This weekly drop-in class will offer a buffet of approaches to writing poems—open to writers of any level. We’ll use different model poems and prompts to generate new writing each week, focusing on various forms and themes, including narrative poems, list poems, odes, rants, elegies, abecedarians, acrostics and others. We’ll consider the many places a poem begins, and how the incitements of form and association nudge its direction down the page. Clarity of images, ideas and close observation of the outside world and inner voice will center our discussions. We’ll prize process and practice above the poem as a finished product. One ambition for the hour will be for everyone to begin a poem they can return to and develop on their own. Sharing will be encouraged but optional. (Note that drop-in classes are not a forum for critique of work; students looking for critique should register for multi-week workshops.)