Q&A: Jenny Molberg of Ploughshares
The new editor in chief of Ploughshares discusses her vision for expanding the journal’s digital format and its community.
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Genre: Poetry
The Time Is Now: Writing Prompts and Exercises
Write a sparrow poem, a story about the loss of self during a period of social upheaval, or a series of vignettes that look back on several past jobs you’ve had.
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Still Alive
In her elegiac poem “the rites for Cousin Vit,” Gwendolyn Brooks captures the aliveness of a loved one as she lays in her casket. Brooks writes: “Even now she does the snake-hips with a hiss, / Slops the bad wine across her shantung, talks / Of pregnancy, guitars and bridgework, walks.” Write a poem that captures the vibrant, unmistakable presence of someone you remember vividly, whether they are near or far, alive or gone. Focus on the small, lively details that make them unique: their gestures, their voice, the habits that linger in your memory. Consider how these fragments—imperfect, intimate, and raw—keep that person alive in your mind.
Writing on Grief: Transforming Loss Into Art
The author of Indigo (Copper Canyon Press, 2020) reflects on how writers can turn grief into literature.
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REC.ON Ecovillage Artist & Writing Residency
The REC.ON Ecovillage Artist & Writing Residency offers two- to four-week residencies year-round to poets, fiction writers, creative nonfiction writers, and translators in the picturesque village of La Mata de Bolaimí near the Sierra María–Los Vélez mountains in Andalucía, Spain. Residents are provided with a private single- or double-occupancy room in a restored rural house and have shared access to a kitchen, a living room, a permaculture garden, and outdoor writing spaces. Residents can also work in the REC.ON gallery, a coworking and exhibition space for focused writing.
Type:
RESIDENCY
Ignore Event Date Field?:
yes
Event Date:
February 13, 2026
Rolling Admissions:
yes
Application Deadline:
February 13, 2026
Financial Aid?:
no
Financial Aid Application Deadline:
February 13, 2026
Free Admission:
no
Contact Information:
REC.ON Ecovillage Artist & Writing Residency, Paraje Bolaimí s/n 04820 Vélez Rubio, Almería, Spain. Paulina Bielecka, Owner.
Paulina Bielecka
Owner
Contact City:
Vélez Rubio, Almería
Country:
ES
List og Land Northern Lights Residency
The List og Land Northern Lights Residency offered three-week residencies from October 1 to October 24 and from November 1 to November 24 at Laugaból Farm on Arnarfjörður, a fjord in Iceland, to poets, fiction writers, creative nonfiction writers, and translators. Residents who lodged at the farmhouse were provided with a double-occupancy room, two shared bathrooms, a full kitchen, a dining room, and a living room.
Type:
RESIDENCY
Ignore Event Date Field?:
yes
Event Date:
February 13, 2026
Rolling Admissions:
ignore
Application Deadline:
February 13, 2026
Financial Aid?:
no
Financial Aid Application Deadline:
February 13, 2026
Free Admission:
no
Contact Information:
List og Land Northern Lights Residency, Laugaból 0, 466 Bildadalur, Westfjörds, Iceland. (323) 552-1294. Leslie Schwartz, Cofounder.
Leslie Schwartz
Cofounder
Contact City:
Arnarfjörður
Country:
IS
Kaatsbaan Weekend Retreats
The Kaatsbaan Weekend Retreats offered three-day residencies from October 3 to October 5 and from November 21 to November 23 at Kaatsbaan Cultural Park, a 153-acre artist sanctuary in Tivoli, New York, to poets, fiction writers, creative nonfiction writers, and translators. Residents were provided with private motel-style rooms, which included a desk, an en suite bathroom, and views of the surrounding countryside, in the Dancers’ Inn.
Type:
RESIDENCY
Ignore Event Date Field?:
yes
Event Date:
February 13, 2026
Rolling Admissions:
yes
Application Deadline:
February 13, 2026
Financial Aid?:
no
Financial Aid Application Deadline:
February 13, 2026
Free Admission:
no
Contact Information:
Kaatsbaan Weekend Retreats, Kaatsbaan Cultural Park, P.O. Box 482, Tivoli, NY 12583. (845) 757-5106, ext. 17. Adam Weinert, Residency and Events Manager.
Adam Weinert
Residency and Events Manager
Contact City:
Tivoli
Contact State:
NY
Contact Zip / Postal Code:
12583
Country:
US
SoCal Poets Lester Graves Lennon and Sehba Sarwar
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In this Poetry.LA video, Altadena co-poets laureate Lester Graves Lennon and Sehba Sarwar read a selection of their poems and speak about how the Eaton Fire has affected their lives and community. Lennon and Sarwar were recently awarded a fellowship from the Academy of American Poets to launch their poetry project “After the Fires: Healing from Histories.”
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The Poem I Wish I Had Read: For What Binds Us
Caption:
“There are names for what binds us: / strong forces, weak forces. / Look around, you can see them.” Danusha Laméris reads and talks about “For What Binds Us” by Jane Hirshfield and shares why this poem is meaningful to her for “The Poem I Wish I Had Read” series in this video from the Boutelle-Day Poetry Center at Smith College.
Genre:
Beyond Stability
“I often think of poetry as something that is beyond the true and the false,” says poet and critic Michael Leong on what he feels is true about the art of poetry in a Literary Hub interview with Peter Mishler. “Poetry’s strangeness is so tied up with how it productively messes with what we previously thought were stable truths and stable falsehoods.” Taking inspiration from this notion that poetry exists in a space that is “beyond the true and the false,” write a poem that explores a seemingly stable truth or falsehood, one that you may be interested in interrogating and undermining. Experiment with using surrealist imagery, playing with expanding far out into the white space of the page to stretch further into the incongruity of your subject.
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