OKAY, so you tracked down that Buzz Lightyear figure last Christmas, finally bought the correct Nikes, and coughed up for that crucial Manchester United "C" Away Kit . . . that still doesn't mean that yours are the children with everything. They may, unless you have been very scrupulous, he lacking a special gift, something that the brochure for an innovative event starting in Dublin next week describes as a wide variety of high quality encounters" with poetry.
From March 3rd to 13th, the Poetry Season at The Ark, the children's arts centre in Temple Bar, will be offering a programme which includes writing workshops, poetry readings, and concerts. Poets Paula Meehan, Jackie Kay and Matthew Sweeney, and actor Barry McGovern, will be among those aiming to make sure that all your encounters will be high quality ones.
As part of the season, mixed media artists and designers, Genevieve Murphy (a former artist in residence at the Ark) and John Kelly have created a number of "poetry trees". With names such as The Heaney Tree, The Anon Tree and The Nonsense Tree, these sculptures bearing leaves printed with various poems, will provide the starting point for workshop sessions.
The poetry woods at the Ark will also harbour a TelePoems Tree, covered with the winners of the Telecom Eireann supported competition to which 44,000 poems were submitted at the end of last year. As well as sprouting from the poetry tree, the 100 winning verses will also be printed and posted to the phone company's customers.
The festival has sessions "shaped" to suit various ages of children, from 1st to 6th class, as well as some "adult" readings and discussions for those involved in "the formation of children's poetic selves" and other interested big people. Further details and programme from the Ark, telephone: (01) 6707788.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/SJQTLMCMMRC2PLALXUKEWWS6HU.png)