April 23rd Meeting
Join us April 23rd, 2025 for our next meeting
Dinner 5:30
Presentation 6:30
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The Poetic Line and "Sacred" Language
With Ryler Dustin
Join us for an exploration about what makes language feel poetic, special, or "sacred" in the etymological sense of being set apart or different from the ordinary. Our conversation will focus on the uses of the poetic line for heightening and intensifying language, including how some poets manage to engage us line after line. But it will also be relevant for prose writers seeking to intensify their prose, and readers/editors/publishers who want to look under the hood and discuss what makes some language feel "poetic."
Ryler Dustin is the author of the poetry collections Heavy Lead Birdsong (Write Bloody Publishing, 2009) and Trailer Park Psalms (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023), which was awarded the Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize. After winning the right to represent Seattle in the Individual World Poetry Slam, he placed eighth among the world's best spoken word artists, and his poems appear in places like Verse Daily, Gulf Coast, The Best of Iron Horse, and Major Jackson's podcast The Slowdown. He holds an MFA from the University of Houston and a PhD from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. After living in Spain, Michigan, Jack Kerouac's former home, and an off-grid cabin in the Oregon wilderness, he returned to his hometown of Bellingham with his wife and a dog he met while hiking.
​​Note We will now be meeting at Buffalo Wild Wings at the Bellis Fair Mall. They have a side room that is double or more than that of the old location. RESERVATIONS are required so that we are properly staffed to eat quickly.​
New to WWP
Welcome, Pacific Northwest Writers!
We meet every last Wednesday from September to June in scenic Bellingham, WA. Supper starts at 5:30, and the speaker starts at 6:30-7.
Dues are 25 dollars a year or 40 for two years. We use the dues to pay for our speakers to come from around the region, and for an occasional table at local writer events. Our dues year runs from September to June, like our meetings, but will roll over if you pay late in the cycle. If you want to try us out first, feel free. Speakers in the past have included authors Cami Ostman and Robert Dugoni, and agent Donald Maass, covering topics such as social media, self-publishing, memoirs, mixed media, poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. It is our goal to offer something for everyone, no matter your place in the writing journey-- just starting or long-published. Old school or new. If you have an idea for a speaker or topic, let us know, but if it has been covered recently it might not be picked up.
Pay your dues
25 for 1 year
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40 for 2 years
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40 for couples
To pay online, please provide name and email address on the form so we can keep track of you.
We have a paypal account if you would prefer to pay on line. You can also pay by check; just drop it off with the treasurer at a meeting.
