Our 3rd Tuesday Workshop and Open Mic features local college student Grace Wildflower.
About Grace
Grace Wildflower (she/her) is a 4th year CSU student studying Human Development and Family Studies and the previous president of the CSU poetry club, Dead Poets Society. She is also an assistant teacher and feels passionately about helping people, working with kids, and poetry. She has actively shared her writing for three years and has had some of her work published in the GuloGulo anthologies and zInes made by Dead Poets Society.
Q&A with venus
GuloGulo: How did you get started writing poetry?
Grace: I started exploring poetry my senior year of high school after seeing a lot of poetry online. I was mostly exploring free form and writing about what I was experiencing at the time. After moving to CO and starting college at CSU, I joined Dead Poets Society and started exploring writing with prompts and sharing my poetry out loud for the first time.
GuloGulo: Can you share a few words about your style and focus of your work? Grace: I am constantly inspired by the world around me and my own experiences, and I primarily write in freeform. I like to write in this form because it lets go of the rules I grew up learning about when it came to writing and allows me to fully express the beauty I see in the world and explore my own complex experiences. Poetry is a form of self-expression for me, and free form gives me the most creative room, but I strongly believe poetry can be anything and lives in everything and has the power to help people feel less alone.
GuloGulo: Can you share more about the poetry scene at CSU?
Grace: I would not be the poet I am today without Dead Poets Society; this is a truly amazing organization on campus. Through this club, I was able to get comfortable sharing my poetry with other poets and gain confidence reading my poems out loud. It was through this club that I was connected to GuloGulo and all the wonderful opportunities they offer. College gets busy, but this organization helped me prioritize my writing even in the busiest of times.
GuloGulo: What do you hope people will take away from your workshop and featured set?
Grace: I hope people who participate in my workshop are able to feel connected to a meaningful relationship they have experienced that they perhaps forgot about or take time to fully appreciate the impact someone has had on their life. From my feature set, I hope people learn a little bit about who my grandma was and the impact she has had on my life. The workshop and the poems I will be sharing are to honor my grandma, who has Alzheimer’s, and my poems are all inspired by my relationship with her.
GuloGulo: Where do you hope to take your art in the future?
Grace: Writing is something I do because I love it and for fun; I never hope to be great or master it but to always enjoy it. Someday I do hope to write and publish my own poetry book for myself and for the people who relate to my writings.
Join Us: Sept. 15 at Wolverine Farm
Please join us for the workshop, open mic, and a featured set by Grace Wildflower! The evening is part of GuloGulo’s signature program, the Journey of the Poem, our weekly rotation designed to move a writer’s work from initial spark to public performance. The third Tuesday is our Open Mic night, and it’s one of the most alive evenings in Fort Collins poetry.
Here’s how the night will unfold:
4 pm – Grace will lead a workshop inspired by her work.
6 pm – Open Mic with Featured Middle Set by Grace – Hosted by Miss Melissa!
The open mic is free and open to all. Bring poems. Take the stage. Performances are limited to 5 minutes, and we ask that poets with sensitive content offer a brief content note before beginning.
Both events take place at Wolverine Farm Publick House (516 N. College Ave.) in downtown Fort Collins. Free and open to the public. Come for the poems. Stay for the community.
