Lexie Shadix, Campus Carrier asst. arts and living editor

The Georgia Poetry Circuit (GPC) was founded by Adrienne Moore Bond in 1985 at Mercer University. Berry became a member of the circuit in 1998, and Sandra Meek, Dana professor of English, rhetoric and writing at Berry College, served as the director from 2007-2020. Currently, Nick Norwood, the director of the Carson McCullers Center for Writers and Musicians at Columbus State University (CSU), is the director of the GPC. He has been involved with the circuit since 2004. 

The Georgia Poetry Circuit is composed of 10 Georgia colleges and universities. Every year, they collaborate to bring three poets to each of the circuit member’s campuses. It allows schools to bring poets to their campuses that they normally may not be able to due to funding constraints. There is a northern leg of the circuit and a southern one, and each poet does both legs.

“Seven other small liberal arts schools just like us, including Bernal and Reinhardt and others, we all pull resources, and we bring three poets a year to Georgia, and they make a circuit,” Clinton Peters, assistant professor of creative writing and sponsor of the reading, said. “[The GPC] was just a good way to bring in higher caliber poets to share the wealth, so to speak. [The poets] get to visit more places, they get a little bit more money than an individual visit and make more contacts, sell more books. But we also get the benefit of those poets without having to spend as much money as we would individually.” 

Each of the member schools nominates two poets they want to join the circuit each year. 

“I think mostly it is the representatives [from each member school] choosing poets that they think would be a good fit for their school,” Norwood said. “I think there’s a real movement among the representatives to try to select poets that would engage their students.” 

Then, once the poets are nominated, all the member schools vote on which three they want to bring to the circuit that year. This year, one of the poets chosen was Camonghne Felix. She was raised in New York and is a writer, poet and essayist. Her debut poetry collection, “Build Yourself a Boat,” was published in April 2019. She is also a communications strategist who is involved in the political scene of the US. Felix visited Berry on Friday, Nov. 8, making it her last stop on the northern leg of the circuit. Events such as these are filmed by Bailey Casey, a junior majoring in creative writing, and posted           to YouTube. 

“All of the professors that I’ve ever had make it clear that poetry is a read art,” Casey said. “You can read it, but it’s supposed to be read aloud, and it’s supposed to be spoken because there are certain things that you are not going to catch. Then what I also like about poetry is every time you read or speak poetry aloud, it changes. So, hearing someone that is a spoken word poet, or anyone that’s a poet by trade, and hearing them read the work out loud; I think it just brings it more to life.” 

Felix read poems from her debut book, her memoir, and some unpublished work. Many of her poems dealt with heartbreak—reaching those who may have had—and even those who had not had, similar experiences.  

“Mostly what she was talking about doesn’t entirely relate to what I’ve gone through,” Cai DeFelice, a junior creative writing major who attended the event, said. “But it was very emotional. I think, for her, it’s a big part of her life, so I felt that pseudo-emotion. I think it’s still good to capture that empathy.”  

Poetry readings help expose students to a different way to make art. Art is not only created with paint on a canvas, but by singing, dance and literature. Not all poetry is the same. Some of it rhymes, some of it doesn’t. Some of it speaks of the past while some speaks of the future. 

“I think [Felix has] a very unique voice, a very interesting style, and is just sort of her own artist,” Peters said. “This will show our students and the people who come another way of doing poetry that they probably haven’t   seen before.” 

It is not just creative writing or English majors that benefit from poetry readings; language is a part of everyone’s everyday life. 

“I think adding a poetic sensiblity to writing makes it more palatable,” Peters said. “We love an exhibited joy of language, and I think that can help with anything. I think anyone can sort of benefit from poetry. Just hearing someone play with language and make language be something other than utilitarian.”  

Poetry is not necessarily an expanding or dying art form, rather, it is a changing one. 

“There’s been a lot of handwringing about how poetry doesn’t occupy the same place in our culture that it always did,” Norwood said. “In terms of impact, I’m not sure that it’s any greater or any less, but it is definitely different right? One way it is different is that it’s now an art form that is not only inclusive, but I would say increasingly dominated by people from groups that were formerly marginalized. In a way, it’s as vibrant as it ever was.”

However, in popular culture, it is becoming farther removed from everyday life. People are no longer reading poetry in the newspapers or paying attention to a poet such as Camonghne Felix the same way as they did to Walt Whitman. This shift away from poetry in mass media is something that heightens the importance of the Georgia Poetry Circuit and poetry readings in general. 

“I think the readings are important because it shows that [poetry] is living art,” Casey said. “It’s people that are all different races, different genders, all different orientations. It’s important to know that everyone has a voice, and you have a story to tell us, and you can tell it by this medium, if you choose to. I think that’s really important.” 

Poetry is a way to express oneself, and having events such as these help expose students and faculty alike to the art form. There are still two more poets that will attend Berry as part of the circuit later in the year, who will demonstrate this unique way of expression to the Berry community. Hopefully, Berry students will carry this art form into the world they will create after moving beyond the Gate of Opportunity, and events such as these can inspire them to continue their own creative pursuits within the world of poetry.