SOUL BONE LITERARY FESTIVAL
List of MIU MFA Spring 2021 Residency Events

Our MFA's first Soul Bone literary festival explores the inner world of the imagination and techniques to access the leaping mind. It asks questions such as: How do you break through writer’s block and nourish creativity? Why is it essential to give yourself permission to experiment and make mistakes? Where do you find inspiration and how do you develop the healthy work habits of the professional poet/writer? We offer several panels on creative process, including one that discusses diversity and creativity, and one that allows you to immerse in your own creative self through sound in a workshop with master musician and gong specialist, Kenny Kolter. Guest faculty offer evening readings, teach master classes on various aspects of craft, and lead advanced workshops in three genres.

Below find a list of our public events.

MONDAY, Feb. 8, 2021

• CREATIVITY WORKSHOP
  River Writing & Earth Song
  with Kenny Kolter & Nynke Passi
  Time: 2 PM - 5 PM

If you haven't ever received a gong bath with Kenny Kolter, you are in for a treat with this workshop especially designed for our MFA in Creative Writing. The workshop is called "River Writing & Earth Song." It's our invocation at the start of our MFA as you head out on your journey into your own leaping, wild, free, mysterious, wonderful imagination.

Kenny Kolter is a musician and sound therapist who has facilitated thousands of workshops nation-wide, incorporating gongs, drums, rattles, Tibetan bowls, and chimes to critical acclaim. He is one of only a handful of sound therapists worldwide to play the gong for patients in a clinical setting and has long-term contracts offering sound/vibrational awareness sessions at the largest mental health facility in Illinois and at Cancer Treatment Centers of America. His work has been featured on Chicago National Public Radio, and in “Evolving Your Spirit.” “Natural Awakenings” and “Dallas Yoga” magazines. He’s also featured in the documentary “Yogi in the Bible Belt.” In the words of author and motivational speaker Dr. Heather Harder, “[Kenny’s] gong was pure vibrational magic. I could feel my muscles relax and my mind soar. I am not sure where I went, but I know when the music stopped, I had been moved.”

Poet and writer Nynke Passi is the co-chair of our English department, director of this MFA program, plus director of her own writing center, The Soul Ajar. Her work has been published in CALYX, Gulf Coast, River of Earth & Sky, and Carrying the Branch, among other places. Poet and musician David Hurlin calls her “the embodiment of the empowered feminine, a wise choice of ally in the wilderness of writing.” Performer Mark Hansen says, “Nynke led me to myself. [She has] the gift to inspire and propel people to let go and create.”

“River Writing & Earth Song” is a collaborative workshop to help you connect to your creativity through silence and sound. Kenny says, “We want to hold a safe space for people to experience profound deepening into their inner rhythms, a transformational awaking to both sound and silence.” Nynke adds, “Creativity is joy, a great rush. Everyone knows that energized thrill of total immersion in the creative process—no boundaries, no sense of time or space, no worry about the opinions of others, just the joy of creating. We want to help people get back in touch with that indomitable creative force, which—in the words of diarist Anaïs Nin—gives us our fire, our color.”

• CREATIVITY WORKSHOP & CONCERT
  River Writing & Earth Song
  with Kenny Kolter & Nynke Passi
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM

In the evening, Kenny will give a concert with his gongs, with chimes, singing bowls, and other instruments. You will have time to write in response to the sound, and there will also be time to share. This concert and workshop is designed to connect your brain's two hemispheres and bring you to an authentic depth of yourself from where you can create with a voice truthful and unique to you. Nynke will give you prompts to write to after.

TUESDAY, Feb. 9

• UNSILENCING THE WORKSHOP 1
  Traditional vs Alternative Workshop Models
  Time: 1 PM - 2 PM

Almost everyone knows the traditional workshop model pioneered by the Iowa Writers' Workshop whereby you sit in silence while everyone else in the room discusses your work as if you weren't even there. In a close-knit cohort, with a solid foundation in respect and trust, this model can work exceedingly well. However, it can also be experienced as crushing, nightmarish, or as a form of silencing. This can be especially true for minority writers and female writers who may be describing experiences outside the norm. Being told to be quiet while others discuss your work, while these others may not have a sufficient or clear understanding of your personal journey or of your work's (and for that matter, your life's) context, does not promote an excited engagement with the revision process, which always is our aim. This workshop examines alternatives. What other ways are there to pry open a work and listen to what it really wants to say and be and convey?

• UNSILENCING THE WORKSHOP 2
  Alternative Workshop Models
  Time: 2 PM - 3 PM

In the second hour, we deepen the discussion on alternative workshop models. What models exist that undo the silencing of the traditional workshop, helping diverse writers' voices shine? What models exist that allow you to be part of the conversation about your work, instead of a mere witness to it? Both this and the previous session come with handouts and reading assignments. They are offered in preparation for the workshop in the last weekend of the residency as well as the semester's mentorship workshops. Today's resources remain relevant throughout every semester of this MFA program. In all of your mentorships, you are allowed to pick your own favorite models for workshopping your work. Today, we'll present you a variety of options.

• CREATIVITY WORKSHOP
  River Writing & Earth Song
  with Kenny Kolter & Nynke Passi
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM

This evening, Kenny Kolter and Nynke Passi will continue their creativity workshop with the gongs, singing bowls, chimes, other instruments interspersed with carefully designed writing prompts. This workshop is designed to connect your two hemispheres and bring you to an authentic depth of yourself from where you can create with a voice truthful and unique to you. There will be time for discussing your experiences and time for sharing your writing.

WEDNESDAY, Feb. 10

• GENERATIVE WORKSHOPS
  Lyric with Ben McClendon
  Narrative with Sasha Kamini Parmasad
  Time: 10 AM - 12 PM

The next few mornings we are going to create! A generative workshop is an opportunity to play with language creatively. You receive exercises and prompts, and you respond. That is all you have to do. There is no right or wrong way. You can experiment, make mistakes, fall flat on your face, get up, and try again. You can drop down deep, "scale the depths of your being from which your very life springs forth," as poet Rainer Maria Rilke called it, and find the wilderness of your own creative imagination where thoughts roam free and you never know what you will find. You can share, or, if you are not yet comfortable, you can wait to share as soon as you are ready.

There is a choice between a lyric generative workshop with Ben McClendon (Session A) or a narrative generative workshop with Sasha Kamini Parmasad (Session B) this morning. Your pick! You are committing for the whole morning, in either workshop. If it is hard to choose, know that in the coming days you can try your hand at different genres, and you'll have multiple opportunities to work with both Ben and Sasha during this residency.

• AN AFTERNOON WITH POET MOLLY FISK
  Master Class, Workshop, Q & A
  Creativity: The Path from Trauma to Recovery
  Time: 1 PM - 4 PM

Whether our experience stems from natural disasters or human ones, most of us are shocked in various ways throughout our lives. To engage with, understand, and transform traumatic experience--wildfire, cancer, war, childhood abuse, systemic oppressions--we must apply our creativity very specifically to the circumstances. Writing is one of the most useful tools for this purpose. We'll look at model poems (Bruce Weigl, Linda McCarrisoton, Sharon Olds, and more), do some short in-class exercises, and talk about how to keep readers from turning away when the content is difficult. There's a lot of joy to be found in letting go of what binds us ,and we'll talk about how to express that, too.

Molly Fisk is a poet, radio commentator, life coach, writing teacher, mentor, speaker, and activist, plus the author of four collections of poems and three compilations of essays/commentary. Her book of poetry is called The More Difficult Beauties. She is Poet Laureate Emerita of Nevada County, California (2017-2019).

• READING
  California Fire & Water: A Climate Crisis Anthology
  with Molly Fisk, Danusha Laméris, Rafael Gonzalez, and Kim Shuck
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:30 PM

As part of a fellowship from the Academy of American Poets, former Nevada County Poet Laureate Molly Fisk created a project to teach kids across California to write poems about climate crisis as a way to work out their feelings about it. Out of the best of those poems and poems contributed by over 100 adults, she put together an extraordinary anthology, California Fire & Water.

This anthology includes poems by Brenda Hillman, Danusha Lameris, Ellen Bass, Gary Snyder, Indigo Moor, Jane Hirsfield, Juan Felipe Herrera, Kim Addonizio, Kim Shuck, Lee Herrick, Marcelo Hernandez Castillo, and a foreword by SA Smythe. We are lucky that tonight Molly is bringing with her several of the poets published in this anthology: Danusha Lameris, Rafael J. Gonzalez, and Kim Shuck. Since these poets are not included in your featured guest schedule, we will include short bios on them below. Together they will give a reading, addressing the climate crisis we are all faced with and that so urgently needs to be addressed.

Danusha Lameris is the author of The Moons of August (Autumn House, 2014), which was chosen by Naomi Shihab Nye as the winner of the Autumn House Press poetry prize and was a finalist for the Milt Kessler Book Award. Her second book is Bonfire Opera, (University of Pittsburgh Press), and she was the 2020 recipient of the Lucille Clifton Legacy Award.

Rafael J. Gonzalez is the current Poet Laureate of Berkeley, CA and once lectured at MIU in the 1970s. Professor Emeritus of Creative Writing & Literature, he taught at the University of Oregon, Western State College of Colorado, Central Washington State University, the University of Texas El Paso, and Laney College, Oakland where he founded the Mexican and Latin American Studies Dept.

Kim Shuck is widely published in journals, anthologies and a couple of solo books. She enjoys volunteering in SFUSD elementary school classrooms to share her loves of origami, poetry, beading, and basket making. In 2019 Shuck was awarded an inaugural National Laureate Fellowship from the Academy of American Poets, and a PEN Oakland Censorship Award. Kim Shuck is Poet Laureate Emerita of San Francisco.

Molly Fisk is a poet, radio commentator, life coach, writing teacher, mentor, speaker, and activist, plus the author of four collections of poems and three compilations of essays/commentary. Her book of poetry is called The More Difficult Beauties. She is Poet Laureate Emerita of Nevada County, California (2017-2019).

THURSDAY, Feb. 11

• GENERATIVE WORKSHOP
  Hybrids with Leah Waller
  Myth with Craig Deininger
  Time: 10 AM - 12 AM

A generative workshop is an opportunity to play with language and ideas creatively. You receive exercises and prompts, and you respond. That is all you have to do. There is no right or wrong way. You can experiment, make mistakes, fall flat on your face, get up, and try again. You can drop down deep, "scale the depths of your being from which your very life springs forth," as poet Rainer Maria Rilke called it, and find the wilderness of your own creative imagination where thoughts roam free and you never know what you will find.

In the first hour, we have a hybrid workshop with Leah Waller, our undergraduate program director and long-term faculty. In the second hour, we are going to focus on myth. Our faculty Craig Deininger is your guide as you embark on this hour-long quest. Craig is also weaving in a mini master class on myth and the imagination.

• MASTER CLASS WITH STEVEN SCHNEIDER
  Ekphrasis: Poetry & Art of the U.S. / Mexico Border
  Time: 1 PM - 3 PM

This Master Class on the Poetry and Art of the U.S. / Mexico border features the work of Poet Steven Schneider and Artist Reefka Schneider, who are the co-creators of the books and traveling exhibits Borderlines: Drawing Border Lives and The Magic of Mariachi. Dr. Schneider will discuss the tradition of Ekphrasis and the techniques and strategies poets use to respond to works of art and that inform his own writing. In this Master class you will also learn about issues of education, literacy, poverty, and culture that are so vitally important on the U.S. / Mexico border. This session includes a Q & A. Art work is by Reefka Schneider.

• PRESENTATION: Social Issues & Ethical Dilemmas in the Literary Arts
  Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion
  Time: 3 PM - 5 PM

What are diversity, equity, and inclusion, and why do they matter in the literary arts? What roles do these concepts play in literary theory and criticism? We’ll establish some guiding principles and open discussion to those who wish to share relevant experiences writing, workshopping, and/or publishing, with particular attention to how creative writing can be a vector for positive social change.

• PANEL: CONSCIOUSNESS & CREATIVITY
  with Steven Schneider, Diane Frank, N. J. Campbell, Susan Daniels, Sasha Parmasad, and Eric Boyd
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM

Our MFA uniquely teaches creative writing from a basis of creative process and consciousness. Tonight we are going to mine the connections between consciousness, creativity, and craft. Panelists will talk about their own creative process, how their creativity is influenced by their practice of Transcendental Meditation, and what methods they use for diving deep within to explore the "wilderness of the imagination," as novelist Arundhati Roy calls it. We are very excited to present you a panel composed of former MIU faculty and former MIU students, who used to take creative writing classes in our program or graduated from our program. Two of our MFA mentors are also joining us tonight.

FRIDAY, Feb. 12

• GENERATIVE WORKSHOP
  Narrative with Susan Daniels
  Time: 10 AM - 12 PM

Susan Daniels will offer prompts and exercises to play with narrative. Susan Daniels earned an M.F.A. in Creative Writing: Fiction from Fairfield University and a Ph.D. in Creative Writing: Fiction from Bath Spa University. Her novel, The Genuine Stories, published by New Rivers Press, was the winner of the Fairfield University Book Prize. Her memoir, The Horse Show Mom’s Survival Guide: For Every Discipline, was published by The Lyons Press.

• MASTER CLASS with Jennie Rothenberg Gritz, Senior Editor at Smithsonian Magazine
  Literary Journalism
  Time: 1 PM - 3 PM

Jennie Rothenberg Grtiz, alumna of MIU's English department, is Senior Editor at Smithsonian Magazine. Before that, she was Senior Editor at The Atlantic. She holds an MA in Journalism from U.C. Berkeley. Today she is with us to talk about literary journalism, how it relates to creative nonfiction, and how you can bring a story to life while sticking to facts and doing your research. She'll bring to bear more than a decade of experience as a Senior Editor at two leading online magazine. This master class includes reading materials, a Q & A, and creative assignments.

• PRESENTATION: Social Issues & Ethical Dilemmas in the Literary Arts
  Authenticity and Appropriation; Toward an Inclusive Canon
  with Ben McClendon
  Time: 3 PM - 5 PM CT

What is cultural appropriation? Why is it problematic, and how can we avoid it as writers? What does it mean to write with authenticity? Where are the admittedly blurry boundaries between lived experience and the author and poet’s right to create? We will discuss strategies and key principles in maintaining cultural humility and resisting appropriation as we discuss how to write ethically and how to use writing to resist established power dynamics.

What is the role of reading and literary studies in creative writing? How do the texts we read shape our writing and contextualize the work we produce? Literature does not exist in a vacuum, created from within constellations of cultural forces and intersectional identity, both a product of a culture and commentary on it. We will discuss the myth of political neutrality, what constitutes positive representation, and how what we choose to read shapes our writing.

• FACULTY READING
  with Terry Fairchild, Craig Deininger, Ben McClendon, Sasha Kami Parmasad, Lean Waller, and Nynke Passi
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM

Tonight all of our English department's full-time faculty will be reading for you from their work. Terry Fairchild is a Professor of Literature and has been the English department's chair for several decades. Nynke Passi is Associate Professor and the English department's co-chair; she founded the undergraduate creative writing program twenty-three years ago. Leah Waller is Assistant Professor and has been undergraduate program director these past six years. Sasha Kamini Parmasad is Assistant Faculty and has taught with us intermittently since 2013, and Craig Deininger, another Assistant Faculty, joined us two years ago. Our English department faculty is so happy that you are with us in our program. We are glad to share our creative voices with you. Welcome to our reading!

SATURDAY, Feb. 13

• MASTER CLASS / CRAFT TALK with MARK SPRAGG
  Point of View in Narrative Story Telling
  Time: 1 PM - 4 PM CT

Today's Master Class includes a craft talk about voice. Mark has spent the last five years working on a new novel, which is told in six different points of view--five in first person and one in a close-third (or limited omniscient). Today Mark is going to share his process in creating voices for his characters and the lengths to which he went to submerge in his characters' worlds to achieve authenticity. He is also going to talk about other craft devices, such as not using quotation marks and other experimental punctuation usage. The afternoon master class with Mark Spragg will continue with a Q & A.

Mark Spragg is the author of Where Rivers Change Direction, a memoir that won the Mountains & Plains Independent Booksellers award, and the novels The Fruit of Stone and An Unfinished Life, which was chosen by the Rocky Mountain News as the Best Book of 2004. He has taught at MIU and in the MFA at Pacific University.

• READING, Q & A
  MARK SPRAGG & MARY SWANDER
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM CT

Tonight we will hear a reading by two luminaries of the literary world who both are rooted in earth and real life while also exploring magical and mystical realms, albeit in a quirky, uniquely whimsical way. Mark Spragg is back for a reading after teaching you a lengthy master class all afternoon. Tonight he is joined by Mary Swander, former Iowa poet laureate, whose connection to the land is centered on the Midwest rather than the West. The reading will be followed by an informal Q & A.

SUNDAY, Feb. 14

• MASTER CLASS with MARK SPRAGG
  Point of View in Narrative Story Telling
  Time: 1 PM - 4 PM CT

Mark Spragg is joining us for another master class. Mark Spragg is a well-known memoirist and novelist who has taught at MIU and in MFA programs such as the one at Pacific University.

Mark has spent the last five years working on a new novel, which is told in a number of different points of view. Yesterday, Mark told you about his new novel, which is told in a number of different points of view. He discussed his process in creating voices for his characters and how he submerged in his characters' worlds to achieve authenticity. Today, Mark will talk in detail about his own journey and "story" as a writer, his craft and creative process. He may touch upon the difference between writing memoir (creative nonfiction) or fiction, writing from life, how to translate memory into authentic material on the page, how to disguise memory and rework it as fiction, how to make up characters and stories from scratch, how to craft a writing life, how to sell your manuscript, and more. The afternoon master class with Mark Spragg will continue with a Q & A.

• PANEL with Mark Spragg & Mary Swander
  A Book's Earth & Sky
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM

Tonight, last night's readers, Mark Spragg and Mary Swander, are back with a panel called "A Book's Earth & Sky." In this panel, they will discuss the rootedness of their work to the world of the senses, to setting, to the land (the West and Midwest respectively). They will also take the panel's title metaphorically: What are the tangibles and intangibles that make a good book, that make a book's world come to life, that transform a reader? We welcome back Mark and Mary. This session includes Q & A with the audience.

MONDAY, Feb. 15

MENTOR READING
plus Q & A
with Sasha Kamini Parmasad, Susan Smith Daniels, Rustin Larson
Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM CT

This evening, your semester mentorships will give a reading of their work and will be available for a Q & A about their creative process, their writing background, their books. Mentors will also touch on their pedagogical approach in teaching their mentorships. This is a great opportunity to meet our MFA mentors and ask any questions you want!

TUESDAY, Feb. 16

• READING
  Fiction & Creative Nonfiction
  with Jennie Rothenberg Gritz, Eric Boyd, N. J. Campbell
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM CT

This evening we offer you a reading of fiction and creative nonfiction by a few former MIU students and alumni who have made their way in the writing world. Jennie Rothenberg Gritz is Senior Editor at Smithsonian Magazine and before that was Senior Editor at The Atlantic. She has a journalism degree from U.C. Berkely. Eric Boyd received his MFA from The Foundry in New York City and has been anthologized in Prison Noir, an anthology edited by Joyce Carol Oates. N. J. Campbell published his first novel, Found Audio, with Two Dollar Radio. It was touted as a "debut to watch for" by Publisher's Weekly.

WEDNESDAY, Feb. 17

• PANEL
  Diversity & Creativity
  with Loretta Diane Walker, Sasha Kamini Parmasad, and Ben McClendon
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM CT

Tonight's panel explores creative process through diverse perspectives. How is it to embark on the writing life if yours is a minority voice? We have with us tonight three writers and educators who represent different minority perspectives. Loretta, Ben, and Sasha will tell you about their journeys as writers and how they approach their creative process. They may also touch on larger themes: the importance of telling stories that may be marginalized or overlooked, their experience with silencing, and what they want to do, as BIPOC or LGBTQ poets and writers, to give voice to the diversity of our culture.

Loretta Diane Walker is the author of In This House and Word Ghetto. She has been included in Her Texas, an anthology of 60 Texas women poets. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and has won many awards. She also is an educator.

Ben McClendon is assistant director of this MFA. He holds a PhD from the University of Tennessee in Poetry and Rhetoric. He has been published in numerous literary journals such as Rattle, Indiana Review, The Chariton Review, Stirring, Zone 3, and Redivider.

Sasha Kamini Parmasad was born and raised in Trinidad and Tobago where she performed her own songs and music from a young age on stage with her family. She holds an MFA from Columbia University. Her first book of poetry, No Poem, was published with Yuganta Press.

THURSDAY, Feb. 18

POETRY READING
with Loretta Diane Walker, Diane Frank, Rustin Larson, & Steven Schneider
Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM CT

Tonight we offer you a poetry reading by some of MIU's former faculty, Steven Schneider and Diane Frank, by current faculty mentor, Rustin Larson, and by our special guest, Loretta Diane Walker.

FRIDAY, Feb. 19

• PRESENTATION
  Blue Light Press Presentation
  Time: 7:30 PM - 8:30 PM

Tonight, poet and former MIU faculty Diane Frank will offer presentation about the workings of literary presses, how to submit, what literary presses are looking for, and how the literary press world works. She will particularly feature her own literary press, Blue Light Press. Blue Light Press is a collective of poets and artists based in the San Francisco Bay Area who produce artistically designed books. Blue Light Press is dedicated to the publication of poetry, fiction, and flash fiction that is imagistic, inventive, emotionally honest, and pushes the language to a deeper level of insight. Our MFA mentor Rustin Larson has published with Blue Light Press, as have several of our alumni, including poet and musician David Proctor Hurlin. Several of our faculty have been included in Blue Light Press anthologies, such as River of Earth & Sky, including Rustin Larson and Nynke Passi.

SATURDAY, Feb. 20

• NARRATIVE WORKSHOP
  with Eric Boyd and N. J. Campbell
  Time: 10 AM - 12 PM CT

This morning you have a chance to workshop some of your fiction or narrative creative nonfiction with former MIU students and writers, Eric Boyd and N. J. Campbell, who were part of Tuesday night's Fiction reading. Eric Boyd received his MFA from The Foundry in New York City and has been anthologized in Prison Noir, an anthology edited by Joyce Carol Oates. N. J. Campbell published his first novel, Found Audio, with the well-respected literary press Two Dollar Radio. Found Audio was touted as a "debut to watch for" by Publisher's Weekly. These two authors are offering a special method of workshopping that Eric learned at The Foundry, This means that today's fiction workshop follows a particular format and does not leave you a choice re. your model of workshopping. This workshop format is neutral and can lead to surprising revelations.

• READING, Q & A with SUSANNE PAOLA ANTONETTA
  The Terrible Unlikelihood of Our Being Here
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM CT

“Susanne Antonetta’s latest masterpiece is a divinely composed ode to the ‘ungovernable emanations’ that are our selves. Gorgeously poetic, deadpan and inquisitive, terrifying and engrossing, The Terrible Unlikelihood of Our Being Here bridges the distance between physics and the occult, psychology and spiritualism. Antonetta’s road trip to a Summerland of the soul is inspiring, unforgettable, and indispensable.” —Mary Cappello, author of Life Breaks In: A Mood Almanack

“In mesmerizing and gorgeous prose, Antonetta tackles nothing less than consciousness and existence, employing an amalgam of science writing and mysticism. It’s hard to imagine another writer who could not only make such a project work but also make it seem natural and necessary.” —Robin Hemley, author of Borderline Citizen: Dispatches from the Outskirts of Nationhood

At their family’s New Jersey seaside cottages, Susanne Paola Antonetta’s grandmother led seances, swam nude, and imaginatively created a spiritualist paradise on earth. In The Terrible Unlikelihood of Our Being Here, Antonetta chronicles how in that unique but tightly controlled space, she began to explore the questions posed by her family’s Christian Science beliefs, turning those questions secular: What is consciousness? Does time exist? And does the world we see reflect reality? In this book, scientific research, family story, and memoir intertwine to mimic the indefinable movements of quantum particles.

Antonetta reflects on a life spent wrestling with bipolar disorder, drug dependency, and the trauma of electroshock treatment—exploring these experiences alongside conversations with some of the world’s leading neuroscientists and physicists, and with psychics. The result is a meditation on the legacy of family, on thought and being, and what we humans can actually ever really know about our world.

SATURDAY, Feb. 20

• OPEN READING
  For and with all of you!
  Time: 7:30 PM - 9:45 PM CT

Tonight welcome our students to take the stage and share with us some of their work. We look forward to hearing your voices, and we hold a safe space for YOU. Welcome to the stage! This is the beginning of your life as a writer. We are so excited that you are embarking on this journey with us and can't wait to watch you grow and transform in our program.