Day of Poetry Brings 600 Students to Campus

12/22/2015
By Katharine Webster

What is a metaphor, and how can you use metaphor to describe exactly how poop or perfume smells to you?

Poet Aja Monet’s question drew giggles from several Wang Middle School fifth-graders, but her point was serious.

“We all smell different kinds of perfume,” Monet told a packed classroom in Dugan Hall. “The better you get at describing these things, the better I get to see the world from your perspective.”

Monet’s class, “Surrendering to the Metaphor,” was part of the first Student Day of Poetry held at UMass Lowell. Organized by the nonprofit group Mass Poetry with help from Asst. Profs. of English Maggie Dietz and Sandra Lim, it drew 600 middle- and high-school students from Lowell and surrounding towns. 

The students signed up for two of 16 workshops in the morning – offerings included Lim’s “I Put a Spell on You” – and gathered after lunch for a performance by three nationally known poets: Monet, Ada Limón and José Olivarez. The students then mounted the stage to read their own work at an open mic.

Several freshmen in the Latin Lyceum program at Lowell High School signed up for Monet’s workshop because they are studying “The Odyssey” and writing epic poetry. Tucker Descheneaux said he likes the type of poetry Monet writes and performs: “I like the rhythm and the rhyme.”

The day provided teaching experience for four UMass Lowell students in Dietz’s capstone creative writing seminar, who paired up to teach back-to-back sessions of “Learning from Emerging Writers.” Victoria Laureano of Dracut and Sean Darling from Melrose ran the first session, while Evan McCarthy of Malden and Freddie Duquet of Andover co-taught the second. Although they’d prepared lesson plans for high school students, they adapted quickly when it turned out that most of their pupils were sixth- and seventh-graders.

Laureano taught about metaphor by reading Kay Ryan’s “Home to Roost” and asking what the chickens represented. “Lies,” or “Bad deeds,” the students replied. Laureano asked the students to read the poem aloud, substituting their answers for the word “chicken.” That’s when the lightbulbs went on.

“They said, ‘Oh!’ They could see how you could substitute one thing for the other,” Dietz says.

The students then wrote their own four-line poems, in groups or alone. Laureano, who hopes to eventually teach middle-school English, was entranced when they read their poetry aloud.

“Everyone did such a great job,” she says. “One group wrote that being without a family is like being a turtle on its back.”

Next, Darling taught about imagery using Wallace Stevens’ “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird,” a series of 13 linked mini-poems. When Darling spotted some boys snacking on Cheetos in the back of the room, he announced the class would write “13 Ways of Looking at a Cheeto,” in part by imitating Stevens’ phrasing. “The river is moving, the blackbird must be flying,” became, “The TV is on, the couch potato must be eating Cheetos.”

“The kids were really hesitant at first – they were saying, ‘I don’t know how to write about a Cheeto,’ and by the end they realized, ‘I absolutely know how to write about a Cheeto,’ ” Darling says. “It’s about getting them to write and have fun with poetry – and then chances are they’ll do it again.”

Mass Poetry has offered a statewide Student Day of Poetry at UMass Boston in past years, but this year the organization decided to hold a series of regional events to reach more students, says coordinator Jade Sylvan. Mass Poetry also sends poets into the schools to offer workshops.

“We want high school and junior high school students to learn about writing poetry from some of the best poets alive today,” Sylvan says. “It’s really important, especially for teenagers, to become empowered to use their voices, and we think there’s nothing like writing poetry to kindle that.”

Dietz, an award-winning poet and longtime poetry educator, says her students gained valuable experience – and drew an enthusiastic response from their pupils.

“They were able to go around and chat with the little groups,” she says. “That was part of the success. Also that they’re young: They’re young and they’re cool.”