communal creations
Feedback is a non-negotiable for my writing practice. I have spent many hours working on the poems in my poetry pamphlet on my own, but they would be nowhere near what I wanted them to be if I hadn’t shared them in their early stages with others. Looking back on some early drafts, I remember at the time feeling like they were almost finished. Now I realise they were still such babies, still gestating, still becoming what they were meant to be.
This is also a personal thing, some writers want their work to be more spontaneous, to have minimal edits, to be raw and vulnerable, to speak to a kind of creativity that is opposite to the meticulously edited and honed piece. And actually this is the idea I have been experimenting with in the make•shift zine. It goes against my nature to stop myself from being a perfectionist, so it’s been freeing and also tricky to create the zine with “mess” in mind — not mess in a negative sense, but as a real representation of life, of nature, and of mothering without a village in a linear capitalist time that is not cyclical or layered. I have also created it without any feedback, or perhaps very little at the beginning stages when it was a seed of an idea. Though I’ve really enjoyed making the zine, which is in its essence a collaborative project full of other caregivers’ work, the past months have felt particularly isolating, for various reasons.
It has been interesting to work in this way, but it’s not something I am planning on sticking with. I prefer extending threads out towards others and then sewing new thoughts and nuances into my work depending on their responses. It is hard to be a reader and a writer at the same time. It’s useful to have others as readers during times when I am skin-to-skin with my poems, almost too close to them.
A lot of my feedback came from people I met at creative groups and circles for mothers. What I mean is that that’s where I met likeminded creatives who inspired me and became sounding boards, conspirators, confidantes. Who I felt excited to share my work with and to hear their feedback. Who gave me notes that got me thinking about my poems and what I really wanted them to convey. The spread of online writing groups and circles since covid has meant I’ve come into virtual-contact with people I hold dearly, who exist in my head somewhat — not in a figment of my imagination sense, they’re real people — and have affected my life in different ways. One day I’d like to trace back through all my online conversations and notes from writing groups and circles to see who led me towards certain books, who recommended I follow a certain account, who shared their experiences with me in a way that directly influenced something I later created. We’re all so intricately connected, even if we’ve never met in real life.
I have been planning a feedback circle for a while — one offered to everyone who has taken part in previous circles or workshops that I hosted, and paid subscribers too, where we can join and chat and give or receive feedback. Let me know if you’d be interested in this. It’s something I’ll launch following the Motherlore Writing Retreat with Elizabeth Sulis Kim so now could be a great time to join a course with me if you’re craving community and connection.
Last few places available!
Through six themed workshops, we will quarry through waking life and dreams, nature, folklore and myth, memory and yearning, past and future, in search of the spark for ideas, structure, clarity and flow, and consider how to translate ideas into reality. This remote writing class is for mothers and carers at any stage of writing, whether seeking to deepen their writing practice or find a new means of self-expression. Together we will find ways to carve out time when we have none and find the sacred in the humdrum. There will be writing prompts, time for weekly check-ins and intention setting, readings and sharing.
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4th June to 9th July, on Thursdays, 11 am-12.30pm BST, £100 (bursary places to be announced soon)
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Babies and children welcome. Workshops will take place on Zoom and will not be recorded to encourage full participation.
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Open to any and all mothers and carers whatever stage of mothering you are in.
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Elizabeth Sulis Kim is a writer and editor. Her narrative non-fiction debut, The Book of Beasts: Reclaiming Animal Wisdom, will be published in August 2026 by Chatto & Windus. Her second book, The Art of Folklore, is coming in early 2027 from Frances Lincoln (Quarto). She is currently working on her first novel. Her writing has appeared in publications such as BBC Culture, Mslexia, The Folk Review, Hellebore, Fiddler's Green, Luna Luna, Litro, The Guardian, TANK, Dazed, The Independent, Oh Comely, Refinery29, and the LA Review of Books. She is the editor of Cunning Folk magazine and the anthology Spiritus Mundi: Writings Borne from the Occult. She grew up in the rural West Country and lives in Scotland with her husband and daughter.