Creative writing is a tool for knowing yourself, understanding the world, and connecting with other people. Led by author Seema Reza and accomplished guest writers—including poets, memoirists, novelists, and storytellers—these community workshops follow the model developed by Community Building Art Works (CBAW) over the course of a decade of bringing people together in military and hospital settings. Each workshop is designed to help participants put their personal stories on paper in a supportive environment.
Whether you’re just starting out or have been writing for years, you are welcome; no experience is required. Bring a pen, a notebook, and an open mind!
Registration closes at 4pm Eastern Time before each session so we can prepare. Please make sure you're subscribed to Strathmore emails to receive the Zoom info.
Thu, Oct 17 | 7pm Eastern Time
The Wonders of Worm Level Writing with Keetje Kuipers
The Latin root of the word humility means “of the earth.” So to humble ourselves—to try to answer the question of what we might have sometimes gotten painfully, even harmfully wrong in our lives or in relation to those we love—is work that requires getting a little muddy. In this generative workshop, we will concentrate on writing towards the places in our poems where we can get down in the dirt: that humble, vulnerable space of worm level. We’ll write guided by a poetics of humility that yields poems of wonder—at change, at realization, at the endless, humble prospect of still-to-be-seen possibility.
Keetje Kuipers is the author of four books of poems, all from BOA Editions: Beautiful in the Mouth (2010), which was chosen by Thomas Lux as the winner of the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize; The Keys to the Jail (2014); All Its Charms (2019), which includes poems honored by publication in both The Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies; and Lonely Women Make Good Lovers, winner of the Isabella Gardner Award, forthcoming in spring 2025. Keetje’s poetry and prose have appeared in The New York Times, American Poetry Review, Yale Review, VQR, Poetry, and over a hundred other magazines. Keetje has been a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, the Katharine Bakeless Nason Fellow in Poetry at Bread Loaf, the Emerging Writer Lecturer at Gettysburg College, and the recipient of multiple residency fellowships, including PEN Northwest’s Margery Davis Boyden Wilderness Writing Residency. Previously a board member at the National Book Critics Circle, Keetje is currently the Editor of Poetry Northwest, and teaches at universities and conferences around the world, including at the dual-language writers’ gathering Under the Volcano in Tepoztlán, Mexico. Her home is in Missoula, Montana, on the land of the Salish and Kalispel peoples and directly at the foot of the Rattlesnake Wilderness Area. She lives there with her wife and their two children, where she co-directs the Headwaters Reading Series for Health & Wellness and keeps an eye out for bears in her backyard.
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Thu, Nov 21 | 7pm Eastern Time
A Conversation with What Haunts You with Cathy Linh Che
In this generative writing session, we will invite what is haunting us into conversations with us on the page. The prompt is adapted from an exercise offered up by the writer Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo, who adapted it from The Ghostline Collective.
Cathy Linh Che is Vietnamese American a writer and multidisciplinary artist. She is the author of Becoming Ghost (Washington Square Press, 2025), Split (Alice James Books) and co-author, with Kyle Lucia Wu, of the children’s book An Asian American A to Z.
This workshop will not be recorded.
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Thu, Dec 19 | 7pm Eastern Time
Your Writing Out Loud with Rosamond S. King
Mary Oliver stunned with a calm, clear voice; Gwendolyn Brooks emphasized rhythm; Jayne Cortez didn’t always read a poem the same way. This relaxed workshop for people new to or nervous about reading out loud will guide writers through recognizing and developing their own reading style. We’ll learn vocal exercises and explore modulation, breath, and pacing. There will be some writing, but please bring a poem of 10-20 lines or 200-400 words of prose to work with – and be ready to use your voice and body. Please note that all participants must have their cameras on for this workshop.
Writer and performer Rosamond S. King is the author of poetry collections All the Rage and the Lambda Award-winning Rock | Salt | Stone. Her poems have also been published in more than three dozen journals, blogs, and anthologies.
This workshop will not be recorded.
REGISTERRegistration closes at 4pm before each session so we can prepare. Please make sure you're subscribed to Strathmore emails to receive the Zoom info.
Check back soon for more information on instructors for the remaining dates.
Seema Reza is the author of the poetry collection A Constellation of Half-Lives and the memoir When the World Breaks Open. Reza has led writing workshops within correctional facilities, military and civilian hospitals, and schools. She is the Executive Director of Community Building Art Works, a unique arts organization that encourages the use of the arts as a tool for narration, self-care, and socialization among a military population struggling with emotional and physical injuries.