"A poetry reading? In Anahuac?"
Local talent tapped for exciting evening of low-cost programming
A. Lynette Parsons

This was a fairly typical question among our friends and library patrons recently. National Poetry Month gave us an idea, and since we are always looking for cheap programs at the library, we took the concept to a most successful conclusion.

Anahuac is the site of the Chambers County Library, one of our three libraries in this rural county between Houston and Beaumont. It is the only one with a meeting room, and, currently, the library where we feature events for a county-wide audience. The town of Anahuac has a population of just under 2,000, but our service population for the county is 17,714. In small towns such as ours, there is a wonderful talent pool of residents, and tapping those talented folks is our goal.

The concept was simple: everyone has a treasured poem from the past, whether it be a childhood rhyme, a poem memorized in high school that has never been forgotten, or a new favorite culled from one’s current reading. We began to publicize the poetry reading evening about two months before the April 7 date, requesting potential readers to contact the library. We also started contacting some of our more vocal and dramatic local personalities, knowing that the invitation to orate would be of immense interest to them! We sent copies of the press release to the local school system, asking that the English and drama class students be invited to participate.

A week before the program, another press release was composed, with a partial list of speakers and the poems that they chose. Additional readers were invited to call the library to get on the list. We also sent out flyers to some of the groups that such a program might appeal to: the women’s Pine Arts Club, local members of the Friends of the Chambers County Library System, and the county’s literacy group, Chambers County Learn to Read. The library board members, county commissioners, and members of the library’s book and debate groups were also invited.

About this time, one of the junior high teachers offered extra credit to the students who would read. After we had three on the list, we were forced to stop, because our adults had also risen to the challenge, and we had a full program!

On Monday evening, we popped popcorn and made lemonade. As our readers appeared, they drew numbers from a fishbowl for the order of reading. We set a limit of five minutes per person, and during that time, the reader could introduce the poet, discuss why that poem was chosen, or merely read. The method worked very well. Poetry ranged from an Australian antiwar poem to ‘The Cremation of Sam McGee.’ We had a Shakespeare soliloquy and ‘Casey at the Bat.’ Poe’s ‘The Raven’ was followed by something from the Internet titled, ‘What if Edgar Allen Poe had a computer?’ We had a mother-daughter team; we had a lady read from a greeting card. The elementary school principal read original limericks.

The youngsters, by the luck of the draw, were last on the menu. They brought down the house. They were trying out their UIL competition numbers, and I think the rest of the state may be in trouble! It was a wonderful ending to a very exciting evening, and in my closing remarks, I mentioned that we would definitely make this an annual event. As one member of the audience walked past me, she said, ‘Make it semiannual.’