Alzheimer's Poetry Project

 Poetry on Wheels

APP among Awardees for Round 2 of the Wisconsin Medicaid HCBS Grant have been selected $12 Million Awarded to 90 Applicants Across Wisconsin. I believe we are the only arts project!

 “Congratulations on your recent grant award as part of the American Rescue Plan Act Home and Community-Based Services Grant Initiative. We will be featuring success stories about our grants on our Department of Health Services website. Your application had innovative ideas that we want to highlight for our audiences.

Brief History

In October of 2022, in partnership with NewBridge Madison we have begun a Poetry on Wheels pilot project. We are excited to work with them to better serve elders in Wisconsin. Jeanette Arthur, reflecting on Poetry on Wheels, said, “It was fun! It lifts your spirit. I met people. The rhythm makes you want to move your body.”

Poetry on Wheels first launched in July 2021 and brought poetry to the participants of the Meals on Wheels program in St. Peters, Missouri. The pilot project was done in partnership with St. Peters Cultural Arts Centre, Aging Ahead, St. Peters Meals on Wheels and continues through 2022.

Poetry on Wheels, Missouri is partially funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. Poetry on Wheels, Wisconsin is partially funded by Bader Philanthropies. We thank them both for their support.

We are actively seeking new partnerships for the next phase of Poetry on Wheels. If interested please contact Gary Glazner at garyglaznerpoet@gmail.com.

This page hosts a series of inspirational poetry videos to help people create and perform poems.
Upon getting his double vaccination, in April, 2021, poet Gary Glazner has traveled almost non-stop for 3 months, to create and perform poems with the people he met and be inspired by leaping dolphins at a Maryland beach; Edgar Allan Poe’s grave in Baltimore; a young rapper on an airplane; singing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” at a Cubs game at Wriggly Field; California where Glazner’s brother recites poetry while sitting in a tree, getting a hair cut and more!

Poetry Booklets

A series poetry booklets consisting of well-known and loved poems, along with simple prompts, will be delivered along with the client’s meals. Here is a short video on how poetry booklets work.

Poetry on Wheels Inspirational Videos

Poetry on Wheels at the Beach (6:30 Min.)

Gary Glazner recites "Maggie and Milly and Molly and May," by E.E. Cummings. A highlight of the video is seeing dolphins leaping.

We create a poem by using the beach as inspiration and  exploring it through our senses.
Here are the writing prompts:

1)    What comes to mind when you hear the word ocean?
2)    What is the fragrance, the smell of the ocean?
3)    What is the feel of the ocean?
What does the water feel like on your skin?
4)    What is the sound of the ocean?
5)    What is the taste of the ocean?
Or what foods and drinks would you bring to a picnic at the ocean?
6)    What does the ocean look like?

If you want to share your poem you may send it to garyglaznerpoet@gmail.com
Thanks!

Poetry on Wheels at the Beach Sunrise edition (2:55 Min.)

We see the moment the sun comes over the horizon at day break. You may use this video as more inspiration to write your ocean poem. Glazner recites parts of "Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town," by E.E. Cumming.

Poetry on Wheels Hair Cut Edition

There was an Old Man with a beard By Edward Lear
There was an Old Man with a beard,
Who said, "It is just as I feared!—
Two Owls and a Hen, four Larks and a Wren,
Have all built their nests in my beard.

Beard and Flowers

One more rendition of "There was an Old Man with a Beard," by Edward Lear. This time with photographer James Rudnick. When Jimmy saw me stopping to take photos of the lovely purple flowers, he said, "Hey, I do that!" Turns out he has lived in Park Slope, Brooklyn for over 40 years and taught documentary photography at a local high school. He blessed us with his performance! We join generations of students in saying "Thanks! Mr. Rudnick!" More about his work at: http://jamesrudnickphotography.com/

Take Me Out to the Ballgame

Sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame," at Wrigley Field in Chicago. A chance meeting after the game with a couple from England leads to a performance of Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare. A perfect poem to end a lovely summer’s day.

Sonnet 18
-William Shakespeare

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Bonus: Create a poem by answering these open-ended questions.

1) What do you think of when you hear the words baseball or ballgame?
2) What are the sounds you hear at ballpark or baseball game?”
3) What are the tastes of baseball game? Is there a food you love to eat at the ballpark?
4) What are the sights you see at a ballgame?
5) What does a ballgame feel like?
6) What are the smells at a ballpark?
7) What do sports teach us?

If you want to share your poem you may send it to garyglaznerpoet@gmail.com
Thanks!

My Brother Lon in a Tree Reciting Poetry

To help inspire you to write and perform poetry, my brother climbs a tree and recites “The Beauty of Things” by Robinson Jeffers.

To feel and speak the astonishing beauty of things—earth, stone and water,
Beast, man and woman, sun, moon and stars—
The blood-shot beauty of human nature, its thoughts, frenzies and passions,
And unhuman nature its towering reality—
For man’s half dream; man, you might say, is nature dreaming, but rock
And water and sky are constant—to feel
Greatly, and understand greatly, and express greatly, the natural
Beauty, is the sole business of poetry.
The rest’s diversion: those holy or noble sentiments, the intricate ideas,
The love, lust, longing: reasons, but not the reason.

Bonus: Create a poem by answering these open-ended questions.

1) What do you think of when you hear the word tree?
2) Imagine climbing a tree. What do you see?
3) What is your favorite fruit tree? Describe biting into the fruit.
4) What do trees give us?
5) If you could speak to a tree what would you say?

If you want to share your poem you may send it to garyglaznerpoet@gmail.com
Thanks!

Young Rapper on a Plane- Up in the air with Poetry on Wheels!

A chance encounter on a flight to California to visit my family led to this good luck recitation. The young woman across the isle had been working hard on her lap top. When I asked what she was working on, she replied I am applying to study abroad in Australia. When I found out she loved poetry and was a rapper, I asked if she wanted to recite the most beloved Australian poem. Here is an excerpt from "My Country," by Dorothea Mackellar. I have found most Australian know at least part of this poem by heart.

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me!

An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand though
Earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.

Bonus: Create a poem by answering these open-ended questions.

1) Mackellar loves Australia and describes it as “My Country.” What would your country by?
2) Imagine being in “Your Country,” what are things you would see?
3) What are the sounds of “Your Country?”
4) What are the smells of “Your Country?”
5) What are the tastes of “Your Country?” Is there a food you associate with it?
6) What does “Your Country,” feel like?

If you want to share your poem you may send it to garyglaznerpoet@gmail.com
Thanks!

Dog Poem by the Lake

A chance encounter with Tito the dog by Lake Michigan in Chicago led to a perform of "The Dog," by Ogden Nash

The truth I do not stretch or shove
When I state that the dog is full of love.
I've also found, by actual test,
A wet dog is the lovingest.

Bonus: Create a poem by answering these open-ended questions.

1) What do you think of when you hear the word dog?
2) What do dogs teach us?
3) We often talk to our dogs and they seem to understand us. If a dog could speak back to you what would it say?

If you want to share your poem you may send it to garyglaznerpoet@gmail.com
Thanks!

Poetry on Wheels the grave of Edgar Allan Poe in Baltimore. You will hear a Poe poetry lover recite "The Raven." Find out about the mysterious Poe Taster who on Poe's birthday visited the grave for over 7 decades.

We create a poem by using the famous poets as inspiration.
Here are the writing prompts:
1) Do you have a favorite poet? If so write down their name.
2) Imagine having breakfast with the poet. What would they eat?
3) What would you like to ask them?
4) What would be their answer?
5) What would they be most surprised to learn about you?

If you want to share your poem you may send it to garyglaznerpoet@gmail.com
Thanks!

For more inspiration here is an excerpt of the poem
Oatmeal by Galway Kinnell

I eat oatmeal for breakfast.
I make it on the hot plate and put skimmed milk on it.
I eat it alone.
I am aware it is not good to eat oatmeal alone.
Its consistency is such that it is better for your mental health if
somebody eats it with you.
That is why I often think up an imaginary companion to have
breakfast with.
Possibly it is even worse to eat oatmeal with an imaginary companion.
Nevertheless, yesterday morning I ate my oatmeal with John Keats.
Keats said I was right to invite him: due to its glutinous texture, gluey
lumpishness, hint of slime, and unusual willingness to
disintegrate, oatmeal must never be eaten alone.
He said it is perfectly OK, however, to eat it with an imaginary
companion,
and he himself had enjoyed memorable porridges with Edmund
Spenser and John Milton.
He also told me about writing the "Ode to a Nightingale."
He wrote it quickly, he said, on scraps of paper, which he then stuck in
his pocket,
but when he got home he couldn't figure out the order of the
stanzas, and he and a friend spread the papers on a table, and
they made some sense of them, but he isn't sure to this day if
they got it right.

The Owl
(Patty Rasmussen the owner of Tre Kronor in Chicago recites "The Owl" by Edward Thomas, along with Glazner and Steve Young, Program Officer, Poetry Foundation, (retired.) We thank the Steve and the Poetry Foundation for their support over the years, especially of our Poetry for Life program bringing youth and elders together. We thank Patty and the amazing crew at Tre Kronor for all the delicious and nutritious food. Stop by for a bite if you are in Chicago. Big hugs to Carie Lovstad for introducing me to Tre Kroner and making it our place.)

Downhill I came, hungry, and yet not starved;
Cold, yet had heat within me that was proof
Against the North wind; tired, yet so that rest
Had seemed the sweetest thing under a roof.

Then at the inn I had food, fire, and rest,
Knowing how hungry, cold, and tired was I.
All of the night was quite barred out except
An owl’s cry, a most melancholy cry

Shaken out long and clear upon the hill,
No merry note, nor cause of merriment,
But one telling me plain what I escaped
And others could not, that night, as in I went.

And salted was my food, and my repose,
Salted and sobered, too, by the bird’s voice
Speaking for all who lay under the stars,
Soldiers and poor, unable to rejoice.