First Workshop Jitters
I hurried to the library. I wanted to be early.
It was the day I’d be speaking at one of our Do Art Poetry Workshops. I had helped Jerry at the comic book workshops before, but this would be the first time that I’d have to hold the attention of the audience for an entire hour.
I was nervous, but I’d been preparing for this, in many ways, all year. Since we’d started doing workshops at libraries early in 2023, Jerry had always planned on expanding to include a poetry workshop. Sínce my background is in English, & I’d been writing poetry practically since I’d been the age of the kids at the workshop, his idea was that I would lead one.
My Home Library
The drive to Ella Johnson Library wasn’t long, although that late in the afternoon traffic added to my anxiety. I kept fighting off this feeling of “wrongness.” While I never seriously considered quitting, I continually got this strange feeling of reluctance. I’d been reading Integrating the Arts in Therapy by Shaun McNiff. McNiff notes a strong feeling of “resistance” among people who participate in “multi-modal art therapy.” Some of this is due to lack of confidence or experience–it’s natural to be afraid or unwilling to try something you’ve never done, where your skills or unproven or success is uncertain. But McNiff also speaks about this “resistance” as a natural part of the creative process, almost in the way that friction is necessary to make fire, or that wind resistance makes flight possible.
This was a slightly more eloquent version of what I told myself as I pulled up to the library. I’ve been going to Ella Johnson Public Library since I can remember. The library (a modest-looking brick building from the outside) sustained me through childhood and adolescence as I avidly read books on the Crusades, the novels of Stephen King, & once when I tried to read Plato’s Republic (at the time I thought it would have more to say about Atlantis, & was frustrated to find out it was more about the ancient Greek’s theories about reality & the ideal society). It was one of the first libraries we’d approached to host a comic book workshop, & the library we’ve done the most events at to date.
The Poetry Workshop
Jerry arrived minutes before me, & we started to set up. As with the comic book workshop this consists of two banners, paper & pencil at every seat, & a centrally-placed whiteboard. A fairly low-tech setup, we’ve found that the banners orient the audience toward who we are, while the whiteboard & paper allow people to follow along with us while they make their own original artwork. This structure of individually-centered activity in an environment of communal support & encouragement is one reason why talkative & shy kids alike get enjoyment & enrichment from our workshops. The setup process went smoothly enough, though Jerry’s attention to detail & my own anxieties only added to my sense of nervous anticipation.
The kids began to file in. The workshop itself was kind of a blur, as I guided the kids through the Poetry Workshop as we currently have it formatted. As I’ve mentioned in a previous post, we start by emphasizing poetry as THE MUSIC OF WORDS, using recitation to build confidence and get kids to use their voices more expressively. One, more extroverted girl took to this easily, and it was almost difficult at times to control her enthusiasm. Other, more introverted kids took more time to embrace the exercise, and I found myself trying to gently coax them into participation while the time would fly by, and then just as mysteriously stall.
The Happy Leopard Smiles
The poems we wrote were mostly silly. I asked for a poem with a Thing (“Christmas Tree”) an Animal (“Leopard”) and a Feeling (“Happy”). The poem we composed was
Setting up his CHRISTMAS TREE
The HAPPY LEOPARD smiles.
Dangerous Teeth.
A simple, frivolous three line poem, which I asked the kids to recite as they thought about three MUSICAL elements of poetry: Speed, Volume, and Tone. While we did this, the kids typed out words or sentences on our typewriter, creating what the Surrealists called an “exquisite corpse:” a poem made up of found elements, each person contributing their own ideas synthesized into a whole.
By the end, I was excited by exhausted by the effort of leading an hour discussion. Elements of poetry like rhyme of metaphor would have to wait for another day. Jerry said that one girl, as she was leaving, said “I love poetry!” Hard to believe, maybe. But poetry can be funny, or silly (just ask Ogden Nash), and a poem about a leopard setting up a Christmas tree is easy to love.