It would be a bit rare these days to see a dazed poet roaming the British countryside, writing about the sublimity of mountains and the grand, incomprehensible sadness of it all like poets of previous centuries. Modern poetry is different—it’s engaging communication accessible to all. It’s a light-hearted piece on eating pig’s feet or a memory of the Black Warrior River.

Poetry isn’t what it used to be, but that doesn’t make the art any less enchanting. The University of Alabama and Creative Campus had the honor of hosting Alabama poets whose thoughts are prose and whose speech naturally shapes itself into stanzas from a poem.

On September 3, Sue Walker and a number of other distinguished writers from across Alabama visited UA for an event entitled “Poetry, Community, and Public Engagement: A Conversation.” Walker shared some of her poems with members of the UA community and reminded everyone of the magic of poetry. Also on her visit, Walker and fellow poet, Jeanie Thompson, held a poetry reading at the Bama Theatre while in Tuscaloosa.

She graduated from the University of Alabama with a degree in English and was thrilled to be “home” during her visit—back where she cultivated friendships and watched Bear Bryant stroll through campus years ago.

“I’ve very proud to be from UA; I remember my times here vividly,” Walker reminisced. “The river is the same—it goes on and on and flows into another body of water and then into another.”

Sue Walker is the Alabama Poet Laureate, an honorary title designated by the Alabama Writers’ Conclave and commissioned by the governor, and she certainly has the credentials to complement this prestigious role.

Walker has published 18 books, numerous poems in 79 different journals, seven short stories, 29 articles of literary criticism, 17 pieces in anthologies, and a one-woman, one-act play in which she also performs. She also founded a small publishing house, Negative Capability, which has provided Alabama writers with opportunities for publication and recognition.

Walker’s most recent poetry collection, Blood Must Bear Your Name, won Book of the Year from Alabama State Poetry Society and earned her a nomination for a Pulitzer Prize.

Walker earned master of arts and master of education degrees and a doctorate from Tulane University. She is chair of the department of English at the University of South Alabama and was named the Stokes Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing in 2007.

“Everything you see, hear, feel, taste can be poetry,” Walker encouraged. “It’s your own language that you hear and speak. It’s those deep things that really matter.”

During the event on Sept. 3, Walker encouraged everyone that poetry is in everything. She stated that poetry goes hand-in-hand with all aspects of life from family to food, music to math (she fondly recalled having fun trying incorporate math equations into her poems).

Her poems sometimes focus on sickness and healing, and she attributes writing to the healing process of many. Walker recalled encouraging an ill family friend to write poetry to aid in her recovery.

“Some people aren’t aware of the power of poetry; literature with medicine is one of my passions,” Walker said. “People who are sick have emotions and want to put that into words.”

To emphasize and teach her views on this subject, Walker teamed up with the University of South Alabama College of Medicine to teach literature classes to medical students, which she hoped would instill in them the healing power of writing.

Walker also shared some of her practices that have helped shape her into the revered poet she is today. She occasionally listens to the sounds of nature, such as a chirping bird, and tries to write that sound on paper.

For Walker, poetry is more than thoughts and emotions written in lines and stanzas in a dusty book on a library shelf somewhere—it’s one’s own interpretation of everything around at any given moment, and it’s a gift to society.

“We should all become more aware of the world around us,” Walker said. “Poetry helps us to see, hear, feel and finally to give back something from ourselves.”