I don’t know if Senator Dorothy Hukill, a Republican from Port Orange, drinks or not, but all of us should pause during the cocktail hour and raise a glass in her honor. On April 23rd (Shakespeare’s birthday), 2014, a bill she’d been fighting for became the law of the state. We know how difficult it seems to be for our legislators to pass anything, and this one had to do with a difficult subject as well: poetry.
Florida, with SB 290 / HB 513, has joined 42 other American states by passing a law appointing a Poet Laureate for a revolving three-year term. Choosing me may not have have been that sensible, but the law’s a good one. Over time, a wide cross-section of Florida’s talented poets will take turns representing our state, joining America’s distinguished slate of state laureates, including Robert Frost (VT), Gwendolyn Brooks (IL), Billy Collins (NY), Fred Chappell (NC), Vassar Miller (TX), Donald Hall (NH), Rita Dove (VA), Robert Bly (MN), and Natasha Trethewey (MI), to name a few.
I was pleased, and also surprised. Florida’s full of nationally known poets of all stripes, shapes and colors. As Jeanne and I have lived here since 1966, a high percentage of them are our friends, so we know that many are very well-behaved.
The English poet Philip Larkin (“They fuck you up, your mum and dad./They may not mean to, but they do”) famously turned down a Laureateship because he dreaded “the sherry-drill with important people.” But I’d worry more about sherryless drills, and our experience has been that there’s always someone interesting there, important or not. Of course, Oscar Wilde’s dictum comes to mind: “When the gods want to punish us, they answer our prayers.” Although there were no campaigns (or prayers) here, a lot of people wrote letters supporting me, and I want to tell all of you I’m honored and touched, and hope I can thank you individually.
As to what a state Poet Laureate actually does, I’ll know a year or two down the line. While St. Pete’s Poet Laureate, I’ve read to school children, the City Council, the homeless; in libraries, colleges, parks with ex-Mayors Rick Baker and Bill Foster; at Studio@620, the Vinoy, Haslam’s, Inkwood, Oxford Exchange, and BookLovers Café.
The thing to remember is: Poets come and go, but the poems are there when you need them. Also, they can be fun. I enjoy reading them, reciting them, listening to them, memorizing them. Each night I fall asleep saying them to myself. This appointment will be much of a muchness, and I look forward to it.
Poetry lives by metaphor, telling us we’re all connected. “Those are pearls that were his eyes,” “For all the history of grief/an empty doorway and a maple leaf,” “I should have been a pair of ragged claws/Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.” Even if you don’t believe in Her, nothing but God begins from scratch.
Our previous laureate, Ed Skellings, called himself the “electric poet.” I’m perhaps one of the last “book” poets, loving books, journals, and the spoken word. Poetry’s wonderful anywhere, but I love it best when printed on paper, held in my hand. I’ve never been as good as I hoped, but in this hyped-up, anti-reading environment, poetry’s a force for good. Because it works indirectly, it doesn’t reflect the party line and isn’t selling anything. In metaphor we can find not only depth, but truth deeper than fact.
As Emily Dickinson urges, “Tell all the Truth but tell it slant—/Success in Circuit lies”:
This article appears in Jun 25 – Jul 1, 2015.