Highlight Of Our Gentle Poet –Laverne Frith

It is with a certain amount of pride that Senior Magazine presents, in every issue, The Poet’s Corner, written by Laverne Firth and Joyce Odam.

For 13 years, two of the most established poets in the literary world bring to the magazine’s pages words of encouragement and guidance for the beginning writer and a short poem dedicated to the season or influences of the time. At times, the column also includes a poem submitted by a reader/ poet.

Nature is a major subject for Firth and is the subject of his newly published coffee table book, “Celebrations: Images and Texts.” The work is a spiral-bound collection of 44 pages of poetry and photographs published by Rattlesnake Press. “I’m very pleased with it,” said Firth. “It’s impressions from a visual standpoint.”

The poet’s last chap book, “The Range of Seeing,” released in 2008 by Finishing Line Press, was nominated for the Commonwealth Club of California’s California Book Awards, as was the one before it. The awards that follow Firth and his work fill a page and distinguish him in his chosen field. The poet is an admirer of Ralph Waldo Emerson and much of his work reflects that image.

Firth was already a major figure in the world of poetry when he first met with the late Ted Richards, then publisher of Senior Magazine. “At the time I was the editor of a national poetry journal named Poets Depth Quarterly,” he said. “Joyce Odam was the assistant editor. I asked her to join me went I went to see the publisher.”

Firth showed Richards a possible column and spoke of it as a public service. Still, the idea of a half page dedicated to poetry was not an easy sell to Richards, but he agreed to give it a try.

“I come from a background to teach,” said Firth. “People need guidance writing and reading poetry.”

In a recent column Firth urges writers to be close to the experience they write about, that poetry is the mysterious combination of mood, feeling and mindset.“Walk through your neighborhood,” he wrote. “You’re sure to find a poem.” Firth is often a team with his wife, Carol, also a poet. The couple give talks, workshops and encouragement to beginning poets. They collaborated on a book called, Practical Poetry: a guide for poets.

“The book is for anyone who wants to engage in poetry,” Firth said. They edit and publish, Ekphrasis, a poetry journal that includes a collection of work by contemporary poets.

This year, Firth was elected president of the California Federation of Chaparral Poets of California, Inc., a statewide organization with 17 active chapters spread across the state. It is one of the oldest and largest poetry organizations dedicated to education in poetry.

“I have an interest in poetry in all its aspects, the historical as well as the modern,” Firth told the organization at its convention in Oakland last May. “That interest includes a continuing commitment to the fostering and writing of the best poetry we can.”From King David’s Psalms to ancient scrolls from the Orient, to England’s Shelly, Keats and Byron to Tennyson and Poe, the lines of the poet live on.

Firth says that through Senior Magazine, his workshops, chapbooks and talks, he is able to reach a broad and diverse audience of aspiring poets as well as poetry lovers.

About the author Nan Mahon

Nan Mahon lives in Elk Grove and is both the Cover Story and Senior Spotlight writer for Senior Magazine. She is also the author of Junkyard Blues, a thrilling motorcycle ride through Texas, California and Mexico behind a Vietnam vet running from the drug Cartel.
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