Carl Sandburg
FIND YOUR OWN WORD POWER
You already have the words. You may have felt their power stirring inside.Your creativity. Your meaning. Your truth. Let poetry open it up for you.
You The Poet offers six sessions designed to free up your poetry. To give you the tools to find the words and the confidence to use them powerfully.
With minimal preparation each week, the course will help you shape a set of poems you will enjoy making and sharing.
Some may feature on this website.You may even be asked to perform them at an exclusive You the Poet event.
Created and directed by international award-winning poet Mark Fiddes, You The Poet runs over Zoom and requires no previous poetry-writing experience. Just a genuine desire for self-expression and love of words.
One-to-one mentoring is also available.
YOUR
MENTOR
scroll
Mark Fiddes is an award-winning poet and writer of ‘The Rainbow Factory’ and ‘The Chelsea Flower Show Massacre’. He contributes to Poetry Review, Magma, The Irish Times, The London Magazine, Poem International and many other titles. He is a past winner in the UK’s National Poetry Competition, the Montreal International Poetry Competition, the Ruskin Prize, the Oxford Brookes University International Prize, the Robert Graves Prize and over fifty more.
He has also worked as international creative director for a number of leading communications agencies, having started out as a journalist in Washington, D.C.
He studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Merton College, Oxford University, and has two sons with his Spanish wife Maribel.
HOW EACH SESSIONWORKS
01
In the preceding week, you will have a poem to consider and feedback on during the session. We’re looking for honest feelings not literary criticism.
What you like.
What you don’t.
What you take away.
We start with some word exercises. Just like you might loosen up your muscles before sport, a few minutes of word gameplay will sharpen you up for
the session ahead.
02
Every participant the speaks for a minute or so about the poem then group were asked to review during the week. Sharing insights,
we build a consensus around what makes the poem worth going back to – or not.
03
04
The first writing exercise takes a theme, for example ‘The Homecoming’. You are then given a series of writing prompts to allow you to write a response to the subject. It might be one line or twenty. This you share with the group and we build on what makes it work and how it can work harder.
02
We follow this with ‘the Ekphrastic Challenge’ in which you are given a picture to write to. It might be a painting or a still from a movie. You will be encouraged to experiment with different forms, from dialogue to writing a letter or rap lyric.
Once more, we share the piece for comment and learning.
05
06
Finally, a member of the group introduces us to our Poem of the Week. This will be a favourite they have selected from their own reading
for discussion.
The only rules are that you DON’T have to make anything rhyme. You DO have to be respectful of others’ creativity.
NEXT
STEPS
Just email us directly on youthepoet@gmail.com
Explain a little of what you want to take out of the sessions - whether you're interested in joining a group or individual mentoring.
We'll get back to you with rates and timings.
Thank you.