This March, the Florida State Poets Association is hosting its annual Spring Fling, and this year it’s entirely online — and completely free.
No membership required.
This one brings together an unusually strong group of voices — from craft-focused sessions to spoken word, elegy, and narrative poetry.
What You’ll Find There
Across six days (March 26–31), you can attend any session that interests you — stay for one or come every night.
Topics include:
Using white space to deepen poems
Strengthening poems through verbs
The turning point inside a poem
Writing through loss and elegy
Narrative poetry and storytelling
Spoken word as civic expression
Submitting to contests and publications
Open mic readings and conversation
In other words: not just inspiration, but usable craft.
The Details
FSPA Spring Fling 2026
March 26 – March 31
Online via Zoom
Free
Workshop schedule:
March 26, Thursday Night—6:30pm
FSPA Leadership: Opening Remarks
March 26, Thursday Night—7:00-8:30pm
Shutta Crum: Dancing on the Page: how to free up, invigorate, and deepen your poetry through the creative use of white space.
March 27, Friday afternoon—2:00-3:30pm
Sue Brennan Walker: Of Verbs and Verse: Examining verbs and how they empower your poem.
March 27, Friday Night—7:00-8:30pm
Al Rocheleau: Growing Your Poem—Start, Change, Stop. Starting out: the subject, its objects, the fuse, the take, the poem. The layers: sound, image, flow; Anatomy of change: the turn of direction, viewpoint, destination. Choice of five exercises.
March 28, Saturday Morning—9:00-10:00am
FSPA Business Meeting: Slate of Officers, announce contests
March 28, Saturday Morning—10:30am-Noon
Susan Chambers: We will explore breaking an how it pertains to poetry: breaking in, breaking away, break dancing, breaking points, breaking apart, and breaking bread and we will enjoy a writing exercise as well.
March 28th, Saturday Afternoon — 2:00-4:00pm
Marc Davidson: FSPA Contests workshop — Come and learn how the FSPA contests work, and what you need to know about submitting your poems. If time permits, we’ll also have a writing practice session.
March 28, Saturday Evening, 6:00-7:00pm
Zoom Room Open House: Visit with your friends
March 28, Saturday Night —7:00-8:30pm
FSPA Chancellor Denise Duhamel: Writing Through Loss And What We Gain: The Elegy. Our most personal losses are most often also ones universally felt by others; poetry can bring what we have lost alive through words and invite others to do the same.
March 29, Sunday Afternoon, 2:00-3:30pm
Peter Gordon: Open Mic (Tea and Poetry)
March 30, Monday Afternoon, 1:30-3:00pm
Poet Laureate of The City of Orlando Camara Gaither: From Verse to Voice: Spoken Word as Civic Expression. This workshop explores spoken word poetry as a civic art form, tracing its roots in social movements, music, and oral tradition. Participants will actively write and shape their own spoken word pieces, practicing vocal presence, repetition, and performative expression.
March 30, Monday Afternoon, 3:30-5:00pm
Elaine Person: Wisdom of Words—Tools and Techniques of Writing. Refresh your mind with clever techniques to enhance your writing, then apply them to writing with prompts. If time allows, we will discuss places to submit your writing.
March 30, Monday Evening, 7:00-8:30pm
Katherine Nelson-Born: Crafting Narrative Poetry Unleash the power of storytelling in poetry with former Northwest Florida Poet Laureate Katherine Nelson-Born in a generative workshop designed to transform your imagination into compelling narrative poetry.
March 31, Tuesday Evening, 7:00-8:00pm
Chancellor Lola Haskins: How to stop worrying and start growing.
March 31, Tuesday Night, 8:30-9:00pm
FSPA Leadership: Closing Remarks — FSPA Leadership
Drop in for one workshop or attend the entire week.
You don’t need to be a member to participate.
If you’ve been meaning to return to poetry, or try it for the first time, this is a gentle doorway.
I’ll be there, and I hope some of you will be too.
~ L.S.