The Grounds For Thought coffee shop hosted a poetry reading and open mic event on Wednesday night at which visitors had the opportunity to share some of their writing.
The event was sponsored by the University’s Women’s Center. This is the third year in a row that such an event has been held by the center and each year Grounds For Thought has been the host.
Kristen Bunner is a graduate student at the University and helped organize this year’s reading. She said that the date was set for this month because April is National Poetry Month.
The title of the event was “The World Split Open,” based on a poem by Muriel Rukeyser. The poem says, “What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life? The world would split open.” These words set the theme for the occasion.
Jean Ann Geist was the first poet to speak. Geist is an author from Northwest Ohio and attended the University during the 1960s. She has also written two self-published novels. When asked how long she has been writing, she said, “all my life.”
Sharon Barnes was the next to share. Barnes came with the group, “The Uppity Women’s Poetry Workshop.”
“Occasionally we read out,” Barnes said, but mostly the women of the group critique each other’s works of writing.
Aside from Barnes, four other members of “The Uppity Women’s Poetry Workshop” shared a number of poems.
The poems focused on a number of topics including childhood, family, teachers and womanhood as a whole. The emotional themes of the writings varied from humorous and lighthearted to painful and even traumatic.
Skai Stelzer is a member of “The Uppity Women’s Poetry Workshop” and she shared a few poems that were written for her long lost sister, who lives in her ancestral country of Latvia, who she had met for the first time years ago.
Stephanie Longmire was another of the featured poets to share. She is a liberal studies major at the University.
The first poem that Longmire shared was titled, “Pinocchio Complex.” This piece centered on an emotionally abusive relationship that Longmire had endured.
Longmire also shared a poem about her Mexican-born friend, who after living in the United States, was overtly and implicitly taught that her native culture was not welcome in this country.
The poem described blatant racism toward those who choose to immigrate to this country and the idea that immigrants are expected to assimilate to American culture exclusively.
“I am so sorry we beat the indigenous out of you,” Longmire said to finish the poem.
Along with events like this, The Women’s Center also holds Brown Bag Series presentations, a Professional Development Series and also co-sponsors the Women’s Research Network with the Women’s, Gender and Sexuality studies program.