Stan Wolzen participated as did Elizabeth Jahn, Ann Edmonds, Margaret Green, Jim Ferolo and Deb Crowson, all reading their own work All but Stan have probably been in writers' groups together and are probably all part of Phidian, so they were worried about "everyone" having heard the poems already. Rest assured, I had not, although being a poet, also, I don't like to have an audience hear something again. Stan, too, agreed, commenting that musicians have it easy -- audiences want them to sing the same songs again, but he writes a new piece for each Franklin Grove get-together on the first Friday of each month.
Jim read those of two other local poets who do not go out in public anymore: Ed Beatty and Robert McClain. He encouraged the others to go visit them.
Being with the actual writers is always a learning experience, because they give background on why and how the poem came into being. On the other hand, I like to adhere to the philosophy of poetry by my high school Spanish teacher, also a poet, Robert Manley, who felt he could not elaborate on one of his own poems, because it is self-contained. Everything he wanted to say is in the poem. The words and construction of the poem are all that should be needed for the reader/listener to make his own interpretation. Still, interpretation is not the same as hearing about the "backstory" to a piece.
For a long time, the position was called "Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress." There were writers who I did not know had held the position, like Conrad Aiken, as well as very famous poets like Robert Frost. In modern day, we have Billy Collins, Rita Dove, Howard Nemerov whom I met while at Washington University (and about whom I wrote a poem while marveling at his striding across campus totally unheralded).
