The Time a 90-Year-Old Veteran Wrote and Shared His First Poem in My Class

What I’ve learned about poetry writing workshops (as a host)

“This is the first poem I’ve ever written,” a 90-year-old male war veteran said to the small, 20-person-strong room of poets in Bluff’s Park, Malibu, after offering to share his just-penned work. The paper rattled in his hands as he brought it closer to his face.

Through a window, the ocean is visible across grassy plains where kids are playing football (the one with the spherical ball we English folk refer to) flanked by California Live Oak, Sycamore, and Redbud trees. Inside, under the drone of an extractor fan, we had gathered in this room as we had been, month-on-month.

The man focused through his thin-framed glasses onto the page, inhaled a shaky breath through his nose, and began to recite his poem. As he did, the room shifted. Even the world beyond felt like it held its breath, awaiting the birth of a new expression.

When he finished, applause filled the room. Never have I seen a smile spread so wide. “I didn’t know that was in me,” he said.

“And now it’s in us,” I responded, then thanked him for sharing.

This was a moment from The Ripple Effect workshop, a monthly workshop writing series I held in Malibu during my time as Poet Laureate.

My Goal for the Workshop

My goal for this workshop was to help us become more aware about how we affect each other — the ripple — and how the energy we pour out enters another and vice versa, focusing on writing prompts and soft skills so we could both write new poems and learn techniques to improve them.

I focused on how writing and sharing poems in the community is an intentional way to think about our “ripples” and how they affect the class and continue to have aftereffects once the class ends.

So touched by being present for the veteran’s first poem, I realized that he confirmed something I’ve said to others who have expressed an interest in starting to write or read poetry: “It’s never too late.” Only now, I wasn’t abstracting a belief; I had a palpable example.

No matter if you’ve never written a poem before or if you’re a daily writer, poetry is always something you can cultivate. Poetry — even if written privately — is communal as soon as it is read or heard by someone else. Its living flesh is constructed with language — itself a technology of communication — after all. And, the best poems end up living within us and changing us, sometimes over the course of our whole lives.

Experiences like this are one of the reasons why I continued hosting poetry writing workshops after my laureateship ended, through the company I started during my tenure, The Poetry Vessel. One of the goals of The Poetry Vessel is to help cultivate people’s unique poetic voices by inspiring them to write and providing educational resources to help them express themselves more effectively.

With this in mind, The Poetry Vessel has opened up its first-ever online poetry workshop, Poetry as Transformation, which I’ll be hosting. This is a 2-hour, once-a-week, 4-week workshop where the goal is to write poetry that is transformative — that helps give us a new perspective, surprises and changes us, and — perhaps most importantly — dares us to write something we’ve never written before.

Each week, we focus on a unique theme, starting with exploring and writing poems about our inner shadows, then moving on to writing poems about dreams, nature and ecological poetry and finally culminating in spiritually minded poems. I’ve purposely used this order to help us move from self to other, and then to dissolution: synthesizing self and other into one.

In my workshops, I believe in setting ritual contexts to help us get into flow. Therefore, I will open each class with a unique, guided meditation I wrote to start the class: exercises will open up your imagination.

We will then read and discuss some contemporary/classic poems, and work with prompts to write in new ways, bringing out words we didn’t even know we had. We will enter a collective flow state, so profoundly poetic expressions can emerge from us. The goal is to write 2-3 poems per workshop class for the four weeks.

The veteran wasn’t the only person who came to the workshop over and over—there are 100s of stories I could tell about students I’ve had, and about times when I have been a student in other people’s classes. But all I know is that the man who wrote his first poem in the class with me didn’t write his last on the same day. With or without classes, I know he has continued to write.

Is Poetry as Transformation for you? Here’s a snippet of what some others have said about my workshops:

If you feel called to join this workshop but cost is a barrier, or if you have any questions, please reach out to info[at]thepoetryvessel[dot]com.

Sign up for the workshop and learn more about full scheduling here.

I can’t wait to write with you.

— Nathan