Hello everyone! First off, I want to apologize for this post being a few days late. I’ve been a little under the weather and had to put things off for a bit, but here we are!

One of the big aspects of being ArtRoot Writer-In-Residence is doing a project during each of our 6-month tenures. As I’ve spent time thinking about the arts, it occurred to me that Poetry is the only major art form that has 2 completely different methods of delivery. We listen to music, we view visual art and dance, etc, but poetry can be either be received directly off the page by the reader, or it can be presented aloud via the spoken word/sound.

With that in mind, the project I proposed is putting together a small archive of poems by local poets along with audio recordings of each poem being read by the author. There are some poems that work *really* well when viewed on the page, but aren’t nearly as effective when spoken aloud. A pretty obvious example to me is any one of E.E. Cummins’ graphic/visual poems. The way they are laid out of the page is integral to how we perceive it. Most of Clark Coolidge’s book, ING, is another example. It just wouldn’t make much sense hearing it rather than viewing. Take a look at the image of one of the pages below. It’s neat to look at, but I wouldn’t try to read it aloud to others. The flip side is that there are many poems that have a power when heard, but don’t contain the same energy when read silently off the page.

I often enjoy hearing recordings of past poets reading their own work. Hearing recordings of Stein or Yeats is really fascinating! I would argue that recordings like these aren’t always the “perfect” reading, but hearing it in the author’s own voice is worth doing when possible.

So. . . over the next few months I am going to be collecting 1-2 written poems per poet along with audio recordings, and I’ll build a small online archive where we can view and hear these pieces!

I have a small list of names already, but any poets from Racine or Kenosha. If you live elsewhere and have ties to the city, like you used to live here or you come to our open mics every now and then from out of town you are definitely welcome to contribute as well.

I plan to host the audio recordings on a Soundcloud site and link them to a post here collecting all the written work alongside the audio links.

Anyone interested can send the written poems and recordings to my personal email at:

jaymollerskov (at) gmail (dot) com

For audio recordings, it can be as simple as recording yourself reading on your phone. Videos are fine. I can extract the audio easily. If you are someone who is cellphone-less or uncomfortable with technology, feel free to reach out and I’m happy to help, but the fact that you are reading this tells me you are at least minimally acquainted with the internet!

Thanks everyone! I’ll be back in half a week or so with a post about sound poetry.

Jay Mollerskov, ArtRoot Writer-In-Residence – 3/5/26