Poets have always dealt with life’s inevitable’s including death and suffering. Sounds cheery, right? Poets also write about love, but some of those poems deal with suffering also.
In this session, we plan to engage in a light and lively conversation about poems that address compassionate responses to suffering.  We may discuss how we feel when we read of someone’s pain.  Do these poems help us build our own compassion? Or do they make us turn away? Harden us? Or something else? Does the poet offer a follow-able model of compassion?
And, you shouldn’t need a handkerchief to weep into for this discussion. Though we will view the suffering depicted and the poetry with the seriousness they deserve, we will endeavor to keep our conversation interactive and enjoyable.
Mark McGuire-Schwartz takes great joy in discussing poetry. In his own writing, he strives to find a tad of originality in this world so overcrowded with words. This led to his creating a new poetic form, the Seventeen. Further, he believes that he may be the first person to ever use the phrase “iffy, itchy, icy, insular” in a poem.
This program is free and open to all.
Please register.