This morning I attended the poetry session and listened to the kids who had participated in the Ava's Smile workshop read their poems. It was a fascinating experience in that the poems were different from what I expected. A lot of the poetry that I've grown accustomed to has been very beautiful - beautifully crafted phrases with beautiful choices of words. That isn't to say that the poems today weren't beautiful. They were just more gritty, more raw. Everyone seemed to be writing about the inner and outer struggles they'd faced, rather than casual observations.
So I felt like every poet was sharing something really personal, which sort of felt uncomfortable in some ways because I don't know all of them that well. The fact that they were willing to put themselves out there is very brave. Especially since they were all 9th graders and most of us have only known each other for this year, so there seemed to be a great deal of trust.
I don't remember all of the poems distinctly, but the ones I do remember are the poems that were read well. A big part of poetry is performance, and though everyone was probably nervous, some people were more accustomed to hiding it. There were just a few students who read their poems in this melodic tone that really resonated with me.
