The Words that Fall Between Us
Fall Poetry Workshop Series
FREE TO THE PUBLIC
www.villagewritingschool.com
Molly Rector 
Self Portraiture / Saturday, October 29th @ 1-3 PM
LOCATION: Rogers Library / 711 S Dixieland Rd, Rogers, AR 72758
In this workshop, which is suitable for all ages, we will look at various kinds of self-portraiture in poetry and in visual art. We’ll examine symbols, including objects, colors, and structure, and discuss our own personal symbols. Each workshop participant will then use those symbols to write a self-portrait poem.
Molly lives and works in Fayetteville, Arkansas, where she co-curates the Open Mouth Reading Series and serves as poetry editor for The Arkansas International. She teaches English for the University of Arkansas, where she is earning her MFA in poetry. She is a 2016 Edward Albee fellow. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in SAND, Hobart, and Nimrod.
Eszter Takacs 
Writing Away from the Subject / Saturday, November 12th @ 1-3PM
LOCATION: Center for Nonprofits / 1200 West Walnut, Suite 1260 Rogers, AR 72756
In this poetry workshop we will locate and shake loose the spirits of our poem-ready narratives through juxtaposition of dissimilar images, opposing forces, unlike thoughts and unlinked objects. Poets like Emily Pettit, Nick Sturm, Natalie Eilbert, James Tate and Heather Christle, whose poems we will explore, often write through a lens of innocence, use playful language, and create what seem to be imaginary worlds. They write poems away and around their triggering subjects, defining only the sentiments of existing narratives and thus, allowing readers the space to exist within them. We will attempt to replicate these modes of writing the anti-narrative poem.
Eszter is the author of the chapbooks Together We Will Talk Right Down to Earth and The Spectacular Crash. Her poems have appeared in Alice Blue, Hobart, Sonora Review, Yalobusha Review, Forklift Ohio, Ampersand Review, Ghost Proposal, Salt Hill, and Soft Blow. She is a Fulbright Teaching Fellow at the University of Arkansas and has taught creative writing at the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth. She is the recipient of writing scholarships from The Juniper Institute and The Ashbery Home School. She holds an MFA in poetry.
Rodney Wilhite
Poetry That Redirects Itself / Sunday, December 4th @ 2-4 PM
LOCATION: Rogers Library / 711 S Dixieland Rd, Rogers, AR 72758
In this workshop, we will look at the nature of metaphor and how metaphor can be a tool for generating surprise in a reader. Then we’ll look at ways to coax our poetry into taking surprising detours and discuss how those detours can shape a new understanding of ourselves. We will also look at some examples of successful poems that employ similar tactics and participate in a few writing exercises designed to generate some new ideas.
Rodney’s poems have appeared in Pleiades, 14 Hills, Cartographer, The Idle Class, The Puritan, and Splash of Red. He teaches at the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith and lives in Fayetteville with his wife and young daughter. Much of his writing focuses mostly on themes of poverty and the disappearance of a local culture in rural areas–specifically (but not exclusively) in northeastern Oklahoma.
Poetry Meets Visual Art
Thursday, January 5th 6:30-8:30 PM
LOCATION: Crystal Bridges Museum
In this workshop, we will consider the poetic image as it connects with the visual art at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. When it comes to writing about a work of art, what does essential description look and feel like? Beyond description, what narratives and ideas might we glean from a painting, sculpture or photograph? Along with this conversation, we will look at poets who have mastered the art of ekphrasis, or writing inspired by art, as we attempt to compose our own poetic responses to particular works of art using guided writing exercises that will take us through a museum experience. We will meet in Crystal Bridges’ lower lobby. Some walking required. Materials (clipboards, pencils, paper) will be provided.
Mary Angelino
Mary Angelino’s publications include the Best New Poets 2015 and 2010 anthologies, Shenandoah, The Journal, New Ohio Review, and Sugar House Review. She is the recipient of the Lily Peter and the Felix Christopher McKean prizes in poetry from the University of Arkansas, and of an Individual Artist Grant from the Arkansas Arts Council. Mary taught Creative Writing for the University of Arkansas while she earned her MFA, and she currently leads a bi-monthly poetry workshop for The Village Writing School. She teaches composition courses on contemporary poetry at NorthWest Arkansas Community College, where she is the Poetry Advisor for the Creative Writing Club.
Tobias Wray
Tobias Wray is a poetry editor for cream city review. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Blackbird, Bellingham Review, Mid-American Review, Third Coast, and elsewhere. He is a doctoral candidate at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and a coordinator for Eat Local :: Read Local, a program that partners local restaurants with poets from Milwaukee and Madison. He holds an MFA in poetry and translation from the University of Arkansas.
No registration required for these events.
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