Hello, everyone

I'm brand-new to the group and pleased to be here. Although I'm not an MFA, I do have a serious interest in poetry, both as consumer and purveyor thereof.

I studied poetry during my college years ('68-'72) and later audited Postmodern American Poetry, as well as Creative Writing ('98-'99), both tours with Peter Siedlecki. He also occasionally brought in as guest lecturers his dear friend, Robert Creeley, and, back in the 60s, Alan Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, and John Hollander, too.

That probably sounds a lot more glorious than it actually was: all I can recall now is that Ginsberg and Corso were dynamic and impressive readers of their own work; Hollander was mostly peevish; and dear Mr. Creeley, while immensely kind and giving, didn't offer anything I hadn't heard before. (It saddens me to say that, as he is still held in such fond esteem in my community.)

Meanwhile, I'm delighted to be in good company here in this group and pleased to see some Goodreads friends whose posts I've enjoyed elsewhere on the site. I look forward to getting to know you all.

Blessings,
Christina

Jim McGarrah helps me out, too. He often suggests great places to submit my work--from one of them I got a rejection with a hand-written note from the editor, my first ever!

I don't have an MFA in poetry, though I did take many writing workshops through the University of Denver when I got my MLS. My favorite teacher over there is Andrea Dupree, but she's fiction, not poetry. If you're interested in fiction and in the Denver area, she runs a lot of workshops through Lighthouse Writers (some of them online, I think)--she's a very warm and funny woman and knows a heckuva lot about fiction.

Right now my poetry teacher is Lisa Bellamy at the Writer's Studio. I love her! We work mostly with narrative technique rather than the formal, musical aspect of poetry. So we work from fiction exercises to write poems as well as poetry exercises. The program has worked for me better than any other writing workshop I've ever taken. Fun too.

I haven't studied poetry formally, but my current mentors are Julia Vinograd and Marc Hofstadter. They each have a number of full-length books published. Because I'm disabled and unable to drive, they each come over to my house about once every six weeks and write with me. Then we critique each other's work.

From Julia I've learned how to listen to poetry instead of just read it, and how to dig deep for the big poems. I've learned that the more specific an image is, the better, and to carry an image or metaphor through from the beginning of a poem to the end. She's taught me to revise, and to choose the best of my work. She's inspired me through her example, and given me a model of an artist who values her art highly. She edited my poetry chapbook and helped me get it published by Zeitgeist Press.

From Marc I've learned to write less, to go with the short and pithy over the verbally pyrotechnic (which is my natural tendency). He's taught me to go through my work in search of small words that can be cut out: a, an, the, and, like. He's taught me to find the simplest and clearest syntax. He's also taught me to think more like a poet and less like a prose writer, in the sense of letting my syntax be more poetic and elastic. He's suggested a good market for my work, and recommended me to journal editor whose taste I really like.

My MFA is actually in Painting, not poetry. I came to poetry late, long after my last college degree, so I've had no university classes in it.

I studied with Jack Grapes in Los Angeles for a long time. He doesn't publish a lot, but he's an inspired and inspiring teacher. Since then I've worked with Cecilia Woloch, another great teacher whose poetry I like a lot.

A few other workshops and classes here and there and on the internet.

It's very funny. I wouldn't say I worked with Mark (because it was a lecture-type class instead of a workshop). However, I can with confidence state that it was his first teaching gig. I still have my notes on T.S. Eliot from that class.

How funny that we both worked with Mark! Small world. I guess the poetry world is actually infinitessimally small. (I wonder if I spelled that correctly.)

I had Mark Levine as a teacher--Forms of Poetry at Murray State--that was back in the early 1990s (way back in the day)! I thought he was great. I finished a low-residency MFA program with Daniel Anderson, Philip Stephens, and Brian Barker as my mentors. They were all fabulous teachers and guides.

I am always curious to know which poets are excellent teachers. The first poet I had as a professor was Patricia Goedicke at U of Montana when I was an undergraduate. She was extremely encouraging towards me and I think I owe much of my confidence to her nurturing. I also took several courses with Mark Levine (now at Iowa) when I was at U of Montana. Excellent teacher, very honest, and innovative in his teaching methods. When I came back to Baltimore I took a non-credit poetry workshop with Mary Azrael. The course wasn't rigorous because it was open to beginners and advanced poets alike, but Mary herself was very interesting and I loved the format of her class. I will be starting the MFA at U of Baltimore in the fall and my first poetry workshop will be with Kendra Kopelke. I've heard excellent things about her, and I am very excited to get the program underway.