While the campaign is over and we did not reach our goal, nothing is lost: many friends and valuable connections were made, insights were gained, and the work continues on!
Special thanks to everyone who has pledged. It means the world to me!
Thank you to Michael Lopez at 0-0-8 Studios and my agent, Michelle at 3.0 Talent Agency.
Thank you to everyone who has contributed a video or written review! Thank you so much to Scott Hasite, Miss January, and everyone at Poetry Girlz, Andrew Benson Brown of the Society of Classical Poets, Michael R. Burch, Christina Goebel, Laban T. M’mbololo, Esq., (of the Cozy Book Nook podcast) Dr. James Rovira (who did a review and wrote the Foreword to the Series), Dr Soheil Ahmed, Dr. Joe Jablonski, Dr. Kevin Kiely, Aleksandra Tryneicka, Paul Douglass, Bobbie-Joe Delgado-Colbert, Joseph Sale, Ashlie Allen, Matt Bialer, Shavaun Scott, Robert Cole, Lee Hall.
To me, it has NEVER been about the money, but about getting the work out there and, most of all, benefiting humanity. Good work, insightful work, does just that. The question is, how do we reach more people and get more eyeballs on the page? Not just my work, but all of poetry, lifting it up, to that plinth decked with laurels where it was long ago.
Of course, I don’t have the answer to that. If it were up to me, poetry would be there already! In the earliest times, poets such as Homer, Hesiod, and Sappho were lauded for their metrical gymnastics as true masters of the art, not just in how the work was crafted, but in the fluidity and depth that rang through each stanza and found a home in readers’ ears. Can we get there again? I believe we can; however, it will take a lot of work. One way to start, for people who read poetry, is NOT to seem embarrassed when someone asks, “What are you reading?” by proudly stating, in a clear, loud voice, what you are reading and who wrote it! Then, offering to share it with the person who asked! Tell them why it resonates with you, who wrote it, and where they can purchase a copy! Don’t be shy, that will get us nowhere! Sing it for all the people who are out there, standing at a bus stop, sitting on a commuter train, or in a cafe, let them hear you proudly announce who wrote it, what the title is, and what you find of value in it!
Make connections between what you are reading and contemporary listeners! With some work, especially love poems, that is pretty easy, but if it’s political, or deeper (like Eliot’s The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock), you may need to cite lines, which is great! That will allow you to draw them in, and that is always a plus! Eliot’s The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock explores aging and is very introspective, which, depending on the listener, can be very valuable. The point is, enthusiasm is contagious, and that is how we win readers, and raise the work, and poetry from the back shelves of libraries and bookstores, to the display window, and finally, the hearts of people everywhere. Therein, the real magic begins, because metrical work has the power to reshape minds, opening synapses that had long been dormant, even helping the elderly, and those suffering from dementia and Alzheimer’s, and it has no adverse side effects that come with medication, how about that?
I will leave you with a challenge today: read one poem, and share it with a friend; give your honest opinion, and start the conversation going!
I will begin with one by Shelley, written for his infant daughter, Ianthe. It is one that, while written over two hundred years ago, still sounds like it could have been written now from the starting line.
I love thee, Baby! for thine own sweet sake;
Those azure eyes, that faintly dimpled cheek,
Thy tender frame, so eloquently weak,
Love in the sternest heart of hate might wake;
But more when o’er thy fitful slumber bending
Thy mother folds thee to her wakeful heart,
Whilst love and pity, in her glances blending,
All that thy passive eyes can feel impart:
More, when some feeble lineaments of her,
Who bore thy weight beneath her spotless bosom,
As with deep love I read thy face, recur,--
More dear art thou, O fair and fragile blossom;
Dearest when most thy tender traits express
The image of thy mother’s loveliness.
with deepest love and gratitude,
Aria
P.S. The above video is my favorite poem from The Romantic Series and is the sound on the music box we offered as a perk in the campaign. If you are still interested in one, message me!
