Writer/editor Mary Margaret Carlisle has an easy answer to the question ยWhat is poetry?ย ยIt is your voice / and not so much / what you say / but that you say itย (from her poem What is Poetry). Now, answering the question ยWhy write?ย is a little harder. ยThe reasons are as individual and diverse as the poets themselves,ย Carlisle says. ยI write to share what I think and feel with others, and listen to others to discover where we overlap. Perhaps, as Rushdie said, poets should point at frauds, take sides, start arguments, shape the world and stop it from going to sleep. I know it keeps me awake.ย Carlisle wonยt be appearing alone. ยThe 2008 Texas Poet Laureate, Larry Thomas, is from Houston,ย she says. ยIยm happy to say heยll be with us at the reading.ย
This article appears in Aug 2-8, 2007.