Public Poetry Project

2005 Poetry Advisory Committee: Bonnie MacEwan, William Brockman, William Joyce, Gabriel Welsch, Steven Herb

2005 Poetry Selection Committee: Barbara Crooker, Gary Fincke, Deirdre O'Connor

Gerry Jones represents the young Walter Dean Myers sitting and reading in his Harlem tower and gauging whether the action below is enough to take his eyes off the page. Usually the book wins, but the sights, sounds, and smells still find their way into the soul of the poet and the minds of his characters.

Video - Award Ceremony

Barbara Crooker said about Jeanne Murray Walker’s “So Far, So Good,” “One of the many things I admire about it is its telescopic quality, the way it zooms way out there to the universe, to the eye of God, and back again, firmly grounded in the things of the world, plastic placemats, spaghetti, mashed potatoes.”

Video - Award Ceremony

Many people who have read Judith Vollmer’s “The Coffee Line” have had the image of the burner, “the wedding ring of night & morning fused” linger in their minds for weeks and months afterward, so powerful is its use here.

Video - Award Ceremony

Video - Award Ceremony (extended version)

Deirdre O’Connor said of Ron Mohring’s “The Company We Keep,” “There's something childlike in both the sound-driven language and in the act of collecting crayfish that is gently but usefully undermined by the conclusion that we human beings insist on our dominion.”

Video - Award Ceremony

Gary Fincke said about Lynn Emanuel’s “The Planet Krypton,” “I've loved this poem since I heard Lynn read it . . . it's so well observed and takes its images under the surface to where the ‘real poem’ lies.”

Video - Award Ceremony