“Sonnet Crash Course”

Maybe extra time to sit at home and ponder has you feeling reflective, fathoms deep—newly aware of how, like Walt Whitman, you contain multitudes. These introspective, brooding times are all but tailor-made for a classic creative outlet: poetry. If you’re unsure about whether to begin with an aubade or an ode, a workshop could be just the thing to help your creative musings take form. Enter the Writer’s Center, a stalwart of the D.C. area literary scene since 1976. For one of its four single-shot poetry classes this month, the Writer’s Center is reprising its “Sonnet Crash Course” taught by poet Claudia Gary. Participants will dive into the three-hour session by reading classic and contemporary sonnets before penning and revising their own poems with the aid of the archetypal 14-line structure to tame the wilderness of a blank page. Writers often work in isolation, but creative camaraderie nurtures genius. So if you, like the Bard, all alone beweep your outcast state, or like William Wordsworth, wander lonely as a cloud, join a group of creatives to forge a new collective bond through verse. Even Emily Dickinson found ways to escape isolation without leaving her bedroom. The class begins at 10 a.m. on April 17 via Zoom. Registration is available at writer.org. $40–$50.