This workshop was offered in 2026. Sign up for our email list to receive updates for the 2027 conference.
Bridges Between:
A Poetry Workshop
Writing Workshop in New Jersey
January 16-19, 2026
Led by Jan Beatty
As writers, we want to explore the highways of our unspoken dreams—networks of pleasure, unarticulated bridges between us, our tunnel of redemption. How do we avoid distant, vague language and find pathways to the fire beneath our lines? Through writing prompts and reading inspiring poems, we’ll jump-start memory and break through self-censorship with word choice, details, line breaks and intuitive associations. We’ll share our writing in a welcoming and supportive space as we receive constructive feedback. Feel free to bring drafts or fragments of poems, or start something entirely new. This workshop is open to writers of all levels.
*Limited to just 10 participants.*
“It was wonderful to feel welcomed as a newcomer, while getting the sense that I had joined a larger community. I wrote four great poems and a lot of new material; hopefully I met lifelong friends! Thank you so much.”
~ Maria, Myrtle Beach, SC
Jan Beatty
Jan Beatty’s eighth book, Dragstripping, was published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in September 2024. Her memoir, American Bastard, won the Red Hen Nonfiction Award. Recent books include The Body Wars (University of Pittsburgh, 2020) and a chapbook, Skydog (Lefty Blondie Press, 2022). Other work includes Jackknife: New and Selected Poems (University of Pittsburgh, 2018 Paterson Prize) named by Sandra Cisneros on LitHub as her favorite book of 2019. Beatty’s work has been published in the Atlantic, the New York Times Sunday Magazine, POETRY, BuzzFeed, North American Review and Best American Poetry. Beatty worked as a waitress, abortion counselor and in maximum security prisons. She is Professor Emerita at Carlow University, where she directed creative writing, the Madwomen in the Attic workshops and the MFA program. Read a poem by Jan and learn more on her website.
