Writing Workshop: Gothic Love Poetry with Zinnia Smith

Gothic Love Poetry

Morbid. But we sort of love it? Many writers have infused their romantic verse not only with a sense of longing but also a sense of dread. Journeys end in lovers meeting, so to say, except that lover turns out to be a genuine haunted house wanting to entrap you forever within its domestic space (The Haunting of Hill House). Look, relationships aren’t perfect. But if you look at a misty October evening, romanticize your lonely walks in the fall rain, eternally play Kate Bush’s “Wuthering Heights,” or ruminate on the aching beauty in a break-up, the blender mix of grief and longing, this class might be for youWhere there is beauty there is decay! The flowers droop, and that itself is a beautiful thing. For the gothic hearts amongst us, there is something natural and stunning in the eternal love stretching from this life to the next.

First half of this two-hour writing workshop will involve reading complicated love poetry, collecting dark and autumnal imagery as we go along. Second half of the workshop will offer generative writing prompts. This will also be the perfect workshop if you have previously taken a love poetry class and would like to goth-ify your verse. But no worries– we’ll all leave the workshop in the high-spirited abundance of decay.

Music will be played. Nobody will make you read anything aloud. Bring your pens and paper.

Snacks+NA bevs will be provided by Cambridge Naturals. Guests are welcome to BYO outside food/drinks as well.

Zinnia Smith (she/they) is a writer and educator from Somerville. She's published with TSR: The Southampton Review, Voicemail Poems, and Peach Mag, among others. Her writing is featured in the speculative anthology, Worlds in Which. She won Fugue's 2018 writing contest for prose and was long listed for the Ralph Angel Poetry Prize by Foundlings Press in 2022. She’s taught writing and literature for years, and most recently was a 2024 Mass Cultural Council Grant for Creative Individuals recipient. She’s passionate about the collaborative efforts of multicultural classroom spaces and arts communities, and through mentors, her disability became a wisdom and guide in these practices.

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