The Idyllwild Arts Academy Adult Arts Center presents a spring poetry workshop/retreat featuring noted poet Suzanne Lummis.

Lummis’ poems have appeared in the Hudson Review, Antioch Review, The New Yorker and the American Journal of Poetry. Lummis edited “Wide Awake: Poets of Los Angeles and Beyond” (Beyond Baroque Books, 2015) noted in the Los Angeles Times as one of the Ten Best Books of 2015.

Lummis taught many years at the UCLA Extension Writer’s Program, where she created courses in poetic craft, the persona poem and the poem noir. She was the director of the Los Angeles Poetry Festival for nine years.

The writing workshop offers poets a full-immersion experience designed to deepen their understanding of story and language. Said Lummis, “In this course, participants will explore important components of craft, including the art of the line-break, pacing, choices regarding structure and, particularly, the evolution of imagery and striking sensory details.”

She discussed why some poems make a more forcible impression than others. “Sometimes it’s the element of strangeness, the unexpected, a certain wildness that sets it apart, qualities that include craft but also transcend it,” she noted.

The workshop/retreat takes place at Creekstone Inn from Sunday, March 12, to Wednesday, March 15.  Enrollment is limited to 12 poets.

See information about the retreat at www.idyllwildarts.org/summer/adultarts/poetryretreat/ and register by calling 951-659-2171 ext. 2365, Diane Dennis.

Poet Suzanne Lummis conducts a spring workshop/retreat for poets at Creekstone Inn as part of Idyllwild Arts Academy’s Adult Arts Center offerings. Registration is limited to 12 poets.
Photo courtesy Suzanne Lummis