Join YpsiWrites and retired EMU Professor of English and Women's and Gender Studies Elisabeth Däumer, along with poet and clinical social worker David Boeving, in an exploration of the poetry of Muriel Rukeyser. Rukeyser viewed poetry as an emotional and mental resource in times of personal and public crisis. She believed resistance to poetry was an expression of fear. For Rukeyser, fears could be “useful” in both creative and emotional ways if we explore them, give them voice, “talk” and respond to them, and just simply work with them.
A question she often asked herself was, “Am I using all my fears?” This session, grounded in Rukeyser’s work, will explore how we might creatively use poetry to explore and give voice to our fears. Professor Däumer will introduce some of Rukeyser’s ideas about poetry, lead us in reading some of her poems, and then, along with David Boeving, engage us in writing, or some other form of creative expression, focused on responding to and using our fears.
Saturday, April 6, 2024, 10:00 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. via Zoom