Sunken Garden Poetry Opens its 21st Season

Wednesday evening marked the opening of the 21st annual Sunken Garden Poetry Festival at the Hill-stead Museum. The first readings of the season included the winners of several contests for young poets. In all, fifteen young poets were honored by reading their own works at the start of the event.

Radio personality Chion Wolf of the Coline McEnroe show on NPR hosted the Fresh Voices Reading by the young poets.

“We have guidelines on our website, but we also try to reach out to as many Connecticut teachers as we can, especially English teachers. A lot of students enter because their teachers prompt them to,” said Poetry Program Coordinator Sarah Wadsworth about the selection process.

Candidates are selected from over 200 submitters to perform their works in front of the committee and five finalists are chosen for the opening night at the Sunken Garden.

Among the young poets was Horlando De los Santos, who read from his original piece entitled “How to Wear Your Father's Cologne.” The piece was inspired by a poem by Warsan Shire, a Kenyan-born writer who published “How to Wear Your Mother's Lipstick,” explained his Creative Writing teacher Maureen O'Brien, who attended the event in support of De los Santos.

He attends the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts magnet school, and was only in the school for one year before being tapped for the competition.

“He wrote some phenomenal poems, and he's a great performer, and we thought he could win, so we said to him, “you've got to do it,” and he went all the way, and we're very excited,” said O'Brien.

De los Santos' version touched on the themes of poverty, manliness, and generational connection. De los Santos' poem read,

“You have to wear it like her wore poverty and abandonment,

You have to let the abuse sink into your surroundings making the air stale,

You have to wear it like he wore it.”

Mimi Madden, Artistic Director of the festival since 2011, said the event, which runs every other Wednesday until August, tends to draw 300-400 attendants on any given evening, but noted that the final day with Billy Collins, Poet Laureate of the United States from 2001-2003 could easily draw over 1000 people with cooperating weather.

Coming off the 20th anniversary year in 2012, Madden remarked, “we had a double sized festival last year, with ten poets instead of the usual five, so this year is a bit of a relief.”

In addition to the poetry readings the festival features talks by the poets and musical acts. A full schedule of the performances can be found at the Sunken Garden website.

Madden was also excited about the legacy of the 20th anniversary year.

“We have several milestones behind us, which includes the publishing of our anthology by Wesleyan University Press and we are selling it again this year,” she said. The book features a cover by local artist Deborah Wadsworth, and prints of the painting are also for sale at the festival.

Featured poets in this season include the aforementioned Billy Collins and Richard Blanco, the inaugural poet for President Barack Obama in 2013.

The opening evening event featured poetry by Tracy K. Smith and music by the Jackie McLean Youth Jazz Ensemble.