Don’t worry, this is not a class for precocious school students, but an opportunity to explore different sorts of poetic form, and to challenge yourself to write according to the unique conventions, restrictions and freedoms of each particular form. Many people have tried sonnets and villanelles, but what about the sestina, the pantoum, the ghazal? Or blank verse, elegy, ode? We’ll look at examples (drawn from a wide range of writers) and you’ll generate new work, sharing drafts in progress with the group and receiving feedback based on close reading of your work. We’ll also ‘off-road’ and look at unusual versions of certain poetic forms, to explore how flexible and innovative form can be.