1 Everyday Poets

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8 Chapter 1middle of our poetry unit showed me how to use these folders in a moresignificant way. Although this boy missed a lot of school, he wrote agreat deal during this time, and he found poetry to be an important releasefor his new and overwhelming feelings. When he turned in all hismissing work, he had entitled his folder “Reflections in a Cracked Mirror,”and he wrote a letter of introduction explaining the source of someof the poems and a rationale for the order in which he had placed them.This student showed me how the process of collecting poems couldimitate the work professional poets do: selecting and ordering poems,titling their collections, explaining their sources, and offering a statementof introduction. Perhaps most important, this project gives studentsa chance to revisit their work, retrace their thoughts over an extendedcreative period, and measure their growth as writers. Studentsare often amazed at the topics they’ve chosen to return to: a grandmother,a favorite pet, friendships, dreams.My students do not have to copy and bind these books, but theirsense of accomplishment is great nonetheless. The books are a testamentto the work they have done, not only the written work but also the workof discovering themselves and the world around them more fully. Theirpride is as clear on their faces as it is in their writing.At one point, several students started an online journal called ThePaper Tango. The journal, as the students described it, encouraged submissionsfrom all students—they even solicited electronic manuscriptsfrom students at other schools. Their goal was to reach a wider audience,and they encouraged comments on any and all poems they posted.The only stipulation they made was that only a reader who had submitteda poem could comment on the poetry of others. They also wentout of their way to let readers know that “all work posted on The PaperTango is work in progress.” They emphasized writing as a process andsaw poetry as a means of building a larger community of writers andsharing their ideas with an audience outside the classroom.Poetry and PerformancePoetry is too often taught as a solipsistic act: something to be done inprivate, like keeping a secret diary, with no regard for an audience beyondthe poet. As Stanley Kunitz has pointed out, however, poetry“must be felt to be understood, and before it can be felt it must be heard.Poets listen for their poems, and we, as readers, must listen in turn. Ifwe listen hard enough, who knows? We too may break into dance” (qtd.in Janeczko 74). Performing poetry offers students the opportunity tocelebrate language through a wide range of media, including the instru-
Everyday Poets 9ment of their own voices.This celebration of language is what Dana Gioia urges in his bookCan Poetry Matter? Essays on Poetry and American Culture:The sheer joy of the art must be emphasized. The pleasure of poetryis what first attracts children to poetry, the sensual excitementof speaking and hearing the words of the poem. Performancewas also the teaching technique that kept poetry vital forcenturies. Perhaps it holds the key to poetry’s future. (23)Much of the excitement and vitality in my classes comes when studentsdiscover their own reading voices and reinvent their own language inorder to communicate their most important ideas and feelings.Students need as much positive feedback and encouragementwhen reading poems as they do when writing poems. So we applaudevery reading. Applause goes a long way toward creating a communityof writers and reminds students they are not merely writing poemsfor class. They have a larger audience (and an adoring public!).In my classes, each poem is read twice, once by the author andthen by a classmate. Students learn about their own poems through thedifferences in the readings—changes in tone, different ways of readinglines, punctuation. It is important to move outside the classroom as well.At most poetry readings, the audience sits quietly for thirty minutes oran hour and applauds only at the end. The audience is expected to attendwith silent reverence, as though at a church service. (This mayexplain why some poetry readings—and some church services—are sopoorly attended!) Wordplaygrounds ends, as my classes do, with suggestionsfor organizing public readings, dramatizing poems, and integratingpoetry with other disciplines.The school day is so fragmented that it is easy to forget how isolatedour classes can become and how chaotic and random much of ourstudents’ learning must seem to them. Dewey argued that “school as awhole is [to be] related to life as a whole” (Selected 80). We need to findways of connecting disciplines and working on common rather thancompeting academic timetables. Finding common areas of interest andstudy will not only help our students make more sense of their learningbut also help us all remember why our work matters so much. Mystudents learn quickly that poetry is not something foreign to their experience;it is their experience. Poetry offers students the opportunityto explore their language, their world, and themselves more deeply thanthey otherwise would. Perhaps most important, writing and performingpoetry help my students see that they are not just studying literature,they are also creating it.
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1 Everyday Poets

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