On Feb. 4, over 100 people nibbled heart-shaped cookies, sipped pink punch with heart-shaped ice, and listened to poetry.
English professor Doug Smith, in conjunction with the Academic Skills Center, presented “The Offices of Love,” this year’s third poetry reading. Participants read love poems to an appreciative audience of Guilford students, faculty, and staff members.
The event’s title came from a line of Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter Sundays,” which reads “What did I know, what did I know/ of love’s austere and lonely offices?”
This was not a typical reading of love poetry. There was no trace of Shakespearean sonnets, nor Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “How do I love thee?”
Instead, many poems portrayed day-to-day love, such as Judith Viorst’s read by Sara Beth Terrell, Director of the Guilford Initiative on Faith & Practice. Viorst’s poem chronicles aspects of everyday life that strengthen love.
Nikos Chremos read Christina Peri Rossi’s “Distancia Justa” in the poem’s original Spanish. Chermos translated the poem, revealing an intimate portrayal of the difficulty of keeping love at the necessary distance.
Other poems narrated the love between a parent and a child, or vice versa, such as Smith’s choice, “My Father Deep and Late on the Route South” by Herbert Morris.
“We wanted to celebrate, with passion, the beauty of language,” Smith said. “There are complexities in love, and these poems wrestle with such complexity.”
“Creative writing is an important piece of what ASC works with students on, so we really value our readings as celebrations of the creative spirit on campus,” said ASC Director Sue Keith, who helped organize and publicize the reading.
After the 12 readings listed on the program, audience members had the chance to read.
The poems read during the open mic broke the audience’s amorous hush, adding erotic passion and lust.
Senior Elizabeth Laird began with e.e. cummings’s “Untitled,” which begins with the line “I like my body when it’s close to your body,” and includes the phrase “I like kissing this and that of you.”
First-year Kyle Higgs read a poem of his own. His poem, “You Make Me Stupid,” was dedicated to “his angel” and reminiscent of the meaning expressed by Peri Rossi.
Perhaps the most “awww” inspiring moment of the evening came at the end, when junior Mary Van Dyke read one of her own poems, entitled “Words I Want to Hear,” and dedicated it to junior Brandon Winter. Winter’s poem, “In place of a poem,” was read by junior Kathy Oliver.
Many in the room were aware of the relationship between Winter and Van Dyke during Oliver’s reading and kept sneaking happy glances at the couple.
“I got some really good vibes,” first-year Sarah Levenson said. “I really liked what happened at the end. I also liked the poem read by Sara Beth. That’s what I hope for myself.