Order and Disorder, Pattern and Variation, Centripetal and Centrifugal with Patrick Donnelly via Zoom

The hypothesis of this class is that poems, like music, require both order and disorder, pattern and variation, elements which cause them to cohere, and elements which (almost) cause them to fly apart. The corollary hypothesis is that poems can go off the rails from too much of either quality. We’ll explore which specific craft elements tend to create order, which disorder, and look at some poems in which an order seems to arise organically from the materials, versus some in which an applied, decorative, or “willed” order is deployed seemingly to suppress symptoms of messy, passionate, disorder (also sometimes called “reality”).

This is a craft seminar (not a workshop) and is not capped. It will be taught online using Zoom. Login instructions will be emailed at the time of workshop registration. Please check spam filters or email admin@writerscenter.org with questions.

Please note: The Altman Persons of Color Scholarships are free and given on a first come, first served basis. Please notify us right away if your plans change and you cannot attend the class. We will then reopen the slot so another student may register. Thank you in advance for this consideration. Please sign up for no more than one scholarship slot per month. Thank you.

Registration is $124 and can be completed at  https://www.writerscenter.org/calendar/donellyzoom/

PATRICK DONNELLY is the author of four books of poetry, Little-Known Operas (Four Way Books, 2019), Jesus Said (a chapbook from Orison Books, 2017), Nocturnes of the Brothel of Ruin (Four Way Books, 2012, a 2013 finalist for the Lambda Literary Award), and The Charge (Ausable Press, 2003, since 2009 part of Copper Canyon Press). Donnelly is director of the Poetry Seminar at The Frost Place, Robert Frost’s old homestead in Franconia, NH, now a center for poetry and the arts. Donnelly’s awards include the Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature, and a 2018 Amy Clampitt Residency Award. More at www.patrickdonnellypoetry.com