National Poetry Month will be celebrated at Iowa Wesleyan College with three events .
WordUp Wesleyan, a writing festival, will be held on Tuesday, April 10, from 12:30 -2:30 p.m. in the Howe Student Activity Center. Student organizations are sponsoring a number of activities to encourage creativity. There will be opportunities to write bad love poetry, take part in music mad libs, create six-word stories, invent word definitions, play Global Jeopardy and create poems based on photos, among other activities. There will be an open mic poetry competition, where original work is encouraged. The public is invited.
Taylor Mali, one of the most well-known poets to have emerged from the poetry slam movement, will present a program on Tuesday, April 10, at 7 p.m. in the Chapel Auditorium.
Mali studied drama in Oxford with members of The Royal Shakespeare Company. He was one of the original poets to appear on the HBO series Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry and was the "Armani-clad villain" of Paul Devlin's 1997 documentary film SlamNation. His poem “What Teachers Make” has been viewed over 4 million times on YouTube and was quoted by the New York Times’ Thomas Friedman in one of his commencement addresses.
Mali is vocal advocate of teachers and the nobility of teaching, having spent nine years in the classroom teaching everything from English and history to math and S.A.T. test preparation. He has performed and lectured for teachers all over the world and has recently reached his goal of creating 1,000 new teachers through "poetry, persuasion, and perseverance."
His performance is free and open to the public. It is supported by the Haselmayer Endowment for the Arts at Iowa Wesleyan College.
Readings from Design, the College’s literary magazine, will be held on Thursday, April 12, at 11 a.m. in the Chapel Auditorium. Design includes poetry, prose and artwork contributed by students, staff and community members. The program is open to the public.
