Mentorship Workshops

As a part of the Go Back & Fetch It program, fellows are offered the opportunity to attend two personalized workshops to engage more directly with their own work alongside one of the program mentors working in the genre of their choice.

This year these workshops unfolded under challenging unique circumstances, with the timing of Operation Metro Surge having a deep impact on attendance, atmosphere and the way these workshops were conducted. These dire times would go on to highlight the member’s and mentor’s resilience, as well as the program’s adaptability.

The program mentors for this year are

Ash Wynter for Poetry

Carolyn Holbrook for Creative Nonfiction

Junauda Petrus for Fiction

Skull Dogs Media had the opportunity to attend two of the workshops this time around, each with very distinct formats: An in-person group poetry workshop with Ash Wynter and an intimate virtual fiction workshop with author Junauda Petrus.

Arial Eyes of the Eagle: Poetry with Ash Wynter

The in-person poetry workshop, led by mentor Ash Wynter, centered on the practice of engaging deeply with one another’s work through structured critique guided by Wynter’s framework.

From the outset, the tone of the session had been shaped by the lingering fear and trauma still present in the air from Metro Surge. Attendance to the in-person meeting was much lower than expected, with some members having switched their sign up to an earlier online version of Ash’s workshop. Meanwhile some members that had stayed signed up for the in-person meeting stayed home out of fear. Even as those who had decided to attend gathered together, the shared tension and awareness of the moment was palpable.

The workshop this time was held in St. Paul’s Highland Park Library. The room was a closed, secured space on one side and a large window with a clear view to the outside on the other, both protective and quietly tense. In such fearful times, the room struck a strange balance of feeling safe, yet exposed, and yet participants could also see clearly if any form of danger would be coming.

But over time and as members settled into the work, the fear and tension began to ease. There was safety in our comradery. The longer the group spent together, safe and with no sign of danger, the more things felt like they were just normal. The meeting became a safe haven in an otherwise unsafe time.

Wynter’s approach to critique emphasized a two-part process: first, engaging the poem as a whole, what she described as viewing with “Aerial Eyes”, and then moving into more focused, line-by-line observations, or “Hawk Eyes.” This structure encouraged participants to begin with presence and curiosity before moving toward specificity, grounding feedback in observation.

Rather than centering authority or definitive interpretation, Wynter invited participants to ask questions, to notice, and to remain open. Feedback became less about determining what a poem is, and more about exploring what it could be and how it moves.

Dream Writing: Fiction with Junauda Petrus

Junauda Petrus is a writer, pleasure activist, filmmaker, activist and performance artist. Her work centers around Afro-futurism, ancestral healing, queerness and black wildness. She is the award-winning author of The Stars And The Blackness Between Them, and Can We Please Give the Police Department to the Grandmothers? She is the 2025-26 City of Minneapolis Poet Laureate.

Those who know Junauda Petrus know she is a wild and free spirit. Her workshops are just as liberating as she is.

The virtual fiction workshop led by Petrus came in stark contrast to Wynter’s poetry workshop. Where Wynter’s was deeply structured and focused on critique and revision of existing work, Petrus took a more intuitive and generative approach to the workshop. Rather than focus on submitted pieces, Petrus guided participants toward the act of beginning. She invited her group to explore a “dream project” they had yet to start. Petrus’ workshop gave members permission to step into new work without the weight of refinement or expectation.

The online setting created a different kind of intimacy. With only a small number of participants present, the workshop unfolded as a focused and personal exchange. Petrus is known for bringing an energy rooted in movement and feeling, incorporating music and physical expression as part of the creative process. Participants were encouraged not just to think through ideas, but to move with them. Her approach to writing is something embodied and alive.

Where the poetry workshop emphasized reflection and response, Petrus’s session centered on momentum.

Retrospective

These workshops illustrate the breadth of Go Back & Fetch It’s approach to supporting creative development. One grounded participants in the careful practice of reading and responding to one another’s work; the other invited them into the uncertain, generative space of beginning something new. Both workshops reflect Go Back & Fetch It’s commitment: to meet participants where they are, and to create spaces that support both the refinement and expansion of their voices