In today’s frenetic, media-saturated world, what does it mean to slow down? To cultivate a “living relationship with the present,” as psychotherapist and gardener Sue Stuart-Smith says in A Well-Gardened Mind? How can we reclaim the lost grounds of our attention and cultivate writing habits that allow us to attend artfully to the everyday? 

This will be an engaging, generative poetry class that draws inspiration from everyday life and the natural world. We will experiment with low-stakes observational practices like sketching, color studies, and plant gathering to foster new possibilities of growth in our writing. No background in visual art is expected or required, only a desire to cultivate greater attentiveness to the world around you. 

In each class session, we will examine concepts like poetic image, description, and form through the world of tree rings, leaf pigmentation, and plant morphology. From there, we’ll follow the garden path to see how writers like Maggie Nelson, Michael Dickman, Ross Gay, and others powerfully ground their writing in experiences of daily life.

In practicing the art of observation, you will emerge with renewed inspiration and a wealth of creative exercises to enrich your writing. You also will have a unique record of the everyday—testament to the way that attention to the ordinary, over time, accumulates into a powerful, living document of one’s relationship with the present.