Saturday, April 25, 1pm NT

Online only.

Riddle Fence presents the third in our series of online workshops! Join from wherever you call home, and learn from some of the very best writers in Newfoundland and Labrador (and beyond!)

This workshop has been generously supported by CEDP funding from the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, and is offered at a pay-what-you-can rate. Workshops run between 2-3 hours.

Found Language, Found Form:    A Generative Poetry Workshop

with Anna Swanson

Rather than waiting for inspiration or trying to create something from nothing, what would it be like to approach poetry from a place of structured play? This 2-3 hour workshop will bypass the blank page and provide multiple entry points for creating poetry by foraging, borrowing, and working with constraints. We will explore found texts, word sets, sound-mapping, repetition, and borrowed forms, while also considering the power structures inherent in relationships to source texts.

The focus will be on developing playful and generative writing practices, rather than creating polished poems. The workshop will start with a series of shorter low-stakes language experiments, with an opportunity to choose one of these seeds and develop it further near the end. Participants will be encouraged to share individual lines in the chat, or read parts of their poems in progress out loud, but sharing work is not mandatory, and there is no pressure to create a finished poem that is ready for sharing.

This is a workshop for anyone who has ever felt stuck starting at a blank page. No poetry experience necessary. A laptop is recommended as we will be using online text sources and tools, but please also bring whatever tools you usually use to write.

Accessibility: The workshop will be held on Zoom, with a short break mid-way through. While participants are encouraged to turn on their cameras, it is not mandatory. Auto-captioning will be enabled, and participants will be muted except when speaking. Instructions for writing exercises will be spoken, and also provided in writing on the screen or in the chat. We will be using online source text in our exercises which may involve being asked to cut and paste from a website or online article, and then searching through the text for words to use.

 

Register here. 

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Anna Swanson is a queer writer, librarian, and poetry editor with Riddle Fence. She is the author of The Garbage Poems (Brick Books, 2025), created from garbage collected at local swimming holes, which was longlisted for the Winterset Award and is a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award. Her first book of poetry, The Nights Also (Tightrope, 2010), won a Lambda Literary Award and the Gerald Lampert Award. She recently completed an MFA at the University of Guelph and lives in St. John’s, Ktaqmkuk/Newfoundland. Her special interests include collective liberation and wild swimming in all seasons. Author website: https://annaswanson.ca/