in 2018 while at firefly bookstore in kutztown, berks county, for a poetry reading followed by an open mic, i met khalid guiden. i could have let my introvert-self keep me from opening introductions socially at the end of the event, but my insides wouldn't let me because the poem he read to the crowd drew an especially real-feeling line to my heart—invisibly in the air—as he spoke each next word into the room.
compelled by his poem for his grandmother he'd lost shortly after writing this piece for her, i asked him for permission to share it on my poetry-teaching blog. here is what i shared of it back then with some photos he offered to go with the memories and intentions presented through the writing.
we were so grateful to feature him reading this poem at goggleworks center for the arts this spring through berks bards and our one-minute poems program we host every spring during april as national poetry month, what we locally coin as bardfest. khalid read this poem for us after he and two other student poets from kuztown university (by the way, frank also attended this school) were our featured poets in march 2020; this poetry reading became the last one we hosted in-person, since the COVID-19 pandemic began, so my fellow volunteer organizers and i are incredibly aware of how fortunate we were for the many monthly events we hosted in the community for years before abruptly yet safely going virtual, and we remember these students in a sense of awe, as our last in-person featured poets, and because of their time with us and also knowing how hard 2020 has been on young people in school and college in how their worlds were reshaped, challengingly so, in a matter of weeks and months.
please share this powerful poem onward.
— jennifer hetrick
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