How to Write a Poem that Makes People Feel Things

In this 90-minute virtual workshop, Jaclyn Desforges will guide you through her method of Intuitive Poemmaking, a creative process designed to help people from all walks of life craft poems from images, memory, and fragments of language. Inspired by dreamwork and somatic embodiment practices, Intuitive Poemmaking uses the power of the subconscious mind to create poems readers can really feel. You’ll dive into your personal imaginal realm, collect the sparkly pieces you find there, and arrange them into resonant poems. You’ll leave with a skip in your step, a brand new poem that’s all your own, and newfound confidence in your inherent poemmaking capacity. No previous writing experience required. 

Register for the workshop here!

ABOUT THE FACILITATOR  

Jaclyn Desforges is the 2023/2024 Mabel Pugh Taylor Writer in Residence. She's the queer and neurodivergent author of Danger Flower (Palimpsest Press/Anstruther Books), winner of the 2022 Hamilton Literary Award for Poetry and one of CBC's picks for the best Canadian poetry of 2021. She's also the author of Why Are You So Quiet? (Annick Press, 2020), which was shortlisted for a Chocolate Lily Award and selected for the 2023 TD Summer Reading Club.  

Jaclyn is a Pushcart-nominated writer and the winner of a 2022 City of Hamilton Creator Award, a 2020 Hamilton Emerging Artist Award for Writing, two 2019 Short Works Prizes, and the 2018 RBC/PEN Canada New Voices Award. Jaclyn’s writing has been featured in literary magazines across Canada. She holds an MFA from the University of British Columbia’s School of Creative Writing and lives in Hamilton with her partner and daughter.