{"id":321,"date":"2012-04-11T10:34:16","date_gmt":"2012-04-11T18:34:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/?p=321"},"modified":"2012-04-11T10:34:16","modified_gmt":"2012-04-11T18:34:16","slug":"rebecca-freverts-poetry-kiosk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/?p=321","title":{"rendered":"Rebecca Frevert’s Poetry Kiosk"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Rebecca Frevert's poetry kiosk in Everett<\/p><\/div>\n

Rebecca Frevert wrote to me recently about the poems she posts in her front parking strip. I asked her to write a brief story about how that started and what has developed since in her Everett, Washington neighborhood. \u00a0Here is her response. \u00a0<\/em>–KF<\/em><\/p>\n

Parking Strip Poets \u2013 Rebecca Frevert<\/em><\/h1>\n

Blame this crazy idea of poetry in a parking strip on Wordsworth\u2019s I Wandered Lonely as<\/em> a Cloud<\/em> daffodils.\u00a0 Spring 2008: my north Everett garden blowsy, snails and slugs on the move, layered gray clouds.\u00a0 Then March finally arrives and those butter-cupped suns rise in their beds all over the neighborhood.\u00a0 Pulling up shotweed and spreading compost, I imagined Wordsworth lounging on his couch, dreaming of his dancing daffodils.\u00a0 And started dreaming my own vision, of somehow wedding my two passions, gardening and poetry, sharing both with neighbors.<\/p>\n

North Everett is a walker\u2019s paradise with wide sidewalks, century old beeches, plums, cherries, and its bookend destinations, Legion Park\u2019s arboretum to the north and Grand Park overlooking Port Gardener Bay to the south.\u00a0 Years ago, after a load of compost dumped on the parking strip burnt the grass to death, my seventy-year-old neighbor Emory and I dug up the sod and planted a flower bed.\u00a0 He\u2019s left earth now, but I\u2019ve always called this little garden Emory\u2019s Bed.\u00a0 A perfect spot to catch the eye of the walkers who might stop a few minutes to read a poem.\u00a0 The poetry stand is a simple design painted blue with a Plexiglas lid that keeps out the rain (but not the spiders who love to leave cocoons in its corners).<\/p>\n

I agonized over the first poem.\u00a0 I realized that what I chose to share with strangers and neighbors would be at times self-revelatory.\u00a0 Would I focus on seasons, holidays, world events, politics, or simply share my favorite poems?\u00a0 Should I censor or worry about offending sensibilities and gear my choices toward the pleasant and crowd-pleasing?\u00a0 The primal, erotic Last Gods<\/em> by Galway Kinnell didn\u2019t make the cut.\u00a0 Call me a coward, but do public decency laws prevail in a poetry stand?<\/p>\n

The first poem I chose was I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud<\/em>, and later, with a warm June day, Dickinson\u2019s Debauchee of Dew; <\/em>when the first snow fell, <\/em>Frost\u2019s Stopping by Woods<\/em>.\u00a0 I\u2019ve chosen famous classics by Keats and Blake.\u00a0 Leonard Cohen, e.e.cummings, Gary Snyder, Rumi, Louise Gluck, Marge Piercy all take their turn.\u00a0 After a neighbor mentioned they would like to take home a copy, I started including several copies under the original, which I slide into a plastic sheath for protection from rain and dew. Which copies get snatched up quickest is fascinating, with Mary Oliver\u2019s The Journey<\/em> the winner so far.\u00a0 When the last copy is taken, someone inevitably takes the original and the kiosk may remain empty for a while when I\u2019m too busy to search out another.\u00a0 Neighbors inform me that they schedule their evening walks to pass by the poetry stand and are a tad disappointed if the poem is old stuff, or the stand is empty.<\/p>\n

My offerings often are kid -oriented in April and May. I love seeing the kids from Whittier elementary school stopping to read as they walk home from school.\u00a0 As I write this today, families are stopping by read about the Owl and the Pussycat<\/em> as they walk home after the annual Easter egg hunt at our local park. Last Halloween, I taped green lit LED sticks to the lid and watched as the costumed princesses, Darth Vaders, hoboes and bumblebees left my front porch after collecting a treat and headed to the kiosk, huddled over, reading The Adventures of Isabel<\/em> by Ogden Nash .<\/p>\n

A sign on the stand encourages folks to contribute their own selections or compositions.\u00a0 Last year, to my surprise and delight, a young poetess named Devany left three hand written poems she wrote herself:<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 My aunt<\/em>
\nShe has lots of<\/em>
\nTattoos<\/em>
\nShe really likes blue<\/em>
\nShe has a baby<\/em>
\nIt drives me crazy<\/em>
\nBut she says love makes a true lady.<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n

When our much loved family dog, Sunny, died suddenly in 2009, my son placed a poem about death and loss in the kiosk. A few days later we found bouquets of flowers placed on the ground around the stand with sympathy cards and notes from strangers who loved seeing Sunny strut his neighborhood over the years. \u00a0When a friend\u2019s father died, she asked me to place Do not go gentle<\/em> into that good night <\/em>by Dylan Thomas in the stand in his honor.<\/p>\n

Bringing \u201cpoetry to the people\u201d and people to poetic expression is such a gratifying experience.\u00a0 I believe that poetry is our first language; we hear it from birth in the rhythms of ditties and lullabies as our parents soothed us to sleep.\u00a0 I\u2019ve wondered why we lose this love of language as we grow up, becoming intimidated and put off whenever the word \u201cpoetry\u201d is attached to a reading.<\/p>\n

In the past year, I\u2019ve learned of other poetry lovers building kiosks, poetry poles or stands, mailboxes full of poems, even a \u201cpoem bench\u201d in Seattle.\u00a0 A neighbor in Everett built his own and then built one for a friend.\u00a0 He also mentioned a sacred sanctuary he visited with poetry in stands along a labyrinth path.\u00a0 Someday I hope to gather my choices together in a booklet with some of the stories of why a poem was chosen.<\/p>\n

I imagine I\u2019m becoming the neighborhood eccentric since I started this project.\u00a0 This summer I\u2019m going to start a poetry corner for kids on the bulletin board at our neighborhood park playground.\u00a0 Who knows?\u00a0 Perhaps a poem planted today will sprout our poets of tomorrow?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rebecca Frevert has been a nurse midwife for over 30 years, working at Providence Midwifery Service in Everett. \u00a0“I fell in love with poetry when I heard Poe’s The Bells<\/em> performed in middle school. \u00a0 In 1966, when I saw the movie Dr. Zhivago, I wanted to be the poet Zhivago, not Laura or Tonya, a disturbing urge for a teenaged girl.\u00a0 My husband and I have two sons, 20 and 23 yrs old, who both write amazing poetry and put mine to shame!\u00a0 As Neruda wrote:\u00a0 Poetry arrived in search of me.\u00a0 I don’t know where it came from…..”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Everett Public Library hosts “Rhymes with Everett”<\/a> tonight, a Favorite Poem Project <\/a>event. \u00a0I hope to see you there. \u00a0–KF<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rebecca Frevert wrote to me recently about the poems she posts in her front parking strip. I asked her to write a brief story about how that started and what has developed since in her Everett, Washington neighborhood. \u00a0Here is … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[110,112,111],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=321"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":324,"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321\/revisions\/324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=321"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kathleenflenniken.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}