The Shape of Attention

Exploring Form in Poetry and Prose

In this two-hour generative workshop, we’ll explore form as a practical and imaginative tool for writers of poetry, prose, and hybrid work. We’ll spend some time discussing how a piece’s shape changes what becomes possible on the page as well as work with prompts that approach form as a way to direct attention, create pressure, interrupt habit, and invite surprise.

Participants will move through a series of low-pressure writing exercises designed to generate new material. This workshop is open to poets, prose writers, hybrid writers, and anyone curious about how structure can help us think, feel, remember, and discover.

What to have ready: Something to write with or on, whether that’s a notebook, laptop, tablet, or phone. Participants may also bring a short draft, fragment, image, object, or memory they’d like to write from, but no prior preparation is required.

About José Angel Araguz, Ph.D

José Angel Araguz, Ph.D. (he/him/él) is the author most recently of the lyric memoir Ruin & Want (Sundress Publications) as well as the poetry collections Rotura (Black Lawrence Press) and La esperanza espera (Valparaiso Ediciones). His poetry and prose have appeared in Prairie Schooner, Poetry International, The Acentos Review, and Oxidant | Engine among other places. He is an Associate Professor at Suffolk University and a faculty-at-large member of the Solstice Low-Residency MFA Program at Lasell University. He blogs and reviews books here at The Influence.