I’m re-running the Season of Mists course, with all new prompts. It was very popular last year and it had such a lovely warm and supportive atmosphere, it made a real impression on me. I hope you’ll join me, maybe for the second time!

I have opened it up to poetry, creative non fiction and fiction writing too, and it includes access to the closed Facebook group. For those who have never attended one of my online courses, this is how it works:

1. Sign up and pay via PayPal (full instructions further down this page)
2. Once signed up you will receive a welcome letter with a link to the closed FB group. The closed group allows you to share your work with others in a completely closed environment, allowing you the benefit of group feedback without damaging your potential for publication and competition entry further down the line.
3. On the first of the month you will begin to receive lesson plans and a daily prompt directly into your inbox. These are yours to keep forever.
4. Have fun. This is a no pressure course where you can do as much or as little as you wish. The focus is on getting writing and exploring the topics and themes. There isn’t even any pressure to join in on the closed Facebook group, though I would recommend it; to date all the FB groups have been supportive and fun.

Ah, autumn. It’s almost upon us. We’ve got the darker nights and the turning leaves, the elderberries just waiting to be made into wine and the sloes just waiting to be made into sloe gin (bit of a theme emerging here) but it’s still riding on the tail end of summer. It’s a strange time of year, after the buzz and flurry of constant bird song, fledglings, flowers, crops, and sunshine it’s almost a sheer drop when we find that it’s dark by 7pm, and it’s raining and you wake up to the sound of the heating coming on, and then you notice the birds aren’t singing anymore, and the stillness and quiet gets under your skin. I feel particularly peaceful at this time of year. It’s a time of year for re-evaluating life goals. In fact, I make better resolutions in autumn than I do in the New Year. I’m lucky enough being self employed to be able to take a break from work and get outside to walk the dog during the day time. We either go down onto the beach, or round the back lanes and farms or sometimes down Forge Valley. I feel like the world belongs only to me and I take great pleasure in my time out in the fresh air. But I also miss the summer. I miss the ease of summer clothes, not really needing make up because the sun does such a good job keeping my skin tanned and fresh looking, I miss sitting out and snoozing to the sound of bees.

Of course, any change in season is a reflection of time passing: age approaches, the years go quicker, our opportunities to do the things we want to do get fewer. As a social animal, especially in this age of instantaneity and immediacy, it’s difficult to not feel angry or frustrated over the changes we see, in the world, in society, in ourselves. There’s so much pressure to do everything while we’re young, and then it’s almost as if, post forty, you start to disappear, and by fifty you’re obsolete. Newspapers and magazines seem to have the sole aim of making us feel old, and advising us on how to fool the world into appearing ten years younger, because who wants to be their age and be obsolete? We’re on the outside of the pack, suddenly, and vulnerable to attack, we’d be picked off in the zombie apocalypse.

There is power in acceptance of change, there is power in allowing ourselves to be angry, there is power in sodding the rules and doing whatever you want to do despite what society thinks of you.

About Season of Mists

In this online poetry workshop/course we’ll look at change and how it affects us. We’ll look at change in the seasons, in nature, in animals and plants, we’ll look at the frustrations of a changing society, and the way that we are manipulated by societal pressures. We’ll look at our own personal stories of change, our own anger and our own acceptance, and we’ll write warrior poems and celebration poems and poems that tell it how it is. Each week there will be a ‘lesson plan’ in which we’ll look at a poem or two by published, emerging and established authors and we’ll work our week’s writing around them. Each day you will receive a writing prompt directly to your inbox. You’ll also be invited to join a closed facebook group, which is a safe place to share poems and chat to other course participants.

You don’t need to be in the facebook group, lots of the previous course participants did not join the facebook group, nor do you need to produce anything finished, or anything at all for that matter. The prompts are there for you to choose to use or not, there is no pressure at all.

Payment Tiers

Why I have given the option to pay more

Sponsored Place – 

£20 

£40

£60

YOU CAN SPONSOR A PLACE

INSTRUCTIONS