In 1959, American poet Frank O’Hara wrote a mock-manifesto he called “Personism” in which he argued that a poem should be immediate and intimate, that it should “address itself to one person (other than the poet himself), thus evoking overtones of love without destroying love’s life-giving vulgarity.” Long before O’Hara, the poem-as-letter (or Epistle) has enjoyed a prominent place in literary history. From the Latin poet Horace whose Epistles are still read to the Pauline Epistles of the Bible to Alexander Pope’s famous epistolary poem “Essay on Man,” to Emily Dickinson’s “Master Letters,” epistolary poems are often the most intimate, versatile, playful or soulful of forms. In this class we will read (and write) contemporary epistles. Reading will include the epistolary poems of Frank O’Hara, Bernadette Mayer, Jack Spicer, Lucille Clifton, Mark McMorris, Laynie Browne, Major Jackson and others. We will write our own poems-as-letters, addressing them to people real and imagined, dead and living, to those we know and those we don’t. We’ll write letters also to corporations, governments, and objects, thinking of the letter as a vehicle for protest, satire, anger, and love. After the course, I’ll email each student with thoughts on your work in the class and idea about moving forward.