Youth poets publishing getting paid
BY MARLI GUZZETTA
Alittle cabal of child-poets is growing on island, and they're

getting published.

Operating out of the Nantucket Boys and Girls Club's Learning Center, where the kids amass each afternoon after school, Len Germinara has been building his own dream team of youth poets.

"What I've been doing with the kids since I started working there is fostering a love and appreciation of poetry, and we're doing really well with that," said Germinara, the center's director. The anchor for the Learning Center is its "power hour," when the kids can "come into a quiet and relaxed atmosphere to do homework, and then we do interesting and educational things with them," he said.

Outside of that, Germinara has a "wide latitude" in providing activities for the kids who visit the Learning Center after school.

"Poetry is a large part of what I brought to the Center," said Germinara, who also voluntarily organizes the Nantucket Poetry Slam - working with the Nantucket Atheneum to host poetry slams for young poets. "The poetry slams became central to what I wanted to do at the club, to foster literacy, to make sure kids have a love of reading and a love of words," he said.

What began as a fun literacy exercise for the kids at the Learning Center "took on a life of its own," Germinara said. He began hosting sit-down sessions, in which he would tutor the children in his group on different structures of poetry. "And now the kids feel comfortable enough to bring me what they want to write. The anchor is that I'm there and available to bring whatever dreams they have to a place where they can succeed, even directing them to friends I have that publish children's writing."

When the opportunity to submit works to the Boys and Girls Club's book on diversity arose, Germinara encouraged the young poets to try.

Now, 10-year-olds John Knutti and Courtney Yancy are the first of the group to be published. Poems written by each child will be included in a book published by the national office of the Boys and Girls Club as part of its diversity initiative. The book will be in every Boys and Girls Club nationwide. Each poet received $50 as payment for his or her submission.

"John's poem was an acrostic poem. It was the first poem he ever wrote, and he got paid and he got published," said Germinara of the young man who was once far more introverted in a group setting.

"The first time John came to a youth slam, he read a poem and didn't do too well in the scoring. But he saw me acting as an emcee and figured he could do a better job," Germinara remembered. "So he shooed me off stage and did a 10-times-better job than I did. This has opened him up and empowered him. And now a lot of the kids know that you can get published and get paid."

"I like almost any kind of poetry, but mostly I like to make and read acrostic poems," said Knutti, who was kind enough to explain what an acrostic poem is to this reporter. "It's a poem with a word spelled out going up and down, and all the letters in that word start a phrase. It can both be hard and fun to make," he said.

Inspired by their peers successes, several kids attending the Learning Center are now working on chapbooks of their original poetry to publish and submit to competitions.

"They're serious about what they're doing," Germinara said.

Seventh grader Melissa Jones, 11, and fifth grader Georgette Smith, 10, are working on their own books of poetry - with cover artwork done by third grader Irena Rogeveen, 9.

Jones spends over an hour writing every afternoon, Germinara said. She addresses her poetry to a specific muse, whose name is Siran and who can fly. Flying imagery pervades most of Jones' work, even her drawings.

"I mostly write about made-up creatures and magic and stuff like that," said Jones, whose favorite line from her own writing showcases her mythological focus: The phoenix, a beautiful red bird, Emerges from its hidden place, Stretches its mighty red wings

And then shows the sun its face

Germinara said that Jones' performance at the last youth poetry slam was so evolved for an 11 year old, that it went over the head of many of the judges. In the first round, while reading an original poem about indecision and uncertainty, Jones noticed that other poets had their works memorized. She made it to the second round, so she memorized her poem and adjusted her performance to be more theatrical.

"Without a copy of her poem, she began the poem pretending like she was nervous, and people started to get a little bit worried. But she was just performing the disconnect of being nervous," Germinara said. "She was getting into the stagecraft of presenting a poem, and she did a fantastic job. ...Afterwards, people came up to me and said, 'Did that girl just play that poem out just right and no one got it?'"

Jones said she is no longer nervous about reciting her poetry in front of an audience. "I'm getting used to it," she said.

Georgette Smith knew from the moment she got to the Learning Center that she wanted to write poetry.

"She put down a notebook in front of me with poems and pictures - just this beautiful outpouring," Germinara said. "They're so young, sometimes you forget it's possible for them to create something so intricate. It's more than just 'moon and June,' simple rhyme schemes. They make things you don't expect from young kids."

Smith is working on 10 poems for her chapbook.

"I like that poetry helps you express your feelings, so everybody can know what you're thinking, and it can help other people," Smith said.

Though Germinara is happy to see the kids succeeding, he is not the literary equivalent of an overambitious soccer dad. He is happy to set a positive literary precedent for his students that will last a lifetime - so that they can enjoy the written word their whole lives.

"I've opened up the door, and there are kids who

are walking though," he said. I

The Learning Center opens at 2:30 p.m. every Monday through Friday. It closes at 6 p.m. from Monday through Wednesday, and then at 8 p.m. on Thursday and Friday. The cost of annual membership is $25 per year, per child. For more information, call 228-0158. For more information on the youth slams held at the Nantucket Atheneum, call the Atheneum at 228-1110.