On Pins and Paper –

To celebrate National Poetry Month this past April, library staff decided to display a “Pin-a-Poem” Poetry Board in the library lobby at UW Bothell and Cascadia College Campus Library. In the spirit of magnetic poetry – this idea was brought to life by blank library check-out cards (the ones you found in the back of books ages ago). Each card had a word on it and we supplied the board with dozens of these attached with push pins. The visual was stunning. The goal was to catch our campus community’s attention to interact and participate with the board and pin a line or two of collaborative community poetry. A book display near the poetry board encouraged individuals to celebrate poets, and read and write poetry all month long in celebration of poetry month. The board turned out to be quite effective and provided an interactive element alongside the book display. It was heavily used with new words and lines added to the community poem board every day. Many voices and thoughts merge into one as more and more lines were added and new poems started. We offered and our campus responded. The display creators were pleased with the results that our library users were interested in this evolving and changing artwork that the community as a whole had a hand in creating – or should I say had a paper and pin in creating. Our hopes were that our campus thought about and wrote poetry for the month of April – and the board provided that very opportunity. Happy Poetry Month all year long and write on!  

– Cora, Circulation Lead, UWB/CC Campus Library

Sample of the collaborative poetry pinned on the board

blue storm after sun                              
like pink water over sky                          
as ugly as it was                                      

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honey mist

beauty is like the

milk moon

sweet goddess urges a chant

the girl is all diamond

apparatus of a tongue