Carol has always worked at the intersection of technical documentation, quality assurance, and instructional design. She celebrated her first poetry publication in a national journal many years ago at the same time she was converting docs to DITA. This sudden confluence woke her to the realization that poetry and tech comm have a surprising number of techniques in common, and that skills in each always improve performance in the other. Since then, she’s had poems published in Boston Accent Lit, California Quarterly, Hawaii Pacific Review, The MacGuffin, Midwest Quarterly, The New York Quarterly, Pudding Magazine, South Dakota Review, The Virginia Normal, and dozens of others. Her essays have appeared in The International Journal of Ethics and Information Technology, The Journal of Philosophy in the Contemporary World, and an anthology by Potomac Press. She’s now teaching poetry workshops around the world to help others experience a new way to grow as communicators and connectors.

They Already Sent a Poet, and It’s You!

In the film Contact, astronomer and astronaut Ellie Arroway, awestruck by what she’s witnessing as she arrives in a distant galaxy, realizes the workings of the cosmos would have been better described using poetry than scientific equations. She admits, “They should have sent a poet.” So, it’s very fortunate that as content professionals, we’re all natural poets.

Our skills are directly transferable to poetry, but even better, this practical pairing means that when we practice the art of creating high-quality poems, we also sharpen our content skills to become better in our career roles. It’s our attention to concrete details that allows us to feed better content and better prompts to AI so that AI, in turn, can share better content with the world.

In the age of the smart machine, the ability you already have to create good poetry is your secret weapon. Join other content professionals in this hands-on workshop as we learn how to create better technical documentation by writing poetry.

In this workshop, you’ll receive:

• All the basic techniques you need to create solid, effective free-verse poems
• Knowledge of the surprising similarities between poetry and technical writing, including, but not limited to, structure, brevity, word choice, iteration, tone, and attention to detail
• Examples of two specific historical poetry structures you may not have realized you already know how to write
• (If you’re in a hiring role) A new appreciation of creative writers who apply for technical content roles and the concrete skills they bring to your organization
• Information and resources for how to continue your journey as a poet after the conference

You’ll also write your first draft of a poem about LavaCon 2026. You’ll be invited to share your poem in the daily newsletter and at the annual storytelling event during the conference. Sharing is optional, but in any case, you’ll have a unique conference keepsake and memory you can’t buy in a souvenir store.