As part of Skyline College’s Critical Global Citizenship Project and International Education Week, the Library hosted its annual International Poetry Reading, co-facilitated by English and Creative Writing Professor Rob Williams and Outreach and Equity Librarian Pia Walawalkar. The event welcomed students, staff, and faculty to share poems they loved or poems they had written themselves, in any language. When works were presented in languages other than English, readers offered a translation or brief explanation so the entire audience could engage with the meaning.
The atmosphere throughout the afternoon was warm and thoughtful, with readers taking turns across roles and disciplines. Students were an especially vibrant presence, sharing both selected poems and original work. Shwe Thel Nway read a poem in Burmese while Moe Abdi performed the French song Parler à mon père by Céline Dion. Qamar Sekandry read in Farsi and also shared one of her own English-language poems. In addition, Courtney Anne Vocal read an original poem she had penned in English.
Earlier in the semester, Chemistry Professor Susanne Schubert had given her students a poetry-writing assignment to encourage a more creative engagement with scientific ideas. Students Sandy Liu, Stephen Richard, and Christian Perez shared their poems from that project, where they blended concepts from chemistry and mathematics with their own voices and perspectives. Their participation highlighted the ways creativity and scientific thinking can inform and enrich one another.
Staff and faculty contributed as well, helping to create a rich multilingual environment. Thanh Nguyen, Detail Retention Specialist from the International Student Program, read a poem in Vietnamese. Susanne Schubert also shared an English translation of a Turkish poem, and Language Arts faculty member Luciana Castro contributed poems in Spanish and Portuguese, reminding attendees of the many languages spoken and taught on our campus. Library faculty, Majdolene Dajani, read in Arabic, and Pia Walawalkar shared a poem in Marathi.
Across the afternoon’s readings, several common themes emerged: learning from setbacks, trusting one’s process, and recognizing how different pieces of our lives and identities shape who we are. The variety of voices, languages, and academic backgrounds made the event feel both intimate and expansive and demonstrated how poetry can connect cultures, disciplines, and people across our community.
Sample poems shared at the event can be found at: International Poetry Reading
Article written by Pia Walawalkar with editorial assistance from ChatGPT. Photo by Sherri Wyatt.
