stanley burkert of maidencreek township served as the poem-source guest among his fellow residents for a poetry reading about the labors of our fingertips: poems from manufacturing history in berks county at keystone villa at fleetwood in the blandon area tuesday afternoon.
burkert made shoes on peach street long ago and worked on custom steel projects for clients near the city of reading. you can read the excerpt of his poem here.
copies of burkert's full poem in large font were printed and handed out to all residents at the poetry reading so they could follow along and ask him questions after everyone had taken in its details. kelly gorski, who kindly offered two hands of help with photography assistance, asked him how he ended up getting his shoe factory job, and he explained that his brother worked there but eventually quit to take a job in construction.
it was wonderful to see ed ochocki again, too, since writing his life story locally and about how he had a sniper's single bullet rip through him in four places in world war ii on the island of tinian south of japan but still survived and kept fighting.
lessons in how poetry can be funny, something a lot of people don't expect, were a part of the reading, too, like with edna machemer's poem, which has an underwear-related joke toward the end. hearing people in their 80s and 90s laugh well and knowing that you nudged that gift into life is a beautiful reward in this work. and we all need to laugh more in this life, anyway. so any opportunity for it is a nice perk and reprieve from the stress and strain in being alive today. and if laughter sparks to light through poetry, that's all for the better in the literary arts and also at a soul-level.
No comments:
Post a Comment