This class is now full. To be added to the wait list, please contact: [email protected]

Past participants say Brittany Deininger’s “prompts were spacious + thoughtful, and her vulnerability in leadership was such a gift” and describe how the whole group’s “trust was built over the week for sharing, so good.”

“It doesn’t have to be the blue iris,” Mary Oliver reminds us. Our prayers can be simple acts of attention, small communications. They can be meditations on the relationship between words and silence, speaking and listening. Our prayers can be as complex as we are: full of protest, doubt, curiosity, delight, chaos, hope, lament, love, loneliness, and desire.

This poetry writing workshop will focus on reading contemporary and ancient poetry and playing with poetic form to craft a variety of prayers throughout the week. How does your voice meet the present moment? What do we pray when we don’t know how to pray in the places we stand? How might poetry disrupt and reshape our preconceived ideas about what prayer is or should be? What might it mean to view the divine as conversational and communicative?

Workshop Objectives:
By reading, discussing, and writing poems in community we hope to:
• Find juicy new metaphors and names for God
• Refresh the reserves of meaning around dry language
• Create new language that holds sacred experience generously
• Develop our voices as vessels of desire
• Steep ourselves in a variety of voices across centuries and cultures
• Enjoy a long meandering dialogue about what we mean by prayer
• Meet the present moment with creativity, agency, and care
• Respond to writing prompts as a place of playful practice rather than performance
• Build a creative community of trust that fosters risk and empathy

All writing levels are welcome, including beginners. Come creatives, liturgists, spiritual pilgrims, poets and writers, pastors, counselors, healers, students, educators; come one, come all. Ages 18+

Note: Students will be expected to do in-class free writing in response to prompts and are invited to share fresh work and discuss ideas. Workshop skills will be taught in the class in order to give kind and constructive feedback on a single piece of writing of the author’s choice. No prior writing workshop experience is necessary.

What will class time be like? Will I need to work outside of class?

Taking good care of ourselves has always been the foundation of taking good care of others. In response to COVID-19, though we can’t meet in person we can creatively offer our face and presence online as we deep dive into the intersection of poetry and prayer. Classes will be offered Monday-Friday July 6-10, 2020 via Zoom from 9:45am-12:45pm (Pacific Daylight Time) for live discussion around class themes as well as time to write in response to several prompts.

The Week at a Glance:
Day 1: Many Names: Naming the Sacred, Ourselves, and Desire
Day 2: Memory and Imagination: Praying Backward
Day 3: Making Sense: Writing from the Body
Day 4: Lament and the Poetics of Witness
Day 5: Mystery, Mystics, and Thanksgiving

Participants wishing to create complex or ambitious projects should expect to spend additional time working outside of class time, though this is not necessary for the course. Workshop skills will be taught in the class in order to give kind and constructive feedback on a single piece of writing of the author’s choice. No prior writing workshop experience is necessary.

When is class time?

Monday-Friday July 6-10, 2020 via Zoom from 9:45am-12:45pm (Pacific Daylight Time)

What can I expect to create?

Students will produce two items:
1. a working writer’s notebook filled with observations and responses to writing prompts that becomes the raw material for poems/prayers.
2. a single 1-2-page piece of writing to workshop with fellow students

What materials do I need?

Instructor encourages students to work with writing prompts longhand in a notebook. If you’ve been looking for an excuse to use that yummy journal you’ve been saving or eyeing online; go for it! If writing on a laptop works best for you, please do what feels good.

A digital workbook will be provided to you with all prompts and necessary materials as a reference and memento from the course.

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Program Fee: Please discern what you can afford.

Sliding Scale: $275 – $175 – $75

While we recognize the importance of the practice of art, faith and community in our lives at all times, we are especially sensitive to offering opportunities now. You can decide your payment level.

$275 – If you have already registered for a summer program class, this is the amount you have paid as a deposit. Choosing this option means you do not owe anything else.

$275 – If you are newly registering, this is our Student and Supporter Fee.

$175 – Regular Program Fee

$75 – Reduced Fee/Partial Scholarship

This class is part of the Grünewald Guild’s Summer 2020 Online Program: Forest Vision. Learn more about the program here.

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This class is now full. To be added to the wait list, please contact: [email protected]

July 5-11, 2020

Online terms and conditions: There are no refunds for online registrations, but they are transferable if you are unable to participate.

This class meets Monday through Friday, 9:45am – 12:45pm Pacific Time.