What Is Live Typewriter Poetry? Everything You Need to Know
When I tell a new friend I’m spending my weekend performing typewriter poetry at a market or a wedding, their first question is always, “What is typewriter poetry?” And as a typewriter poet for hire based in Augusta, Georgia, I get this question a lot. Here’s my best answer.
While more commonplace on the corners of bustling cities and niche TikTok communities, typewriter poetry is by and large a strange thing to see today. Whereas our parents and our parents’ parents used typewriters regularly, and read or wrote a bit more poetry, too—this generation all but grew up without both.
How Typewriter Poetry Changed My Perspective on Art
Two years ago, my friend Alyssa asked me if I’d be willing to set up a typewriter at Bedford Greenhouses for their annual Valentine’s Day event. Knowing my passion for poetry and having seen street poets on different pockets of Instagram, she thought it would be a neat idea for me to try.
I said yes without hesitation... or at least without enough hesitation to say no. In the days that followed I bit my nails into oblivion as I learned how to type the way my parents did (with a metal contraption that makes ding sounds).
That Saturday, I set up a little table with a simple sign: “Give me a word and I’ll write you a poem.”