Wendy Barker visits DMC for reading, talks with students
Poet Wendy Barker greeted Del Mar College with her poetry as part of the Library Poetry Series on Feb. 14 for an hourlong reading packed with words and metaphors about Barker’s life.
“I liked that there was lots of humor and profanity in her poetry,” surgical tech major Briana Martinez said.
Associate of Arts English Professor Sara Kaplan chose Barker to visit campus.
“We are literature. It’s not who we read, it’s who we are. Who we read makes us who we are,” Kaplan previously told the Foghorn News when Barker’s visit was announced.
In her poem “The Dirt,” Barker talks about how people abuse the soil of the earth and overlook it. It is “populated to their own destruction,” she writes.
Barker talked about her inspiration at the event.
“Life inspires me the most and the poems come from the life,” Barker said.
For Barker it’s the “ability to weave all kinds of experiences together into one poem and tapestry.”
Surgical Tech major Alexis Torres attended the event.
“I want to learn about history and her inspiration for her poetry,” Torres said.
Barker is influenced by many writers including Barbara Hamby and Ruth Stone. In her poem concerning when she taught Robert Frost to her class she writes of “something dark deep” inside of us. That dark something is something beautiful deep inside us at our core. It is our purpose, Barker said.
Furthermore about her work, Barker said, “I’m very aware of the natural world” and “ a lot of my poems come from an impulse sparked by an occurrence in nature.”
In the pipeline for the future, Barker has one full manuscript that she is revising into a story about her mother’s past.
