Reading & Writing Robert Frost
Saturday, September 6, 2025
1-3pm at The Frost Place
John F. Kennedy famously said that Robert Frost, “bequeathed his nation a body of imperishable verse.” From his mastery of traditional verse forms and metrics, to depictions of rural New England, to his command of American colloquial speech, arguably, no poet is more essential to an understanding of American poetry than Robert Frost.
In this course, we will examine several of Frost’s poems closely, listen to him read his own work, and gather insights from his interviews and biography. We’ll look at Frost’s use of trimeter, iambic pentameter, and blank verse, consider his unmistakable tone and use of the dramatic monologue, consider themes such as duplicity, isolation, nature, and existential questioning, and then try our hand at our poems.
This course is for anyone interested in investigating Frost more deeply and learning from one of the true masters. No experience necessary.
Writing Nature in Place
Sunday, September 14, 2025
1-3pm at The Frost Place
Drawing inspiration from the natural beauty around us, this workshop offers participants an opportunity to take in nature and turn their observations into powerful and vivid poems. In this course, we’ll study examples of celebrated poems that effectively capture the wonder and beauty of nature. We’ll also discuss techniques such as metaphor, imagery, repetition, and sound as well as cover effective use of line breaks. No experience necessary.
About Jodie Hollander
Jodie Hollander’s work has appeared in The Poetry Review, Poetry Magazine, The Yale Review, The Harvard Review, Poetry, PN Review, The Kenyon Review, Poetry London, The Hudson Review, The Dark Horse, The New Criterion, The Rialto, Verse Daily, The Best Australian Poems of 2011, and The Best Australian Poems of 2015. Her debut full-length collection, My Dark Horses, was published with Liverpool University Press & Oxford University Press. Her second collection, Nocturne, was also published with Liverpool & Oxford University Press in 2023 and was longlisted for the Laurel Prize in nature writing. Hollander is the recipient of a MacDowell fellowship and a Fulbright fellowship in South Africa. She is also the originator of ‘Poetry in the Parks,’ in conjunction with several National Parks and Monuments in the US. In 2024, Hollander was the first poet in residence for the Elmet Trust in the Calder Valley, where she wrote and taught out of the childhood home of Ted Hughes. She lives in Flagstaff, Arizona. https://www.jodiehollander.com/
To We Or Not To We: Considerations on First Person Plural Point of View – A Lyric Question
Saturday, September 20 @ 12:30 pm ET
So much contemporary poetry centers on the “lyric I.” Since the self is already unknowable and shifting, how and when can a poet presume to speak for others, even others in their own community? In this class, we will look at poems that use “we” as a powerful tool of resistance (Charles Simic, Carolyn Forché), as thought-provoking social commentary (Ilya Kaminsky, Wislawa Szymborska), or to encourage collective unity (Ross Gay, Claudia Rankine). In direct opposition to poems that use the “colonial we,” Judith Butler interprets “we the people” as a statement that is both linguistic and embodied as a call to action. We will examine some of our own poems that might benefit from the introduction of “the lyric we” or the “imperative we” and we will discuss pitfalls to avoid while deciding to employ the first-person plural. We will read poems by Auden, Larkin, Ostriker, Kaminsky, Brown, Szymborksa, Pollock, Vang, Bang, Brock-Broido, Gluck, Doty, Simic, Forché, Farris, Smith, Bass, Laux, and Hirshfield.
Jennifer Franklin is the author of three poetry collections, including If Some God Shakes Your House (Four Way Books), finalist for the Paterson Prize and Julie Suk Award. Her work has been commissioned by The Metropolitan Museum and published in American Poetry Review, The Paris Review, “poem-a-day” on poets.org, The Nation, and Poetry Society of America’s “Poetry in Motion.” She won a Pushcart Prize, a NYFA grant, and a CRCF Award. She is cofounder and cohost of the reading series “Words Like Blades.” Her new manuscript, A FIRE IN HER BRAIN is a series of epistolary poems to Virginia Woolf, Lucia Joyce, and Sylvia Plath. She teaches in Manhattanville’s MFA program, Poets House, The Frost Place, 24Pearl Street & her own manuscript revision workshops.
Twists, Turns and Tumbles: Syntax and the Art of Poetic Surprise
Sunday, October 26 @ 12:30 pm ET
This class will explore the dynamic interplay between syntax and the element of surprise in poetry. We’ll examine how various contemporary and classic poets manipulate word order, sentence structure, and the tension between sentence and line to challenge reader’s expectations and build layers of meaning. Through close discussion of works by Emily Dickinson, Ocean Vuong, Carl Phillips, Natalie Diaz, Ross Gay, and others, participants will gain an understanding of how syntax influences pacing and tone, creates meaning, and contributes to the overall impact of a poem with a view to applying this knowledge to their own writing.
Angela Narciso Torres is the author of What Happens Is Neither (Four Way Books), Blood Orange (Willow Books Award for Poetry) and the chapbook, To the Bone (Sundress Publications). Recent work appears in Alaska Quarterly Review, 32 Poems, and Poetry Northwest. A graduate of Warren Wilson MFA Program and Harvard Graduate School of Education, Angela has received fellowships from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Illinois Arts Council, and Ragdale Foundation. She received the Yeats Poetry Prize (W.B. Yeats Society of New York) and was named one of NewCity Magazine’s Chicago’s Lit 50. Born in Brooklyn and raised in Manila, she lives in San Diego and serves as reviews editor for RHINO.
Financial Aid
The Frost Place is committed to fostering an inclusive environment. If our class fees are incompatible with your budget, we encourage you to apply for financial aid.
Assistance is available on a first-come, first-served basis, as funds allow.
Aid may only be used for future programming and cannot be applied retroactively.