Orpheus's Lyre:  Using Poetic Forms to Shape the Lyric Essay

The Poets Corner fosters community among writers and readers interested in poetry and short prose. Based in midcoast Maine, The Poets Corner serves this community with readings and other offerings of interest.Founded by Meg Weston and Kathrin Seitz in June of 2020.

The Poets Corner

Join us for this craft talk with Heidi Czerwic, essayist, poet and professor, who has written the first craft guide to the lyric essay form.

Join us for this craft talk with Heidi Czerwic, essayist, poet and professor, who has written the first craft guide to the lyric essay form (Crafting the Lyric Essay, 2024). We’ll begin by defining the form and looking at what elements meld prose and poetry into the lyric essay.We’ll discuss adapting poetic forms in writing nonfiction and review four verse forms—haiku, sonnet, sestina, and pantoum—and the kinds of content they pair well with. We'll discuss how their formal features might be adapted to prose, and look at examples of lyric essays that have done so.While poetry often borrows heavily from narrative prose forms (scene, anecdote, parable, joke, fairy tale), creative nonfiction doesn't often borrow poetic forms. Yet verse forms, with their ready-made scaffolding and inherent patterning, can be used either to reveal patterns in the content or to impose order on what seems like chaos. Writing in these structures can also provide what Adrienne Rich called "asbestos gloves" for handling difficult material.Come join us! Interesting to both poets and prose writers of any experience level.

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Orpheus's Lyre: Using Poetic Forms to Shape the Lyric Essay

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Orpheus's Lyre: Using Poetic Forms to Shape the Lyric Essay

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