Shadow Form: A Masterclass for Poets with David Baker (via Zoom)

How could poets use traditional forms to write “free verse” poems? We’ll look at a range of classic and contemporary poetry to consider ways by which you might employ aspects of a formal poem—from its outer structures to inner rhetoric—to craft a new poem not “in” that form but ghosting or shadowing that form. It’s one thing to recognize a pantoum; but is it possible—is it fruitful—to employ technical structures of a pantoum to provide a partial or hidden form, rather than a complete template, for your new poem? That is, can you use the ghosts of earlier forms to write new poems? I’ll provide a range of poems for us to read and discuss, and together we’ll explore ways to create prompts and opportunities for your new work.

NB: This class will be taught on Zoom and will be capped at 20 students. Registrants will receive the Zoom link to the email address they use to register. It will arrive immediately after registration so please check your spam folder if you do not receive it. It will also be sent the day before class as a reminder. Please review the course policies page before registering for any classes. Please email misty@writerscenter.org with any questions.

David Baker is author of thirteen books of poetry, recently Whale Fall (Norton, 2022), Swift: New and Selected Poems, (2019), Scavenger Loop (2015), and Never-Ending Birds (2009), which won the Theodore Roethke Memorial Poetry Prize. His six books of prose include Seek After: Essays on Modern Lyric Poets (2018) and Show Me Your Environment (2014). Among his awards are prizes and grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, NEA, Mellon Foundation, Ohio Arts Council, and Poetry Society of America. His work appears in such journals as American Poetry Review, The Atlantic, The Nation, New York Times, The New Yorker, Poetry, and The Yale Review.