As I mentioned in my last post, I am now hosting an open, multi-genre writing group at Village Books called Environmentalists Anonymous. This is an in-person group that meets on the 2nd and 4th Wednesday of the month from 12-1 pm. More information on VB Writing Groups here.
This is the EA Writing Group description:
Do you enjoy being in nature and writing about it? Are you concerned about human's impact on the Earth or are you experiencing ecological grief? This writing group will offer opportunities for observation and self-reflection and regular prompts that center on regional flora and fauna, climate change, and ecology. Passages and poems from notable environmental writers will also be shared regularly. All levels welcome. This group is facilitated by local poet and writer, Jessica Gigot.
In an effort to be more inclusive I will post a synopsis of each meeting on Her Deepest Ecologies. Readers/writers from afar might be inspired by our discussions and prompts as well as books and events that people share. I also have an email list for our Bellingham-based group and if you would like to be added to that send me a note.
1/25/23
Our first meeting started with an overview and ideas for how to structure the group—we will start off generative, but may move into sharing/critiquing each other’s work. I enjoyed our discussion about the difference between nature writing and ecopoetry and I look forward to exploring several genres of environmental writing as we go forward.
Together we got started on some interesting poems about birds, looking at very different examples from Richard Wilbur and Ellen Bass.Â
A take-home prompt was to write a poem about a specific place (a park, your yard, a national forest) in the form of a detailed (and perhaps introspective and meandering) list. This was inspired by the poem "Specimens Collected at the Clear Cut" by Alison Hawthorne Deming.
Ted Kooser's name came up and I wanted to share that this virtual event is happening next week:
https://www.coppercanyonpress.org/braided-creek-a-conversation-in-poetry/
Good luck in your writing!Â
Jessica