One stereotype of the motherhood poem is that it’s all sweetness and domesticity, a loving mother indoors with her child, doing crafts or baking cookies. But a recent spate of media is finally depicting mothering, and parenting more broadly, as a complex identity, a relationship that makes us reconsider our place in the political and natural worlds.
In this generative workshop featuring the poems of contributors to the forthcoming anthology The Long Devotion: Poets Writing Motherhood, participants will read the work of several writers whose experiences of parenting have changed the way they encounter the world. In addition to meditating on children’s wonder at nature, these poems ask questions about racism, climate change, war, cultural inheritance, and the challenges of working motherhood.
We’ll consider work by Remica Bingham-Risher, Pamela Hart, Layli Long Soldier, Erika Meitner, Sara Mumolo, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Sasha West. After discussing several poems, we’ll write together. The workshop will include time for participants to share their drafts, compare experiences, and brainstorm directions for future writing.
This workshop is open to mothers and caregivers of all genders; participants need not identify as parents. The class itself will focus on poetry, but writers of all genres are welcome.