Are You Prepared to Publish?

Date:

Saturday, June 5

Writers who have a great book idea or a completed manuscript often struggle with how to take the next step. Join award-winning author and publisher KaNikki Jakarta as she leads “Prep to Publish.” This workshop will provide tips on navigating the publishing process and bring you closer to your dream of becoming a published author.

Hear Award-Winning Poet KaNikki Jakarta Read from Her Work, Then Share Your Own

Date:

Friday, June 4

The Driftless Writing Center is delighted to sponsor a reading by award-winning author KaNikki Jakarta, the Poet Laureate of Alexandria, Virginia. A community open mic will follow Jakarta’s program. Those who wish to read during the open mic should bring a maximum of five minutes of writing to share.

KaNikki Jakarta is the author of three novels, In Real Life, The Color Blue, and The Other Side of Pretty, as well as the memoir How to Be the Wife of an Epileptic, Honor Your Vows and Honor Yourselfand a collection of poems and short stories, Alabama Girl, Virginia Woman.

Named the Poet Laureate of Alexandria in 2019, Jakarta was introduced to poetry in the womb by her mother who read Nikki Giovanni when she was pregnant. After hearing her father quote Maya Angelou’s work, Jakarta began writing her own poetry in third grade.

Explore Truth in Poetry in a Guided Conversation Led by Dasha Kelly Hamilton

Date:

Saturday, May 15, 2021

“Truth Evolution” offers a guided conversation into reading and crafting poems about our truths led by Wisconsin and Milwaukee Poet Laureate Dasha Kelly Hamilton.

Enjoy a Reading by Wisconsin & Milwaukee Poet Laureate Dasha Kelly Hamilton, Then Step Up to the Mic

Date:

Friday, May 14, 2021

The Driftless Writing Center is honored to host a public reading by Wisconsin and Milwaukee Poet Laureate Dasha Kelly Hamilton, which will be followed by an open mic. Those who wish to read during the open mic should bring a maximum of five minutes of writing to share.

Dasha Kelly Hamilton is a writer, performance artist and creative change agent, applying the creative process to facilitate dialogues around human and social wellness. She is the author of two novels, three poetry collections, four spoken word albums and one collection of personal vignettes. She has taught at colleges, conferences and classrooms and curated fellowships for emerging leaders. An arts envoy for the U.S. Embassy, Hamilton has facilitated community building initiatives in Botswana, Toronto, Mauritius and Beirut. Her touring production, Makin’ Cake, uniquely engages communities in a forward dialogue on race, class and equity. Hamilton is a national Rubinger Fellow and, concurrently, Poet Laureate for the City of Milwaukee and the State of Wisconsin.

Demystifying the Submissions Process

Date:

Saturday, April 17 and 24

Author, translator, and professor Jesse Lee Kercheval presents two informal workshops that will help writers submit their work to a broad range of publications. On Saturday, April, 17, the Submission 101 workshop will provide tips on submitting work and will walk participants through using the Submittable software program. On the following Saturday, April 24, participants will gather for coffee and submit their work.

The DWC would like to thank Ms. Kercheval for donating her time and expertise to present these free and informal workshops to the DWC’s supporters and friends.

Jesse Lee Kercheval is the Marjorie and Lorin Tiefenthaler Professor of English at UW-Madison and the award-winning author of eighteen books, including the short story collection Underground Women, the memoir Space, and the poetry collection America that island off the coast of France.

Harness the Power of Place in Your Writing in a Workshop Led by Joe Wilkins

Date:

Saturday, April 10, 2021

“Layers of Landscape: Harnessing the Power of Place” recognizes that place is an active force in all of our lives and that we ignore its power at our own psychological and physical peril. Place shapes and reshapes us, offers foundation and refuge, and challenges us to be good citizens of all our communities. In life and in writing, we ought to try to understand and harness the power of place. This workshop led by Joe Wilkins offers writers four ways they might begin to do just that.

Hear Joe Wilkins Read from his Award-Winning Fiction and Poetry, and Share Your Own Work During the Open Mic

Date:

Friday, April 9, 2021

The Driftless Writing Center is thrilled to host a public reading by Joe Wilkins, which will be followed by an open mic. Those who wish to read during the open mic should bring a maximum of five minutes of writing to share.

Joe Wilkins is the author of a novel, Fall Back Down When I Die, praised as “remarkable and unforgettable” in a starred Booklist review. A finalist for the First Novel Award from the Center for Fiction and the Pacific Northwest Book Award, Fall Back Down When I Die won the 2020 High Plains Book Award and has been translated into French, Spanish, and Italian. Wilkins is also the author of a memoir, The Mountain and the Fathers, the winner of a 2014 GLCA New Writers Award—an honor that has previously recognized early work by the likes of Richard Ford, Louise Erdrich, and Alice Munro—and four collections of poetry, including most recently Thieve and When We Were Birds, winner of the 2017 Oregon Book Award in Poetry.

Wilkins lives with his family in the Willamette Valley of Oregon, where he directs the creative writing program at Linfield University and is a member of the low-residency MFA faculty at Eastern Oregon University.

Transcend Genre Boundaries and Be Inspired in Freesia McKee’s Workshop

Date:

Saturday, March 27, 2021

Freesia McKee’s workshop “Spinnerbaits, Jigs, and Spoons: Writing Haibun and Zuihitsu Poetry” introduces writers to two genre-bending forms that spark surprising associations through juxtaposition. Participants will consider classic and contemporary examples of these capacious, lightweight forms, and then cast their lines to write their own. This workshop is suitable for writers of poetry, writers of prose, and the genre-curious. Register early for this limited-enrollment generative workshop that will inform and inspire all writers.

Genre-bending Writer Freesia McKee Reads from Her Work Followed by an Open Mic

Date:

Friday, March 26, 2021

The Driftless Writing Center is delighted to sponsor a public reading by Freesia McKee, which will be followed by an open mic. Participants who want to read during the open mic should bring a maximum of five minutes of writing to share.

Freesia McKee writes poetry, prose, and the genres in-between. She’s the author of How Distant the City, the essays editor at South Florida Poetry Journal, and a book reviewer at large. Freesia’s work has appeared in Flyway, Bone Bouquet, So to Speak, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Painted Bride Quarterly, CALYX, About Place Journal, and the Ms. Magazine Blog. Originally from Milwaukee, she’s been teaching hybrid forms, micro-memoir, and poetry classes remotely from Fort Wayne, Indiana. Freesia welcomes you to connect with her online at freesiamckee.com or through Twitter at @freesiamckee.

Celebrate NaNoWriMo with the DWC!

Date:

Wednesdays and Saturdays through November; Sunday, November 29

Want a challenge to take your mind off the world? Want to take a deep dive into a writing project with friends? Join Driftless Writing Center board members Lisa Henner and Jennifer Morales for National Novel Writing Month, aka NaNoWriMo.

NaNoWriMo, which takes place from November 1 through November 30, is an international community of writers striving to write 50,000 words in one month—essentially a draft of a short novel. DWC will be providing drop-in writing sessions online twice each week and a bonus “Homestretch Sunday” session at the end of the month.

On Wednesdays, Jennifer will lead participants through two 25-minute writing blocks with a 30-minute Q&A at the end for your writing craft questions. On Saturdays, Lisa will lead two 25-minute writing blocks followed by a 30-minute conversation about “tips and tricks” to help you develop skills that will keep you motivated.

The DWC will also offer a “Come Write In” community on the NaNoWriMo site.

Online Reading Featuring Angie Trudell Vasquez, Madison’s Poet Laureate, and an Open Mic

Date:

Friday, October 9, 2020

Angie will read from her new book, In Light, Always Light (Finishing Line Press, 2020), followed by an open mic. Bring five minutes of writing to share.

Angela Trudell Vasquez received her MFA in creative writing with a concentration in poetry from the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and was a Ruth Lilly fellow as a Drake University undergraduate. Her work has been published in the Taos Journal of Poetry, Yellow Medicine Review, Raven Chronicles, Return to the Gathering Place of the Waters, and Cloudthroat, and appears on the Poetry Foundation’s website. She has new work forthcoming in RED INK: International Journal of Indigenous Literature, Arts & Humanities.

Poetry for the People Workshop

Date:

Saturday, October 10, 2020

We need a new language for these times. Poets and poems are central to the global movement towards peace and justice. We will examine poems that resist and renew, that give us hope and joy. We will explore various poets from all over the globe. Madison Poet Laureate Angie Trudell Vasquez will share her work and poetic influences including Carolyn Forché, Joy Harjo, Simon Ortiz, Eduardo Galeano, Allison Adelle Hedge Coke, Arthur Sze, among others, and the craft techniques they employed in their work. We will write our own poems of witness and share.

“If you look back over the past 100 years, you can see how vital poetry has been in the movement for peace and social justice.”

— from “The Poetry of Protest,” a speech delivered by Matthew Rothschild on November 3, 2012, to the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets.

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do / with your one wild precious life?”

— Mary Oliver from her poem “The Summer Day”