Art Needs To Respond

This past weekend, the Town of Oxford put on its second annual Poetry At Large festival, wrapping up Sunday afternoon with the Poetry Cafe.
My friend and writing mentor, Harry Thurston, of Tidnish Bridge, was the headliner. He's a brilliant poet, descriptive and accessible, lyrical and lovely. AND HE READ ONE OF MY FAVOURITES, a poem about river otters. For me personally, what appeals to me about his poems is that he writes about country life and life along the river and the tidal marsh. He writes about birds and animals, and relationships.
He read two new poems that are simply brilliant.
Poetry is meant to be read aloud, and it's meant to be listened to. It needs to be heard.

In the photo, he's reading from a small collection of poems, titled ICARUS: Falling of Birds, inspired by a tragic wildlife event in 2013: 7,500 migrating songbirds were killed when the Canaport LNG plant in Saint John, New Brunswick, illegally burned off sour gas; the birds flew into the gas flare. The company faced three charges under Canada's environment protection act.
Harry, and a photographer friend, were inspired to create the collection of poems and photos because, Harry said, "LNG lost the court case, fortunately, but sometimes, art needs to respond."

I also made note of how Harry answered when asked who his favourite poets are: On the diversity of his list, he said, "I'm a self-educated poet. I read widely but erratically." Incidentally, Harry was in pre-med, studying biology, when he began writing poems.

I didn't know Harry considered himself a self-educated poet, so as a self-educated writer myself, I feel some validation for the long, slow development of my writing career.