Bucks County Community College welcomed acclaimed poets Ethel Rackin and J.C. Todd to the Bucks Newtown campus on Monday, Feb. 20, for a poetry reading in Tyler Hall, room 142.
The reading was free admission and open to the public, and was presented by Bucks’ Wordsmiths Reading Series, a group that brings talented poets to Bucks to preform poetry and prose. Both Rackin and Todd brought copies of their acclaimed published works that were available for purchase at the event.
Dr. Chris Bursk, co-director of the Wordsmiths Reading Series and also a professor in Language and Literature, introduced Ethel Rackin and J.C. Todd to the audience of between 50-100 people around 1:00 P.M. The event was relatively short, only lasting around an hour to an hour and a half in length.
Dr. Ethel Rackin is an associate professor of Language and Literature at Bucks Community College, and co-directs the schools Wordsmiths Reading Series as well as the Poet Laureate Program. She is the author of two published works, “The Forever Notes” (2013) and “Go On” (2016). Her poetry has been published in the Colorado Review, Verse Daily, and Volt. She earned her MFA from Bard College and went on to receive a P.h.D. in English Literature from Princeton University.
Rackin’s “lyrical poetry” (she also describes them as “adapted sonnets”) centers mainly on various means of survival, whether it be political, environmental, or personal survival. She chose to read mainly from her publish work “Go On,” but read a few unpublished poems that could potentially be published in the future.
One of Rackin’s short poems provoked a notable amount of emotion from the audience, “You can’t be loose and play when your teeth are being ripped out by dreams.” She also explained a technique of hers for writing poetry, described as “tricking yourself” into writing. A technique for doing so is to re-visit a location that inspires you, one of hers being the Lambertville Café, then it will be likely that you will become inspired to write poetry.
J.C. Todd is a creative writing professor at Bryn Mawr College, and is the winner of the 2016 International Literary Award in poetry, as well as a 2014-16 Pew Fellowship. She is the author of one published book,“What Space This Body” (2008), and two chapbooks by the names “Nightshade” (2000), and “Entering Pisces” (1985). She has also begun another work by the name “Beyond All Repaired.”
Todd is a former student of Bucks Community College’s Dr. Chris Bursk, though she began writing poetry way before his influence. She grew up under the influence of “community poetry,” which she explains as the collective voice of her community’s culture (literature, art, music) that had an immense impact on her choice to start writing poetry. She describes her poems as “organic,” and states “My poetry gets better when I don’t think.” Her works are organized into what she calls “30-second movies,” or “Sonnets that aren’t able to behave enough to be called sonnets.” She read mostly from “What Space is This Body” and from unpublished works that she calls “the maybes”- short poems that will maybe become something bigger in the future.
Todd took a very humorous approach towards her reading, laughing with the audience as well as interacting with them. However, her poems were thought provoking and some calling attention to serious political and social issues. At one point of the reading, she gave the audience a choice between two poems, allowing the audience to choose what they would rather hear based on the general topics of each.
The poetry reading ended with Dr. Ethel Rackin and J.C. Todd taking questions and comments from audience members who approached them after applause. Both Ethel Rackin and J.C. Todd put on extremely successful readings and their published works including “The Forever Notes,” “Go On,” and “What Space This Body” are available for purchase online.