Huckleberries: Spreading poetry to the masses one telephone pole at a time

Monday Huckleberries:

• Poem that Roger is posting in photo is called ‘Regret’ by his wife, Jenni Fallein. Read it here.

Once a month, around the ninth day, his anniversary day, almost-79-year-old Roger Dunsmore rides off on his bike with a stapler and 50 copies of a poem.

Before he completes his circuit back to his beloved Jenni, he will post most of the poems on telephone poles around Coeur d’Alene. He’ll leave some at his auto repair shop, the Mexican Food Factory in Midtown, the Art Spirit Gallery, the neighborhood bistro, two bookstores and other small businesses he and his wife frequent.

Dunsmore has followed this routine since October 2013, when he got the idea while hanging up “lost cat” posters after his “sweet, black cat Davy went missing.” Anything to get poetry to the masses. Today, Dunsmore is known by some as “the poetry guy.” But he’s much more than that.

Dunsmore has written five books of poetry and one of essays (“Earth’s Mind: Essays in Native Literature”) – and has twice been shortlisted to the governor for the position of Montana poet laureate. For 50 years, he taught humanities, wilderness studies, environmental studies and American Indian literature at the University of Montana at Missoula and Dillon. Upon retiring five years ago, he and his wife, the painter Jenni Fallein, had planned to relocate to Spokane. But their car broke down in Coeur d’Alene. And they changed their minds.

Now, Dunsmore spreads his love of poetry to his new community in an unorthodox manner. The first poem he posted was Robert Frost’s “Unharvested.” His goal is to select poetry that has a broad audience and an edge (to push readers from their comfort zone). Dunsmore loves hearing that a waitress took a poem home. Or that his auto mechanic reads his poetry, including some that are “beyond him.” Occasionally, he’ll find the poems crumpled up and thrown in a gutter. But, overall, the response has been positive.

“The whole project has given me an identity in a new place,” Dunsmore told Huckleberries. “It has helped me take literature outside of the halls of academia and into the world of regular folks, and I love it.”

Montana’s loss is Coeur d’Alene’s gain. More here.