The poetry of strangers : what I learned traveling America with a typewriter

It might surprise you who’s a fan of poetry — when it meets them where they are. Before he became an award-winning writer and poet, Brian Sonia-Wallace set up a typewriter on the street with a sign that said “Poetry Store” and discovered something surprising: all over America, people want poems. An amateur busker at first, Brian asked countless strangers, “What do you need a poem about?” To his surprise, passersby opened up to share their deepest yearnings, loves, and heartbreaks. Hundreds of them. Then thousands. Around the nation, Brian’s poetry crusade drew countless converts from all walks of life. In The Poetry of Strangers , Brian tells the story of his cross-country journey in a series of heartfelt and insightful essays. From Minnesota to Tennessee, California to North Dakota, Brian discovered that people aren’t so afraid of poetry when it’s telling their stories. In “dying” towns flourish vibrant artistic spirits and fascinating American characters who often pass under the radar, from the Mall of America’s mall walkers to retirees on Amtrak to self-proclaimed witches in Salem. In a time of unprecedented loneliness and isolation, Brian’s journey shows how art can be a vital bridge to community in surprising places. Conventional wisdom says Americans don’t want to talk to each other, but according to this poet-for-hire, everyone is just dying to be heard. Thought-provoking, moving, and eye-opening, The Poetry of Strangers is an unforgettable portrait of America told through the hidden longings of one person at a time, by one of our most important voices today. The fault lines and conflicts which divide us fall away when we remember to look, in every stranger, for poetry. From award-winning writer and poet Brian Sonia-Wallace comes this heartrending collection of literary essays that explore Americas crumbling institutions and ultimately revealthe humanity that emerges at the margins. In this collection of thematically and geographically linked essays, Brian Sonia-Wallacea keen observer of the human condition and a poetry evangelisttravels across the US armed with only a typewriter to write poetry for strangers as he attempts to celebrate, eulogize, and potentially restore some of the most ubiquitous staples of Americana: the transcontinental railroad, the shopping mall, and music festivals, to name just a few. On his remarkable journey, Brian connects with fascinating American charactersthose not typically covered by the mainstream media, but who instead connect with the readers of J.D. Vance, Robert Moor, and Rick Bragg. By capturing and linking these individuals and their stories through the poems Brian writes for them, Dust Bowl Nation speaks to our times and to an increasingly larger part of our populace who yearns to understand our changing cultural landscape. Thought-provoking, moving, and eye-opening, Dust Bowl Nation is an unforgettable, masterful workby one of our most important voices todaythat gives readers a compelling, unvarnished view of Americaone that is rarely seen.