2nd October Meeting

As most of you probably know, we had a second October meeting last Tuesday because the election falls on the date of our regular meeting day, and I thought making time in your schedule to vote was more important than making time to write poetry.

So we had three folks show up, one new person, which means we have 12 people on our poetry group list now- if we could only get them all in the same room sometime! I wanted to talk about "place" and the details (sound, sight, smell, tactile) that bring the place (or people in that place) to LIFE.

Before we got into the writing portion, everybody had a chance to read something they had previously written. Diana, who had a couple of short stories recently published in an anthology on Detroit, read from the book (one on old Tigers Stadium, formerly Briggs Stadium, parts of which have been recently torn down, and her uncle who took her there; and another story on Belle Isle, which evoked some great memories for another member, Linda). India, who happily told us she is getting married in a month (congratulations!), read a poem she had written for her single who raised 4 kids, the first coming when she was 14. It was a beautiful work, and India happily pronounced that it been selected as a finalist for a competition at Poetry.com. Linda was more content to listen, but after we did a group reading of a Stephen Vincent Benet poem ("Portrait of a Baby"), she gave a stirring rendition of "My Soul is Awakened" by Anne Bronte. Well done, group!

We concluded with a writing exercise on place, starting with the phrase "I remember ...". Everybody read from their work. I forgot to get somebody to submit something for the next meeting, which isn't until 12/2. I may try to do that one at night, to see if we get a better turnout. Hope you're all well. Please comment here or send me an email (andy.schuck@westland.lib.mi.us) if you have any comments or questions.

calling all poets ...

Diana from our adult group has agreed to come in a few days before our meetings to give each of our group members reminder calls. She'll be calling from the library here, so it won't be an unusual number. Maybe a fresh voice will help gather up the troops ...

Cheryl Vatcher-Martin

One of our local poets, Cheryl Vatcher-Martin, has written a new book "Cheryl's Musings ...". There was recently an article in Hometown Life about her. If you're interested, you can view it at:

http://www.hometownlife.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081009/NEWS03/810090610/1020/NEWS03

While the library does not at this time have any of Cheryl's books, if you are interested you can contact the Border's Express in the mall as I know Cheryl has done book signings there in the past.

Keith Taylor reading/workshop

A good time was had by all at our latest workshop, a combined effort of Teens and Adults (9 total including 2 brave, totally new members). 

To begin the workshop, our guest leader, Keith Taylor (www.keithtaylorannarbor.com) walked us through some interesting exercises regarding (of all things) syllable counting. He showed how poets like Marianne Moore and Kenneth Rexroth (and even himself) have used this method to create unique forms to their poems. Some poets strictly used a certain number of syllabes for each line (say 8), except for a line or two that they wanted to stand out and these were given a larger (usually) number. It depends on what you want the poem to accomplish. I thought this type of poetry writing would lend itself well to poems associated with a specific date (anniversary, birth, death). Maybe we'll explore this in our next poetry group. ;]

For the second half of the workshop, Keith led us through 2 of our group members' poems (since he received them before the workshop he had more to say). He noted how one work, "Seniors Dancing," used its rhyming nature quite well since it was set to a piece of music. The other work, "Just like her," had a great form to it, focusing with repetition both verbally and imagistically on the title words. Everyone had a chance to read their poems out loud and received a few comments on them from Keith and other group members.

For his reading portion of the event, Keith took to one of our big and comfy chairs in the Faust/fireplace area and let his hair down on an informal yet fun trip of poems new and old, from early memories of his mother's hair (since his family was religious, the women never cut their hair) to remembrances of days as a poor expatriate in the French countryside with his first lover. Exciting stuff!

We hope to keep events like these going at the library, but we need our poets to keep writing and showing up. Hope to see you at the next adult workshop on 10/28 from 3-4:15 (note: there is not November event, since our normal day would fall on Election Day and I think it better to give everybody a chance to do their civic duty, rather than their poetic).