"Where are you really from?”—a question too often asked of POC whose lived experiences are themselves transgressions on identity. However, consider an alternate origin. Where did you come from, and who were you before you were named? Who would we be if we let our poems rewrite our roots in trauma?

Origin stories are integral to the identities of those who live in diaspora. If “stanza” in Italian means “little room,” a stanza might be likened to “room in a house, a lyric dwelling place” (“Stanza,” Academy of American Poets). In this hybrid poetry workshop, participants will examine the doorways they crossed to get where they are today.

Through prompts and after discussing origin stories both personal and cultural—folk stories, myths, superstitions, and more—participants will generate new materials, then utilize various visual forms on the page—pour their poems into different containers—in an attempt to scrutinize their bodies' beginnings anew through a decolonized eye. In this reverse alchemy of sorts, these works will be shared in the workshop if participants so choose. They will also be given several prompts to take home. What has walked with you, and what have you left behind? What parts of you have changed in this crossing?

This is a one-day craft class Sunday, October 16th from 2:00 PM–5:00 PM ET, open to all writers of color.

Check out the class page for more information. To see all of our fall and spring classes, visit Kundiman online classes.