One Page Poetry Circle Archive

Welcome to the One Page Poetry Circle at St. Agnes Branch Library!

Date: Tuesday, May 8
Time: 5:30 - 6:30 pm
Place: St. Agnes Branch Library, 444 Amsterdam Avenue (near 81st Street), 3rd Floor
Theme: Poetry and Choices (pdf)

Find a poem! Show up! Read a poem! Discuss a poem!

We're back for the spring season of the One Page Poetry Circle where people gather to examine the works of established poets. While there's no instructor and this is not a workshop for personal writing, once a month OPPC gives everyone a place to become teachers and learners to explore the form, content, language and meaning of poetry. Since the circle began, participants have selected and discussed 1066 poems and have read countless others in pursuit of poetry that speaks to them.

For May's program, Poetry and Choices, we will examine how poets express choices, why they make them, and the consequences. One of the most famous poems on the subject, and perhaps the most abused, is Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken" in which the narrator reaches a crossroads. He argues that the choice of which way to go is equal, yet reflects that merely choosing "has made all the difference." A seemingly smaller choice, a decision of which trees to cut to improve the view, is made by the narrator of Tess Gallagher's "Choices":

• I go to the mountain side
• of the house to cut saplings,
• and clear a view to snow
• on the mountain. But when I look up,
• saw in hand, I see a nest clutched in
• the uppermost branches.
• I don’t cut that one.
• I don’t cut the others either.
• Suddenly, in every tree,
• an unseen nest
• where a mountain
• would be.

We're looking forward to the poems you bring and read aloud on the subject of Choices. Whether a poem concerns a choice, or a poem chooses you, bring one that has meaning for you. Can't locate a poem you want to bring? Browse the poetry section at the library or check out Poetry Foundation or poets.org.

In the meantime, please blog with us at onepagepoetrycircle.wordpress.com.

Spring 2018 Schedule
May 8: Poetry and Choices

Fall 2018 Schedule
Tuesday, September 11, Poetry and Disaster
Tuesday, October 9, Cowboy Poetry
Tuesday, November 13, Poetry and Simplicity
Tuesday, December 11, Poetry and Wine

Abigail Burnham Bloom and
AnnaLee Wilson

The One Page Poetry Circle is sponsored by the New York Public Library and is open to all. St. Agnes Branch Library is handicap accessible.