The Wick Poetry Center is proud to be part of the twenty-two-member national Poetry Coalition (PoCo) united to promote the value poets bring to our culture and the important contribution poetry makes in the lives of people of all ages and backgrounds. During the month of March, the Poetry Coalition launches its inaugural effort, Because We Come from Everything: Poetry & Migration.
The Wick Poetry Center will present programs and projects on the theme of migration, starting with a weekly interview with a participant in our ongoing Traveling Stanzas: Writing Across Borders project. This week we are featuring Usama Halak, a refugee from Syria now living in Akron, Ohio.
The additional programs that we will feature this month include a call for submissions for poems that address the theme Because We Come from Everything. Please visit www.TravelingStanzas.com and click on "Submit" to share your poem and upload a video to the community voices section. Make sure that you "tag your poem" PoCo. At the end of the month, we will select up to two poems to feature on the front page of the Traveling Stanzas website.
The Wick Poetry Center will also host a Facebook Live session (the date and time will be announced next week) where we will take questions about our projects from viewers around the world.
The culminating event is a poetry reading and ribbon cutting on April 13 at 6:00 p.m. at the Akron Art Museum. We will gather to celebrate the installation of new outdoor Traveling Stanzas kiosks featuring poems by refugee and immigrant community members of Akron. This event is free and open to the public.