The Poetry Foundation’s poem of the day is Good Bones by Maggie Smith. I just heard this lovely thing read aloud at Kenyon. Maggie was a fellow in one of the poetry classes. Hooray Maggie!
Leaving Kenyon
Seven days in a wood-panelled room with 9 other writers. After saturating our minds with the possibilities, Rebecca McClanahan leaves us with the following, aiming us toward our own further development:
- What (or who, where when) keeps rising up from what you have written?
- What do you not yet understand about your subject? List these questions. What remains to be written or researched? List missing links
- List all the possible forms, shapes, structures the material could take and find the one
- Who else has done a similar project/text? How might yours be similar or different?
- What is the biggest obstacle you face 1) with the project, 2) with your writing in general, 2) with your writing life?
- What can you do, starting today, to overcome – or use – that obstacle?
- If the writing god told you that you could write only 10 more pages before you die, what would you write?
- What are you waiting for?
Kenyon Day 7
Dinner with superlative teacher Rebecca McClanahan (front left), our wonderful fellow Ron Stodghill (opposite end of the table) and fellow participants, hosted by editor of the Kenyon Review, David Lynne.
We seem to feel the same — ready to get back to our homes and our lives but regretting the end of an amazing week. In addition to BBQ, everyone is stuffed full of inspiration, new perspectives, fertile writing tools and a bunch of new friends.
Kenyon Workshop Day 4
Kenyon is a gorgeous campus, green and, this week, blessed with near-perfect weather.
Salient features of the workshop:
- Writing: every day, most of the day
- Reading or hearing others’ writing: a good chunk of the day
- Talking about writing: the rest of the day
- Regression: spartan dorm rooms without even a poster or two; standing in line with trays in the cafeteria, hoping the athletes leave you something
- Impostor syndrome: rampant, especially if you take the time to read your fellow students’ bios
- Luxury: allowing the outside world to recede
- Inspiration: it floods the place, oozing out of the teachers’ presentations, the fellow students’ passion, the requirement to write thousands of words
- Growing anxiety: the assigned slot to read fresh work to the entire group of students and teachers approaches
On Elk Meadow Road 