VIRTUAL PROGRAM — streaming live for online registrants
This program is FREE to attend. Registration is required.
Part of the 2026 Tell It Slant Poetry Festival!
Join us for the 14th annual Tell it Slant Poetry Festival, a week of events happening both online and in-person at the Museum!
This workshop will offer three perspectives from Japanese literature—haiku, tanka and haibun—in connection to Emily Dickinson’s poetry. Acclaimed craftswomen of these forms will share a wide range of example works including 10th-century zuihitsu, poems by a 19th-century Japanese female poet (a contemporary of Emily Dickinson), haiku based on the African American experience, as well as their own work inspired by respective examples. The audience will be given writing prompts and invited to share their works and discuss.About the presenters
Miho Kinnas, poet and translator, is the author of three poetry collections and collaborative books of poetry. Her work is anthologized in Best American Poetry, Voice&Verse: Asian Literary Journals’ 10th and 20th Anniversary Issues. She writes book reviews and essays for American Book Review, World Literature Today, and Re-Markings. She teaches poetry at Writers.com, Pat Conroy Literary Center, and New York Writers Workshop. She speaks at Hobart Festival of Women Writers (2025 & 2026.)
Crystal Simone Smith is the author of Runagate: Songs of the Freedom Bound (Duke University Press, 2025) winner of the Roanoke-Chowan Poetry Award and Dark Testament (Henry Holt, 2023). In 2022, her collection of haiku, Ebbing Shore, won The Haiku Foundation Touchstone Distinguished Book Award. Her work has appeared in numerous journals including POETRY Magazine, Harper’s Magazine, Rattle, and Frogpond. She teaches in the Thompson Writing Program at Duke University.
Holly Thompson is the author of three acclaimed verse novels for young people — Orchards; The Language Inside; and Falling into the Dragon’s Mouth — as well as poetry picture books including her biography in haibun form Listening to Trees: George Nakashima, Woodworker (Neal Porter Books, 2024). She divides her time between Japan and the U.S. and teaches creative writing at Yokohama City University and GrubStreet Boston.
Support The Tell It Slant Poetry Festival
The Tell It Slant Poetry Festival is sustained by the Emily Dickinson Fund, which provides critical, unrestricted support for the Museum’s day-to-day operations. Your generous donation helps us offer immersive poetry programs to a global audience and preserve the historic Dickinson legacy in Amherst. As the Fund supplies 36% of our annual budget, your tax-deductible contribution is essential to our mission. Join us in inspiring learners of all ages by making an immediate impact today.