A poem is a gesture toward home.
-Jericho Brown
As Brown suggests in his poem “Duplex,” the act of writing poetry can allow us to reach towards a sense of self & belonging. In this course, we will consider the relationship between place and home. We’ll look towards the material world around us, the people in our lives, our communities, nature, and systems of obstruction & oppression as avenues through which to interpret the concept of “home.” We will discuss a selection of poems interpreting “home” in different ways, and the course will end with a generative writing exercise.
Hannah Smith is originally from Dallas, where she now works for Southwest Review. She was a 2023 National Poetry Series Finalist and Jake Adam York Semifinalist, and her poems have been published in Best New Poets, Gulf Coast, Ninth Letter, Image, and elsewhere. She received an MFA from the Ohio State University, where she served as the Managing Editor for The Journal. Her collaborative chapbook, Metal House of Cards, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press.