Upcoming workshops, classes, and conferences:

“A Crash Course in the Lyric Essay” online “at” Charlotte Lit.  Tuesday 28 April and 5 May from 6:00 – 8:00 pm ET.

This class takes a short but deep look at the lyric essay. What makes an essay “lyric”? What are the benefits of using imagery and intuition to explore a line of thought instead of narrative and exposition? In this two-part class we will discuss both the pleasures and challenges of the lyric essay. We’ll look at some of the myriad forms a lyric essay can take (flash, segmented, braided, and hermit crab), read some short examples, consider the ways form can intensify content, and do some generative writing towards a few lyric essays of our own. This course is open to all levels; just come ready to read, write – and play.

“Journaling with The Book of Alchemy” online “at” Politics and Prose, September 2026 (link TK).

“Living a Writerly Life” with  New Directions (2025-6)

Upcoming (university/postgraduate):

“Essay Forms: From Familiar to Lyric,” MFA in Nonfiction, Goucher College

Past teaching:

University:

MFA in Nonfiction, Goucher College

Essay Forms: From Familiar to Lyric (2021-present)

Low-Residency MFA in Creative Writing Program, West Virginia Wesleyan College

Summer, Winter Residency (2020-present)

American University (2019-2021)

Creative Writing: Nonfiction (August-December 2020
Introduction to Creative Writing (January-May 2020)
Independent study: “Essaying on the Edge of Poetry” (January-May 2020)
Creative Writing: Nonfiction (August-December 2019)

East Carolina University (2019)

Advanced Nonfiction Writing

American University (2001-2009)

Full-time instructor of three writing courses each term (honors and non-honors composition courses, composition courses for students with learning disabilities, introductory creative writing and creative nonfiction courses, honors colloquia), service on department committees, advising and mentoring

New York University (1998-2001)

Expository Writing Program — Instructor of honors and non-honors composition courses for first-year students
Creative Writing Program — Instructor of introductory classes of creative writing

Other past teaching:

“Writing through Wintering” online at Politics and Prose.  Four stand alone classes in November, December, January, and February.

“Segmented Essays: When the Whole is Greater than the Sum of Its Parts” online at Charlotte Lit.  Tuesday 5 December 2023

“The Shape of Things to Come: How Playing with Form Can Invigorate Creative Nonfiction Work,” Chautauqua Writers’ Center, 24-28 July 2023

Creative Nonficiton at the Wildacres Writers Workshop, Little Switzerland, NC, 8 – 15 July 2023

Writing Lyric Essays with A Harp in the Stars online “at” Politics and Prose, 10, 17, 24,31 May from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. ET

Listing Your Way to a (Lyric) Essay at the Bay to Ocean Conference, 4 March

Writing “Shapely” Essays with Meander, Spiral, Explode online “at” Politics and Prose, 1, 8, 15, 22 March from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. ET

“A Crash Course in the Lyric Essay” online through the Charlotte Center for Literary Arts (Charlotte Lit)  (December 2022)

“Diving into the Lyric Essay” online through the Lafayette Writers Studio (22 October 2022)

“Writing Lyric Essays with A Harp in the Stars,” an online class through Politics & Prose (August 2022)

“The Long and Winding Road: Publishing an Essay Collection” at HippoCamp (the creative nonfiction conference run by Hippocampus Magazine); Carmen Maria Machado will be the keynote speaker (12 – 14 August 2022)

Various workshops with New Directions (2019-2023)

Creative Nonficiton at the Wildacres Writers Workshop, in person at the Wildacres retreat in Little Switzerland,  North Carolina (9 – 16 July 2022)

“Crash Course in the Lyric Essay,” an online class through Alongside (Saturday 9 April from 12 :00 – 2:00 p.m. EST )

“Writing Lyric Essays with A Harp in the Stars,” an online class through Politics & Prose (four Wednesdays: 10, 17 November [skip 24], and 1, 8 December, from 6 to 8 p.m. ET)

The Pleasures and Practices of Journaling: Creative Ways to Write and Draw Your Life, Politics and Prose (online, 18 July – 8 August 2021, Sundays, 10:00 a.m. – noon ET)

Segmented Essays: When the Whole Is Greater than the Sum of Its Parts, Thursdays with ESWA, (online, 3 June, 7:30 p.m. ET)

Segmented Essays: When the Whole Is Greater than The Sum of Its Parts, Bay to Ocean Writer’s Conference, 20 March 2021, 2:15 p.m. ET

The Shape of Things to Come: How Playing with Form Can Invigorate Creative Nonfiction Work, Chautauqua Institution (online) – 10-14 August 2020

The Ins and Outs of the Braided Essay, Market Street Writers (online) — Saturday 1 August 2020

Cherry Tree Young Writers’ Conference, Rose O’Neill Literary House, Washington College (online) – 14-19 July 2020

Writing in (an extra)ordinary time, Washington National Cathedral (online) — Sunday 12 July 2020

Spring into Summer: Writing through a Change of Season, Washington National Cathedral (online) — Sunday 31 May 2020

The “Hermit Crab” Essay: How to Use Borrowed Forms to Structure Your Work, Market Street Writers (online) — Saturday 30 May 2020

Cedar Ridge Writers

Leading the workshop “The Art of the Hybrid: Using Creative Forms to Shape Essays and Memoirs,” Bedminster, NJ (21 September 2019)

HippoCamp (the creative nonfiction conference run by Hippocampus Magazine) Lancaster, PA (25 August 2019)

Leading the workshop “Crafting the Lyric Essay”

Emerging Writers Festival, Alexandria, VA (16-18 August 2019)

Leading the workshop “After the Art” at the Atheneum

Politics and Prose Bookstore, in Washington, DC for “The Pleasures and Practices of Journaling” (June-July 2019, September-October 2018)

HippoCamp: A Conference for Creative Nonfiction Writers, in Lancaster, PA, for “Crafting the Lyric Essay” (August 2018)

HippoCamp: A Conference for Creative Nonfiction Writers, in Lancaster, PA, for “Worries of the Poet, Tools of the Essayist” (August 2017)

The Writer’s Center, Bethesda, MD for classes on memoir, spiritual memoir, and “From Private Diaries to Public Writing” (2010-11)

The Center for Prayer and Pilgrimage at the Washington National Cathedral for spiritual writing gatherings and writing-based pilgrimages.