“I Measure Every Grief I Meet”: A Workshop on Grief Poetry

Emily Dickinson—perhaps the best-known Victorian poet—wrote frequently on death, grief, and mourning as did other poets of the age, from Walt Whitman to Lydia Sigourney, the “Sweet Singer of Hartford.”

In this two-hour workshop, we will read and discuss grief poems from Dickinson and many modern and contemporary poets, including W.H. Auden, Robert Frost, Lucille Clifton, Natasha Trethaway, Mary Oliver, and Marie Howe. We will spend time in the special exhibition Dearly Departed: Mourning & Memory, and also draft and share grief poems of our own.

Space is limited. Advanced registration is required. $10 suggested donation at the door.

About the Presenter

B. Fulton Jennes is poet laureate emerita of Ridgefield, CT, and poet-in-residence at the Aldrich Museum. Her poems have appeared widely in literary journals and anthologies, and her collection Blinded Birds (Finishing Line Press) received the 2022 International Book Award for a poetry chapbook. Another chapbook, FLOWN—poems about her sister’s terminal illness and death—will be published by Porkbelly Press in 2024. Jennes’ poem “Glyphs of a Gentle Going” won the 2022 Lascaux Prize.

Dearly Departed: Mourning and Memory, and its related programs, are made possible by the generous support of Oak Lawn Cemetery & Arboretum and Spear Miller Funeral Home.