Poems Appearing in Oregon Public Art

In an article published at Statesman Journal, Eleanor Berry draws readers' attention to the unexpected appearances of poetry in public art around the state of Oregon. "Poems probably aren’t the first thing you think of when you hear the term 'public art,'" Berry explains, "but poetry by Oregon poets appears in a good deal of public art around the state, including in Salem." From there: 

When we come upon poems in public art, it may be by chance, and there may be others alongside us. We find ourselves reading poetry amid other activities—taking a walk in a park, catching a bus, buying a loaf of bread, going for a swim.

In Lake Oswego’s Foothills Park, the Stafford Stones, an installation designed by sculptor Frank Boyden, form a sort of grove beside the Willamette River. Eight basalt columns about twice the height of a person stand about like trees. Each has a rough side and a smooth side. The smooth side is incised a poem by the late William Stafford, a prolific and influential poet, pacifist and teacher.

The poems are as short as three lines—“Oregon is insanely green / It is the light / Left over from Eden”—and as long as the much-anthologized “You Reading This, Be Ready,” its three quatrains and final couplet glowing white against the dark stone.

In West Eugene, poetry is part of the “Art Thread,” public art installations at 21 stops for the EmX rapid transit system. Completed last year, this project, led by ceramic artist Betsy Wolfston, involved seven artists working in different media. Eugene poet Cecelia Hagen wrote the poetry, different for each stop, which is printed in blue ink on the smooth sides of chest-high, stainless steel electric boxes. The electric boxes make a very different sort of “page” on which to read poems than the basalt columns at Foothills Park. They invite a casual glance to take in a few lines at a time, which then may linger in the mind:

the first scene
   where you don’t
      know your lines
   where you begin
to improvise

This poetry installation is for commuters, preoccupied and in haste or forced to wait, whose attention may drift to words that invite the imagination.

Learn more at Statesman Journal.