Poetry Lab Notes
Three Poets, One Conversation
What Is Poetry Lab?
A few years ago, Teresa Carson had an idea. What if a few far-flung poet friends met regularly on Zoom, maybe to talk about books, maybe to share writing prompts, maybe just to spend unstructured time together? She invited Jeanne Marie Beaumont and Dawn Potter to join her experiment, and Poetry Lab came into being.
Now the three of us meet once a month to discuss shared reading projects, new poem drafts, teaching and publishing experiences, museum exhibitions, aging . . . whatever strikes our fancy. As we’ve become more comfortable in this realm, both our conversations and our drafts have become richer and more entwined.
Here’s how Jeannie describes our mission:
Poetry Lab is an ongoing collaboration and conversation among three poets—
to take the measure of selected books and texts
to devise and experiment with various prompts and methods and share the results
to discuss issues and topics related to the making of art
to share what’s on our minds, be it obsessions, vexations, enthusiasms, puzzlements, dilemmas, or sorrows related to our lives as poets, as women, as citizens
to encourage, support, and uphold each other in our creative endeavors
Poetry Lab Notes
Poetry Lab Notes is a collaborative journal that will revisit some of our conversations, share writing prompts we’ve used together, and publish small sheafs of poems we’ve written under one another’s influence. It will likely include recordings, photos, links to exhibits, discussions of our other projects, and features on artists and thinkers who are affecting our own trajectory in some way.
