Port Townsend workshop has rhyme and reason

PORT TOWNSEND — Crystol Brown's relationship with local police officers has rarely been pleasant, never just a short "howdy" or a smiling nod. When the Port Townsend teen was 5, she watched police slam her mother to the ground for resisting arrest, she said, and in recent years it seemed their objective was mainly to harass.

But this week, her encounters with officers have revolved around similes, metaphors, rhythm and rhyme. Brown and a Port Townsend police officer sat side by side on a concrete slab yesterday, pens wagging anxiously as they searched for just the right words.

"I know it's just odd seeing a cop writing poems with us, reading their poems to us and writing about their feelings," Brown said. "They've surprised me. I realize that they are normal, and they're not just psycho, out to get you."

A most disparate group of Port Townsend residents has been gathering daily at nearby Fort Worden State Park to lay bare revelations and worries, hoping for the intoxication of that which most of them feared: writing poetry.

The grand experiment is called "Connecting Chords," the brainchild of award-winning poet and musician Christine Hemp. Modeled on a similar project Hemp conducted in London, the Port Townsend version contains a diverse mix: six teens, many of whom have had run-ins with police, two Port Townsend police officers, the police chief and a probation officer. Their work culminates in a stage performance at 7:30 tonight at Port Townsend High School.

"I'm excited to be doing this now because it seems to be a way to encounter and address the violence of the world on a really, really tiny scale," said Hemp, who is originally from Edmonds and now lives in Port Townsend. She has taught poetry in a number of programs, including the Harvard Extension School and the University of Washington.

"I make no presumptions about saving the world," she said, "but it starts at home."

Truth be told, many of the participants were reluctant at first. Some of the kids thought it would be "lame," another feel-good exercise. This week only promised an awkward reunion with people who have seen them at their worst.

"It is kind of weird. He's the first officer to arrest me," said John Herron, 17, pointing to school resource officer Troy Surber.

When Surber arrested him, Herron said he thought the cop was a jerk. "Now," he said, looking at Surber smiling across from him, "if I could have any cop arrest me, it would be him."

And for Officer Eric Franz, a veteran of the Army's Special Forces and soon to be the Police Department's first canine handler, poetry offered few benefits, forcing him to shelve a busy week of appointments and tasks. He majored in history, not English, he noted. Boot camp made more sense to him. Yet somehow, this stoic did manage to rhyme more than a few times.

Everyone has an image to protect, and for police officers it's one of being in control. But Police Chief Kristen Anderson saw vulnerability and discomfort as opportunity.

"The gap between cops and kids, that's been going on for hundreds of years," Anderson said. "This allows the kids to see cops with a motivation other than 'I'm going to nail you.' It allows cops to see kids on a more personal level and where they came from."

Anderson and Barbara Carr Johnson, director of Jefferson County Juvenile and Family Court Services, needed little convincing. They pulled together $7,700 from the county, the community, several thousand dollars from a scholarship fund established in the name of a slain officer and an anonymous matching grant.

This nontraditional approach is slowly getting attention. King County Sheriff Dave Reichert liked the idea of using a different medium, said Sgt. Sydney Jackson, who coordinates King County's school-resource officers. Three schools in the Highline School District are eager to host a poetry workshop if funding can be found.

During one session this week, Hemp called her group to attention by playing a Celtic tune on her flute. Three days into the workshop, most inhibitions about writing seem to have slipped away. Some in the group were even eager to read their pieces.

"I don't like poetry / Poetry don't like me," wrote Robby Little, a 13-year-old. Despite his clever quip, Little seems to give in somewhat. "It's always been ... / You get so bored / you want to write / some more."

And Chief Anderson laid herself bare, remembering a tense moment from her childhood — flying pizza and angry words — captured in a somber 10 lines.

Throughout the day, the group traversed tough terrain. Jim Singleton, a probation officer, wrote of a relationship lost. Sarah McDonough, 14, explored, teary-eyed, the carefree moment of laughter with a best friend who had died.

Hemp guided the group through a discussion of values and character, made them probe their insecurities and then hammer out verse to those naysayers who whispered those words of doubt.

"It's incredible when people find out they can write with authority," she said. "It's intoxicating."

Keiko Morris can be reached at 206- 464-3214.