July | Hot and Heavy: Writing Love & Sex Poems That Will Actually Get Published and Have Readers Begging for More
This workshop is brought to you by award winning poet Shannan Mann and will run from July 1 - July 25, 2024.
No, editors aren’t all prudes or anti-romantics who don’t want your passionate poetry. And yes, readers are dirty as heck and would love to read more exciting and authentic love and sex poems. This workshop will help you craft a set of love and sex poems that are true to who you are while also focusing on how to get them out into the world.
Workshop takeaways
Learn the hot and heavy history of the love/sex poem
Discuss how love and/or sex in poetry goes beyond physicality and romance
Learn how to shadow-write based on your favorite poet’s work in order to maximize creativity and inspiration
Transform drafts through an exercise in focalization
Understand the editorial “Machine” concept and build a personal glossary and thesaurus for your set of love and sex poems
Leave with six new poems in six different forms.
Date of optional craft chat: Saturday, July 27
Why take this class with Shannan?
I got back into writing poetry full-time in 2022. In 2023, I placed 27 poems about “Love and Sex” in wonderful places. Eight of those were honored with some kind of an award/honorable mention/finalist placement. But these are kind of external credentials. I think my true credentials are rather humble and simple and I prefer to focus on those: I’m in love with someone who is also my dearest friend and best critic/editor. I write love and sex poems so I can make them smile (and you know, dot dot dot). I’m also going through a long-winded divorce after a rather made-for-tv-bad marriage. So, what I’m trying to get at is, whether you’ve written a love and sex poem before or not, let alone whether it’s been published, I want to help you tap into the power of this vulnerable theme through poetry. We all love weirdly and beautifully. I’ll just help you write about it a little better.
Subscribe now to receive these lessons as soon as they post. As always, half of the curriculum will be free to all subscribers, with the option to upgrade and access this and all courses in full for $10/mo .
Shannan Mann has been awarded or placed for the Palette Love & Eros Prize, Rattle Poetry Prize, Auburn Witness Prize, Foster Poetry Prize, Peatsmoke Summer Contest and Pacific Spirit Poetry Prize among others. Her poems appear in Poetry Daily, Black Warrior Review, Poet Lore, Gulf Coast, The Literary Review of Canada, EPOCH, december, & elsewhere. She is the Poet Laureate’s pick for Exile. Her essays appear in Tolka Journal and Going Down Swinging; they have been awarded the Alta Lind Cook Prize and the Irene Adler Essay Prize. She also translates Sanskrit poetry. Having worked as an editor and educator for nearly a decade, she now raises her baby, studies, writes, and runs ONLY POEMS.