Creative Change Agent
Wisconsin Poet Laureate Emeritus · Author · Performer
Pull up a chair at a free table for writers, performers & artists.
Join the InkwellPull up a chair
A few craft notes from the desk, plus a fresh prompt each time you visit. Take it to your own notebook and let the next sentence find you.
Craft notes
Write the timer, not the muse
Set ten minutes and keep your hand moving. Momentum makes more meaning than inspiration does.
Trade adjectives for images
Don't say 'she was lonely.' Show the second cup she poured and never drank.
Protect the ugly first draft
Let it be messy and wrong. Revision is where the poem earns its shape — not the first pass.
Steal from your own life
The smallest true detail — a brand of soap, a bus route — gives fiction its weight.
“Write about a smell that transports you to a room you haven't stood in for years.”
Carry this one to your own page. Let it sit, then follow wherever the first line wants to go.
Writer, Performance Artist, & Community Organizer
Dasha Kelly is an author, poet laureate, performance artist, and creative change agent who uses art as a tool for personal growth, community engagement, and civic dialogue.
As former Poet Laureate for the State of Wisconsin and the City of Milwaukee, Dasha has delivered keynotes, held workshops across 5 continents, and founded Still Waters Collective, an initiative that impacted thousands of young writers and leaders.