SkillCircles

Sharpened Visions: A Poetry Course

A course by Douglas Kearney

Poetry can change the way you and your readers think of the world and its inhabitants; it can break new ground for language; turn a blank sheet of paper into a teeming concert of voices and music. In this poetry workshop, we'll cover key poetic terms and devices by studying poems by a handful of modern and contemporary poets and then get a chance to try our own hand at writing new poem drafts from a select number of prompts. Throughout the course you will have the opportunity to workshop your poem drafts and get feedback on your work, working towards a more polished poem.

📌 Important information! This is a course by coursera. SkillCircles provides the platform for you to find your peers 🤝. You will enroll and access contents in coursera.

This Course

Starts on October 11

The SkillCircles Experience

Form Your Own Circle

Choose your peers to create your ideal learning group.

Dive Into Course Materials

Access video lessons and contents directly on coursera.

Weekly meeting with your peers

Meet up with your peers to unpack the week's contents together.

Course Contents

• Week 0: Welcome!

This first meeting is a chance to meet your peers and get to know each other. Spend some time with your Circle and familiarize yourself with the Circles app. Then, check out the course and plan your learning journey together!

• Week 1: Introduction and the Poetic Line

Poetry orchestrates its music, arguments, tensions, and environment via arrangements of language into lines and stanzas. This week we’ll address the importance of the line break, perhaps the most conspicuous, signature tool in the poet’s toolkit. Do you break more for sound, for sense, visual effect, shape, a mix of several?

• Week 2: Abstraction and Image

Abstractions and images may fill our poems, but how can you leverage them to compelling ends? This week we’ll work at finding new symbols to replace clichéd ones for abstractions and we’ll work at crafting images that do more than add furniture to a poem, but create systems of relationships, moods, and even style.