Transmuting Rage and Grief:
a pop-up poetry writing workshop
What do we do with our outrage and grief when we are unable to join protests? When signing petitions and calling our reps doesn't cut it? When we still feel the roiling of rage beneath the skin? When we feel saturated with grief and the tears won't stop? What do we do with it all?
We turn to poetry.
The power of poetry helps us to channel the grief and rage that we experience on the physical, mental, and emotional levels. It captures—or at least comes close to—expressing what is within. It helps us find the words to say the thing that feels unnamable.
And when we can do this, when we can turn to poetry, we can transmute that energy into art that can, not only help us to move through these cycles, but make a difference for another who might not be able to name or understand their own rage and grief.
Join me this Sunday, 2-4pm ET on zoom for a special pop-up poetry workshop to help us harness the power of poetry through our own writing, through our own words that may help us move through our grief and rage so that we may be strengthened in our resolve to fight for the liberation of all.
Transmuting Rage and Grief
a pop-up poetry writing workshop
Sunday, January 18, 2026
2-4pm ET
on zoom* // $40
*a recording will be made available
About your facilitator:
Leslieann Hobayan is a Filipina-American poet, essayist, activist, and host of Spiritual Grit, a podcast at the intersection of spirituality and activism. She is the author of the chapbook, Divorce Papers: A Slow Burn (Finishing Line Press, 2023). Nominated for a Pushcart Prize and a 2018 Best of the Net, her work has appeared in The Rumpus, Aster(ix) Journal, The Grief Diaries, The Lantern Review, The Mom Egg Review, The World I Leave You: Asian American Poets on Faith and Spirit, and elsewhere. She has been awarded the 2025 NJ State Council for the Arts poetry fellowship, along with fellowships from the Vermont Studio Center, Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and artist grants from Community of Writers and the Bread Loaf Orion Environmental Writers Conference. She teaches at Rutgers University.