Sue Sinclair, in this writing workshop, shows it's possible to approach poetry less as an outpouring of the self and more as a pouring of the world through the self and onto the page. We can think of the world as being filled with languages of various kinds—the aural languages of wind and rain and traffic, and the non-verbal languages of smell, shape or posture. What is a flower saying with its scent? What are the eyes on a butterfly's wings saying? What is a winding road saying about the land it winds through? What does a straight highway say about the land?

We can think of poetry as the act of translating the world around us. The poet's task, then, is to be receptive to its various languages and to become a fluent translator, while respecting the limits on our fluency. In this workshop we will read poems that explore the idea of poetry as translation-of-world, and we will ourselves play with the possibilities and limits of this approach. Poets both new and experienced are welcome.