Prose and poetry are not mutually exclusive. In this age of “scratch the surface” where few words are supposed to represent the whole idea, prose poetry is a place/strategy for telling a deeper story. It is not failed poetry or failed prose, but a genre of its own that deserves a place in our writing. We will examine (briefly) the history of prose poems and look at examples. We will create our own prose poem drafts and look at how they work to tell the stories (and secrets?) that we hold. We will look at several KINDS of prose poems and explore our own comfort zones with writing some of them.
Carol Willette Bachofner is an award-winning poet, memoirist, photographer, and watercolorist. She served as Poet Laureate of Rockland, Maine from 2012–2016. Carol is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently Test Pattern, a Fantod of Prose Poems (Finishing Line Press, 2018). She enjoys experimenting with forms and fractured forms. Carol is a facilitator for the Maine Humanities Council and a workshop presenter in person and on Zoom. She says: Poetry is a living story, always evolving but never losing sight of its parentage, its legacy.
Carol’s poetry has appeared in numerous journals, such as Prairie Schooner, The Connecticut Review, The Comstock Review, Cream City Review, DeLuge, The Mackinaw: a journal of prose poetry, as well as in the following anthologies, Dawnland Voices: An Anthology of Writings from Indigenous New England (University of Nebraska Press 2013), Enough! (Littoral Books 2020), and Wait (Littoral Books 2021).