Due to unforeseen circumstances, this workshop is being rescheduled... Please check back for an announcement of the new date and time. We apologize for any inconvenience that this may cause and we look forward to seeing you soon!

Blushing Sky Writer’s Playground is Pleased to Present
 
Of Memory and Joy
A Full Day Writing Workshop and Reading
Saturday, March 10th, 2012, 9:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.
The Life Learning Center
3121 Rochester Road, Royal Oak, Michigan 48073 (Map)
(734) 812-8649

Featuring Workshops with:

Maria A. Constantini

Maria A. Costantini was born in a town near Rome, Italy, and came to the United States at age twelve. Her work has appeared in literary magazines and anthologies in print and online, such as The MacGuffin, The Driftwood Review, and versedaily.com. She is the author of two books of translation from the works of Italian poet Ada Negri (1870-1945), The Book of Mara and Songs of the Island, (Italica Press, New York, N.Y., 2011). Maria has given lectures/readings on these works at Wayne State University and at Henry Ford Community College. Among her recent writing awards, Maria’s poem, “Blame,” won first place in the Poetry Society of Michigan’s 2011 contest, and her memoir story, “The Washing Machine,” won an honorable mention in the Springfed Arts 2011 Prose Contest. Maria is currently working on three projects: a book-length collection of poems and stories on her childhood in Italy, an adult memoir, and a third book of poetic translation titled, “Motherhood.” Formerly, Maria worked as a Bilingual/English as a Second Language teacher and chairperson in the Utica Community Schools.

Peter Markus

Peter Markus is the author of a novel, Bob, or Man on Boat, as well as three books of short fiction, the most recent of which is We Make Mud. His stories have appeared in such magazines as Chicago Review, Black Warrior Review, Massachusetts Review, Northwest Review, Denver Quarterly, Quarterly West, among others. He teaches fiction writing at Eastern Michigan University and is the Senior Writer with the InsideOut Literary Arts Project of Detroit.

Matthew Olzmann

Matthew Olzmann’s first book of poems, Mezzanines, was selected for the 2011 Kundiman Prize and will be published by Alice James Books in April, 2013. His poems have appeared in Kenyon Review, New England Review, Poetry Northwest, Gulf Coast, The Southern Review and elsewhere. In 2010, he was awarded a Kresge Arts Fellowship in Poetry. He’s a graduate of the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. Currently, he is the Poet-in-residence for the University of Michigan’s Lloyd Hall Scholars Program and the poetry editor of The Collagist.

and your host, Cheri L. R. Taylor, M. F. A., Director of Blushing Sky Writers

Cheri L. R. Taylor, M.F.A.  is the author of Wolf, Maiden, Moon Pudding House Press, 2009. She has four chapbooks and has been published in Rattle, Ellipsis, Sirens, Awakenings Review, The Café Review, Clean Sheets, Current Magazine, Third Wednesday, Poetic Resonance Imaging, the Anthology Strange Michigan  and others. She currently works as a writing instructor at Macomb Community College in Michigan.
 
Cheri is the recipient of a 2007 RARE Foundation Everyday Heroes Award for her work with writing in community settings and was awarded a 2009 Writing Residency with The Ragdale Foundation in Lake Forest, Illinois. She is a featured reader and workshop facilitator at multiple venues in the Metro Detroit area and elsewhere.
Come out for a day of exploration and wonderment as we explore themes of memoir, childhood, humor and absurdity in a workshop with some of Detroit’s best award winning authors and compelling workshop facilitators! Re-charge your writer’s soul in an environment of learning and laughter with good food, great writers and camaraderie. Make time for you in the new year!

This workshop has a limit of 20 participants!

Register by February, 15th.

The first ten registrants will be entered into a drawing for a free writing coaching session with Cheri L. R. Taylor.

Register early to ensure your space!
Workshop Schedule: 
 
8:30 - 9:25 Registration and Coffee, Continental Breakfast
 
9:30 - 11:00 Maria Constantini; Poetry as Memoir. Locating the “I” within the space of real or imagined experience is the task of the poem-as-memoir. Taking facts and making them new, turning language on edge—whatever you want to call it, the truth remains that language becomes the memoir. In this workshop we will explore the possibilities of memoir poems: the way our memories re-arrange and juxtapose long after the experiences have ended. We will discuss factual truth vs. emotional truth as it relates to poetry. Attendees will read and respond to model poems (classic and contemporary), and receive writing prompts for in-class writing and sharing. For inspiration, please bring photos, magazine pictures, or something you’ve been working on.

11:00 - 11:10 Break
 
11:10 - 12:40 Peter Markus; See the Child: The Poetics (and Fiction) of Childhood. Childhood is its own nation, its own state of being, its own emotional and topographical geography. In this workshop, we will look at works of both fiction and poetry that make good use of childhood as both its subject and source of inspiration. We will then turn to the landscapes of our own childhoods to see how we too might make use of that time and space to generate new words on the page.

12:45 - 2:15 Lunch and book signing by featured presenters.
 
2:30 - 4:00 Matthew Olzmann; The Odd. This class will look at humor and absurdity in poetry. We’ll examine how such material is developed, paying particular attention to how it impacts, and sometimes overthrows, a reader’s expectations for the poem itself. Along the way, we’ll consider what the absurd is capable of revealing about the world around us, how the act of being funny can be a very serious business, and how strangeness can actually seem quite familiar. Together, we’ll read a bunch of poems and write some too.
 

4:00 - 4:45 Cheri L. R. Taylor; Writing Booth Game, Edible Poetry and Build-A-Poem: Writing as Play
 

4:45 - 5:15 Featured Presenters Reading & Wine & Cheese Reception 
5:15 - 6:30 Open mic featuring Attendees!
6:30 Closing remarks

 
This full day of writing and regeneration is $145.00 and includes all workshops, continental breakfast, full lunch, and wine and cheese reading/reception.
 
You will have the opportunity to write during workshops and share your work and the opportunity to read at the open mic!
 

**Sign up with a friend and you both receive $10.00 off the registration price!** 

 
You will receive a confirmation email!
  

         This is going to be a fantastic workshop! Don’t miss out!


The Sky’s the Limit with Blushing Sky!