‘When the River Speaks’ Poetry publication debuts first release
Last week, San Marcos Public Library organizers invited guests to the San Marcos Cemetery for the launch of their new monthly poetry bulletin titled: “When the River Speaks.” They invite San Marcos area residents to submit their original poetry and the theme for their debut publication was “Everybody In!”
The team is mostly made up of library staff and volunteers working together to spread the word and review submissions for a monthly collection of local poetry. At the launch, copies of the release were passed out and several attendees took to the podium to share their work featured in the publication as well from their notebooks.
“I think there’s a lot of creative people in San Marcos, and the art community is definitely growing. I thin that this is just an extension of that creativity,” said library assistant, Mary Garcia. “This part of Texas has been settled for thousands of years so I think that there is a lot of history, a lot of culture here.”
From flyers to open-mics, and not to mention the social media push, the effort to spread the word about the bulletin has been indicative of their focus on diversity, Garcia said that the selection process was about finding the ones that spoke to the committee members and fit with the theme, as well as sampling from all of the members of the community.
SMPL librarian and WTRS organizer, Deborah Carter said that the bulletin is ultimately a communitybased publication although it is rooted in the library.
“You don’t have to be a ‘poet,’ it can be your first poem ever, it could be any kind of expression. We want people to feel welcome and we want it to be really about the community and for the community as a way to communicate with each other,” Carter said.
SMPL has held several events at the cemetery previously, but Carter said that it can provide a heightened sense of emotion and reverence. They also invited guests to write poems of remembrance to leave on the Día de los Muertos altar set up behind the podium.
Carter said, “We haven’t been able to come together physically much over the past year and a half so coming together in an art form seemed like a beautiful way to go about that.”
SMPL clerk Emily Watson said there has been a team of eleven volunteers working together on the layout, picking the poems and the public relations. She said, “We’ve got a great team of people who are all passionate about this project working together, so it’s been fun.”
“We had a fabulous turnout, lots of people from the community showed up to support us, which was really fantastic. Lots of great poets came to share their work, and it’s a beautiful evening in the cemetery,” Watson said.
“Everybody’s voice matters and everybody has something important to say,” Watson said, “the more opportunities we can create for everybody to share what’s within them, the healthier our community will be.”
Carter said that the theme of this month’s issue, “Everybody In,” represents the push to unify under creativity and around the river. The bulletin features work from college students, school children, mermaids and many more walks of life but all of the selected poems speak towards the relationship to the San Marcos River.
“I just happened to start writing back in the seventies when I was going through PTSD and welfare and the system didn’t care about you, I want to write a poem on it and then I’d try that again, also my wife and I started writing love poems,” said lecturer and writer, J.D. Elshoff.
His poem bearing the same title of the young publication “When the river speaks,” is featured on the second page. He shared this one along with several others from his notebook from the podium during the event.
“Good poetry makes you feel something, even if it’s just for that moment. Maybe it inspires you to go home and write yourself or do some reading or just to look at things a little differently, and I think poetry is powerful in that way,” Said Garcia.
While they hope to draw in more submissions from the San Marcos community, there is no firm deadlines to the publication. Similarly, they encourage those who submit their work not to feel too restricted to the monthly prompt.
“Hopefully, we can start spreading it more because now we have a tangible thing. Now that we have this, we can leave them places in town that might inspire people there,” said Carter.
As for the second issue of WTRS, the theme will be “A few of my favorite things,” so their team looks forward to seeing some fun poetry coming in around the holiday season.
The WTRS team encourages any and all San Marcos area residents to submit their original poetry. Visit their website: whentheriverspeaks.com/ submissions to submit and for more information on the publication. Poems in languages other than English are welcome and poets can also either post their work on their Facebook page or email them to submissions4wtrs@gmail. com.
