Lighthouse Teaches Poetry to the Masses With New Denver Festival

One of Lighthouse Writers Workshop’s goals when it opened its new facility earlier this year was to open up the writing world — literature and its creative pursuit — to more of the general public.

“We went on a field trip to some nearby businesses when we first got into this new building,” recalls Lighthouse program director and co-founder Andrea Dupree. “One of them was Prodigy Coffeehouse. They run internship programs for neighborhood kids with economic disparities and other challenges. Those kids get trained up on working in the coffee shop, and then there are all these leadership trainings they can avail themselves of, things like that. We met the manager at Prodigy, who worked her way up through that program, and she told us that when Prodigy moved into the neighborhood, she figured it wasn’t a place for her.”

That presumption proved to be false, but it’s one of the inspirations for Lighthouse outreach: to prove to the surrounding community, no matter their previous experiences with writing and literary matters, that Lighthouse Writers Workshop is a place for them, too.

That's why Lighthouse is debuting its first Poetry Fest, a dynamic weekend of readings, classes, panels, short craft talks and celebrations; a mini-festival custom-made for poets and the poetry-curious. It all happens on Saturday, November 4, and Sunday, November 5. A full weekend pass is $195, with a Saturday pass option at $120 and Sunday at $80. (Lighthouse members receive discounts on these rates.) But there’s also à la carte morning intensives, and registration for the readers and conversations is available separately.

Lighthouse, which is well known for its annual LitFest each summer, wanted to put on an event that would raise public awareness around poetry. Dupree, whose own writing emphasis is generally in the world of fiction, says that too many people have had poetry spoiled for them by a bad experience, probably in freshman English. “It’s usually left over from someone feeling super alienated by it in school,” says Dupree. “Students are told, ‘Hey, you don’t understand this poem,’ or ‘Did you read the footnotes? Because the footnotes will explain to you how you’re totally wrong.’”

That’s a curious fate for a form that’s generally so beloved in youth: We start with nursery rhymes, Dr. Seuss, maybe Shel Silverstein. For too many, that’s where poetry stays.

“That’s one of the things we’re trying to address,” Dupree says. “This idea that you have to wear a beret and smoke clove cigarettes and think that poetry rules the world in order to get something from it, to make it worthwhile as an interest or a pursuit. If you just preach to a community that poetry is accessible, that writing is worth their time, it’ll fall flat. It’s a fool’s errand. But if you get them writing, they’ll convince themselves just in the doing of it.”

To that end, Lighthouse is broadening its definition of poetry to include the art of songwriting — certainly a parallel form, if not a subset of the poetic arts. “Martin Gilmore from Swallow Hill Music will be teaching the craft of songwriting and appearing on a panel, "The Poetry of Everyday Life," with Joshua Abeyta [of Swallow Hill and Los Mocochetes], Rachael [Lonely Choir] and Clay Rose [Gasoline Lollipops]," says Dupree. "Music is something that’s made everyone — everyone — feel something. There’s this disconnect somehow between song and poetry that makes no sense. Song and poetry is where all literature started, back in the oral traditions. It speaks to us on a level that’s ancient and vital. So we’re happy to include several singer-songwriters to perform and also talk about their writing process. It’s another way we’re working toward as broad an inclusivity as we can for this event.”
While Dupree claims that Poetry Fest is “starting small,” size is clearly relative when it comes to talking about a Lighthouse event: It’s a full weekend of programming, with attention clearly and purposefully paid to maximizing the appeal to as wide an audience as possible. Events range from readings by and discussions with poetry heavyweights like Alice Notley, Victoria Adukwei Bulley and Linda Hogan to sessions such as “Poetry for Haters,” a time designed for everyone who was introduced to the form in a way that left a terrible taste in their mouth for anything that rhymes or carries meter. A complete listing of the events currently scheduled is available on the Lighthouse website.

Poetry — and the communal celebration of it, life and art in general — is even more important during such times as what the world is currently staggering through. “I just did an interview with [Colorado Poet Laureate] Andrea Gibson, who’ll be doing opening remarks on Saturday night’s reading. I asked them if there was a time when they more often turned to reading or writing poetry in order to deal with personal or worldwide tragedy," Dupree says. "Their response was, ‘I turn to poetry for everything.’ That’s a resource available to everyone, all the time. That’s why we’re doing this weekend. That’s why it’s important.”

Lighthouse Writers Workshop, 3844 York Street, hosts its premiere Poetry Fest, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday, November 4, and 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Sunday, November 5. For more information or to purchase passes, see the Poetry Fest page on the Lighthouse website.