Featherstone Kicks off Summer Poetry Festival with Island Poets Laureate

hosted three poets laureate under the summer tent at last night. Featherstone’s Executive Director, Ann Smith, explained that this was a huge event for Featherstone since it includes local poets. "West Tisbury has been on the track for some time now. They really set the tone for the Poets Laureate," she said.

Local poets laureate  and  have been coordinating the summer poetry festival for the past seven years. Ahren, West Tisbury's newest poet laureate explained, "We always like to throw in some local poets and this year because there's  poet laureates in several of the towns, we decided to do a poets laureate reading.”

The readings began with Dan Waters, the first poet laureate of West Tisbury. "Dan is a wonderful poet known for his concise poems and his wit. I find his poems to be hysterical and charming," said Ahren in his introduction.

Waters' credentials are impressive. In 2011 he received the Creative Living Award of Martha's Vineyard. Along with being the West Tisbury Poet Laureate for several years, Waters has written thousands of poems for the Vineyard Gazette. "A lot of people ask 'what does a poet laureate do'. Well, in West Tisbury there's really only one official duty and that is to write a poem every year for the town report."

On that note, Waters read the first poem he wrote as poet laureate called, 'Before A Town Meeting’ "It was all down hill from there," Waters joked at the conclusion of his poem.

The current Poet Laureate of Edgartown, Steve Ewing, explained, "I've been writing poetry all my life. As Poet Laureate you're supposed to speak at schools and stuff. So I went and talked to some seventh graders. I grew up in Edgartown and went to that same school so it was pretty cool."

Along with being an accomplished poet, Ewing is a dock builder. Many of his verses were based around the ocean during his childhood. He began with his poem "The Bunker Is Leaving.” Ewing’s reading also featured a guest appearance by his sister-in-law, Lizzy Bradley, who accompanied one of his poem with vocals and a guitar.  

Justen Ahren, the current Poet Laureate of West Tisbury ended the evening with a story. Through a combination of songs and poems, Ahren told the story of a mother who loses a child and her son's relation to that situation. "That's the scenario. I won't elaborate anymore. I won't give anything in between. I'm just going to read it as if it were a story," he said.

Ahren explained that there are more poems in his collection, but this piece outlined the "narrative ark" of it. Ahren’s combination music and poetry could not have been more effective for story telling. The audience was visibly emotional during the performance with man deep sighs and understanding head nods.

The next and features poet and human rights activist Carolyn Forche who has been traveling around the world with the State Department doing human rights work. "She will blow you away, " said Ahren.