Coming Up For Air
Poets of all ages and backgrounds are “emerging” — from the Kitchawan Preserve in Ossining to the bustling streets of Yonkers — reading their poems in short videos at various chosen outdoor locations throughout Westchester County. It’s not pure coincidence. BK Fischer, the County’s inaugural poet laureate, is up to something. The series of videos is part of a poetry project called “Emergence: Poetry Pop-Ups.”
Says Fischer: “In this season of reemerging after a pandemic, this project celebrates the collective spirit of coming up for air.”
The videos serve not only as a digital anthology of poetry-in-place throughout the county, but they also archive a historical moment – a moment during which the people of Westchester County are slowly coming out of their homes to take up space in public places once again.
The curated selection of poets, whose videos will be on view on ArtsWestchester’s YouTube channel, range from established professionals to fifth-graders at Washington Irving School in Tarrytown who are just getting their feet wet in their poetry practices.
“After all the stresses, restrictions and isolation of the pandemic, it’s uplifting to get outside, put words to our thoughts and experiences, and share them with others,” says Fischer. “Poetry is a great way to process and document what it was like to live through a time of great upheaval.”
In the series, one poet reads next to the Old Croton Aqueduct, which nearly two hundred years ago ended an epidemic by bringing clean water to New York City, and now brings solace where another pandemic has just waned.
Another video features a Rehabilitation Through the Arts alumna reading the poem of her friend who is currently incarcerated at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility. She reads on the grounds of the Katonah Museum of Art, dappled sunlight streaming through the trees behind her.
Poets are “tuning in to a lot of different poetry channels,” says Fischer. “Some are drawing on the images of romantic nature poetry, and others are tapping into the cadences of spoken word.”
In addition to the videos on YouTube, the public is welcome to participate in the project by reciting their own poem from an outdoor location in Westchester and uploading it to social media using the hashtag #westchesterpoetry. The project is expected to run through Labor Day.
“Emergence” is in collaboration with Westchester Youth Poet Laureate Danielle Kohn and the Hudson Valley Writers Center, and is coordinated by ArtsWestchester. The series is phase one of a larger focus of Fischer’s two-year tenure – a four-phase map project titled “Bring Down the Maps: Poetry as Human Ecology in Westchester County,” which aims to bring Westchester poetry into dialogue with history.
A version of this article first appeared in the July-August issue of ArtsNews, ArtsWestchester’s monthly publication. ArtsNews is distributed throughout Westchester County. A digital copy is also available at artsw.org/artsnews.
About ArtsWestchester
For more than 50 years, ArtsWestchester has been the community’s connection to the arts. Founded in 1965, it is the largest private not-for-profit arts council in New York State. Its mission is to create an equitable, inclusive, vibrant and sustainable Westchester County in which the arts are integral to and integrated into every facet of life. ArtsWestchester provides programs and services that enrich the lives of everyone in Westchester County. ArtsWestchester helps fund concerts, exhibitions and plays through grants; brings artists into schools and community centers; advocates for the arts; and builds audiences through diverse marketing initiatives. In 1998, ArtsWestchester purchased the nine-story neo-classical bank building at 31 Mamaroneck Avenue which has since been transformed into a multi-use resource for artists, cultural organizations and the community. A two-story gallery is located on the first floor of ArtsWestchester’s historic building on Mamaroneck Avenue. artsw.org
