic voice. Sink in to the beauty of language. Past topics included: Light, Quiet, Forgiveness, Seed, Resilience, Found, Song, Delight, Water, and Heart.