An Arizona-based poet is trading desert for rainforest to host a series of free poetry workshops in Sitka this month.
Jodie Hollander is a poet and educator who has taught workshops in national parks since 2018. She says a visit to Walnut Canyon National Monument, near Flagstaff, Arizona, inspired her to start a program she calls “Poetry in the Parks.”
“I thought gosh, wouldn’t it be an incredible place to write?” Hollander said. “I thought about this idea of connecting people with their public lands through poetry and giving them the opportunity to deepen that connection by writing poems in inspirational places.”
Hollander has since hosted workshops across Arizona and California – and when a Walnut Canyon ranger familiar with Sitka suggested she consider Sitka National Historical Park, she jumped on the opportunity. She’ll be hosting three workshops against Sitka’s backdrop of forest and ocean, where participants will write poems inspired by the landscape.
“I think using the inspiration of the beautiful space around them, or us, is an opportunity to really connect with something authentic within ourselves, something in nature that speaks to us, and sometimes that emerges on its own,” Hollander said. “We need to just get out of the way and let the poem speak.”
Hollander says participants don’t need a background in poetry to get something out of the workshop.
“These workshops are for everyone, no experience required,” she said. “Even if you have the smallest inkling of interest in poetry, I would really encourage you to come.”
The first workshop is Saturday, March 16 at 1 p.m. at the Sitka National Historical Park Visitor’s Center, with additional workshops March 21 and 23. For more information, check the Sitka National Historical Park Facebook page.
Listen to the full interview with KCAW’s Erin Fulton below.
