April is National Poetry month and like the tulips that pop up from the ground, they're meant to be looked at and enjoyed, not hidden away.  Last month, the Good Tern Cooperative Food Market in Rockland put out a call to poets in the Midcoast to mail in a poem of any size or length — or style — and the Good Tern would put them up on the wall for all to see.

The submissions that came in ranged from Watershed high school students who did spare line drawings with quotes from famous authors or musicians to complex mix-media watercolor pieces combining art and words.

Lois Anne, a long time volunteer coordinated the exhibition.

"We probably got 60 poems sent in," she said. "Everything that was submitted went up on the wall. It was very democratic. The one exception is that someone sent in a drawing of a nude man and though it wasn't offensive, it was still going to be something kids would possibly see, so on the other side of the drawing was a painting — we had that side showing."

Anne grouped each of the pieces visually on the wall.

"I thought that grouping them that way might entice people to come closer and investigate."

Some of the poems that struck Anne the most were the high school poems. "The feelings that came out of some of these, I thought it was wonderful."

Here's one by Jarin Brooks. It touches on the natural, seasonal themes that poets like Edna St. Vincent Millay made universal. And if you've ever lost someone in your life, this poem will hurt your heart a little.

Snow is falling but will never stay.

Everything gives way to change

Nature’s sacrifice gives way to life.

Nothing is ever truly lost

Always found in something else.

And whatever beauty melts from our grasp

Gives, sprouts life to something else.

The exhibition will run until the end of April, at which point, Anne will box up the poems and leave them to be collected by their owners if they wish.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com