Description

In this poetry class, we will discuss model poems by contemporary poets and what makes such poems pleasurable to read. We will practice craft, consider ideas for generating new poems, and discuss various forms of poetry. The overall goal of the session will be for the participants to write increasingly skillful and satisfying poetry. When you are in touch with your feelings and experiences your poems have a genuine authenticity. When you go deeply into your emotions you are on the right path.

Seretta Martin, managing editor of the San Diego Poetry Annual, has authored several poetry books including her forthcoming Overtaking Glass. She is a finalist in the Philip Levine Prize for Poetry contest, as well as the Word Works Washington Prize and the Atlantic Review International Poetry Contest.

Her writing appears in California Fire & Water, A Climate Crisis Anthology; Serving House Journal; Web Del Sol; Poetry International; MARGIE: The American Journal of Poetry; Modern Haiku, Under the Basho and A Year in Ink, among others. She teaches adults at San Diego Writers Ink and children at the Border Voices Poetry Project, KIDS! San Diego Poetry Annual and California Poets in the Schools.

Seretta appears on ITV shows and curates readings at libraries and symposia. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing and is the founding editor of Blue Vortex Publishers, which creates first-edition books for poets. As a Kaiser hospice volunteer she helps patients write letters and poems. Seretta lives in the foothills of San Diego, California with her musician son. She is long-time participant in Mary Harker’s Oasis poetry classes, has been a member of Oasis for many years and holds one of the original membership cards.