Free Writing Workshop led by Stephen Thomas: THE PERSISTENT LINE @ 4:23

Reading and Open mic: 6:15-8:14 pm.

Here’s the Facebook Event Page ready for sharing!

Stephen will read from his new book of poems: WHAT IS BETWEEN US, Hand To Mouth Books, 2023, Walla Walla, Washington, $18.00. followed by Open Mic.

The Workshop details:

Most of us find ourselves, also, in the possession of one or more of these lines. A line that comes out of the blue. In my case a line like “My daddy made me reinvent the wheel,” or “The stiller I stand, the more trees move.” The line insists on a poem, but no poetic context seems to satisfy it. One writes draft after draft. None works, and still the line won’t disappear. It begins to trouble one’s sleep or even to interrupt conversations. What to do?

I take such lines to be the muses’ way of forcing me out of my established modes of expression into new vistas.

In this workshop we will investigate strategies for marshalling the energy of such lines and making poems that satisfy their demands. All participants are invited to bring a line or phrase of this sort that has been giving them trouble. We will experiment, as poets have to do, with the ways and the means and the itch and the scratch.

BIO:

Stephen Thomas played his role in Seattle’s poetry scene of the 80s, 90s and early 2000s. He performed often at Red Sky Poetry Theater, at Bumbershoot, and many other regional venues, as well as farther afield. In 1984, he founded and built The Cabaret Hegel, where now an off-ramp leads I-5 traffic into the Industrial Flats. There Stephen presented and performed with many other Northwest writers and musicians, including Jesse Bernstein. Stephen taught creative writing (poems) at the University of Washington Extension. He has published his work in many ephemeral magazines, as well as in Exquisite Corpse, Poetry Northwest, Raven Chronicles, The Malahat Review, Windfall, Malpais Review, and others. His book, Journeyman, was published by Charles Potts’ Tsunami Inc, 26 years ago. His latest book of poems is What Is Between Us, Hand to Mouth Books out of Walla Walla, Washington, 2023. He currently lives in Germany, where he helped found Gemeinschaft Sonnenwald: a sustainable, regenerative, agriculture community.