Poetry Out Loud

Poetry Club meeting pre-COVID

Poetry Indeed: Close Up on Ursuline’s Poetry Club and Poetry Out Loud Event

By Adrianna Robertson

English Department Faculty & Poetry Club Co-Moderator

“If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.” –Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson’s famous quote has stood the test of time because she captures the response to reading a good poem with such accuracy. A good poem excites the mind in such a way that the body responds. In this way a poem has the power to make us feel as other genres simply do not. This connection to feeling--both mental and physical--is what Dickinson was expressing in her famous quote. Dickinson needed poetry because she realized that it was a necessary part of living in and experiencing the world. And, though Dickinson could never have imagined a year like 2020, she might have pointed us in the direction of poetry as a way to learn, imagine, understand--and ultimately find healing.

Our Fourth Annual Poetry Out Loud event, sponsored by Ursuline’s Poetry Club, took place on June 2, 2020 in the midst of a pandemic and a pivotal racial reckoning. Though always well-attended and essential to community-building, this POL was unlike any other. Some part of this most certainly had to do with the fact that it was attended via Zoom for the first time; however, it went beyond this. There was a reverence for the poems that matched the recent world happenings. There also seemed to be a longing for them to provide answers, solutions--a salve for all of our grief. The poems did not disappoint--from original student-written poems to treasured favorites by the likes of Robert Frost, Charles Simic, and Danez Smith.

The need Dickinson had for poetry, to express her feelings and connect with the world somehow, is the same need that prompts the members of the

Poetry Club to attend their bi-weekly meetings, moderated since 2016 by English teachers Adrianna Robertson and Maria Hanson ’84, and to share what they have been writing.

As the school community worked its way through the 2020-21 school year marked by much uncertainty, there was no doubt that the need for poetry thrived. Even with the club’s meetings taking place via Zoom and the POL event as well on April 22, 2021, the club did what it always has done: shared poetry and all that it has to offer with the Ursuline community. The words written and read most certainly have the power to give us that electric feeling that Dickinson talked about. It reminds us that we are alive and that in the face of fear or loss, we keep on living.

Kristen Vincent ’22 shared her abecedarian poem on the POL Zoom She Keeps Her Emotions Trapped in Jars

by Kristen Vincent ’22

Sadness is on the right corner of the shelf above her bed; It hangs over her head like the Sword of Damocles when she sleeps

Happiness is on her nightstand, next to her favorite book and scrappy pictures of lost lovers and forgotten friends; She has learned that hiding one’s emotions can make one lose those who mean the most to them

Anxiety is on the windowsill across from her desk; It stares at her whenever she looks outside at the people walking down the street or the clouds that kiss the sky; Do the people on her street also keep their emotions in jars? Would they judge her if they knew she did? Will the clouds bring rain?

Anger is in a locked drawer; She tries hard not to remember where she keeps it, for it has ruined so many things in her life and she never wishes to release it from its jar like Pandora’s box

Hope is on her kitchen table, greeting her in the morning when she eats her breakfast; It reminds her that every day brings something new, or at least it could

Love is hidden in a treasure box; Sometimes she takes it from the jar and cradles it in her hands as a personal form of therapy to remind herself that she is worthy of receiving love when she gives it away to people who seem to never give anything in return; She puts it away quickly at the thought of losing her most delicate emotion, her desires stored in safety

Sometimes she thinks of breaking all of the jars and letting her emotions spill out all over her home, but then she reminds herself of what a mess that would make; Is it better to hide one’s emotions than to shatter and expose them?

Poetry Out Loud event, April 22, 2021

get off the roof, dear,

by Maeve Reynolds ’21

the shingles are not insured. you will leave scuff marks on the tiles. if you get down for me, i will cradle your knees into mine, appraise the iron lapping at your ankles, tow your car for the next two miles.

if you get down for me, i will sign us up for that seasonal corn maze you are always forgetting about. i will fetch us matching quilts that we will crawl into after ignoring our weekend malaise.

because don’t you remember that june in vermont? men on stilts could barely duck before you shucked your shoes like ears of corn and nearly knocked their top hats off. but now—the daisy wilts.

the goldfish starves. and get off the roof, my dear, the hawthorn tree cannot distinguish you from clouds. you will get splinters. bruises, maybe. i will fetch our copy of young frankenstein and butter popcorn.

i cannot fix the heat but i can fix your arm. it really amuses you, doesn’t it? how we take turns being freaks and lose ourselves in cabinets? someone needs to feed the cat. it cannot chew burnt fuses

anymore. the vet will wonder. your doctor will wonder. shelves cannot win again. here, get my coat, i will take us to manhattan. just do not touch me there. that—do not touch me there. it repels

me. get off the roof, dear, that robe is made of pricey satin and i do not remember where you found it. see, the deer are running, now—you scare them. to them you are a cannon.

get off the roof. this is the last time i will ask. i fear you will sleep up there next time. i fear there will not be a next time. i fear the popcorn bowl will someday disappear. Fire

by Kayla Bowles ’21

Pushing further, air Getting thicker by The second, your Hair stuck to the back Of your neck and beads Of sweat blur the world You are struggling To see; sweltering Sunshine, evil rays Of goodness redden Your already scarred And blistered cheeks, while The sand pulls you down Hindering the small Amount of progress It took you so long To make, the only thing Keeping your eyes from Rolling back into Your skull and your knees From buckling and Giving into the Merciless blaze, the Tropical air and Sun is the feeling Of ice-cold water Trailing down the back Of your throat, calming Your enflamed insides And giving you strength Somehow, to go on