Robert Frost once said that “Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.” Students from Georgiana Bruce Kirby Preparatory School will be bringing their thoughts to life with emotion the first week in March, when they perform as part of Willing Suspension Armchair Theatre.

The students have been working on the show with poet Gary Young, who was recently named the first Poet Laureate of Santa Cruz County. A Pushcart Prize-winning poet, Young teaches at UC Santa Cruz. In 2009, he received the Shelley Memorial Award. Though busy teaching, writing and running Greenhouse Review Press, Young agreed to answer five questions for Weekend Santa Cruz.

Willing Suspension brings poetry and prose off the page and on to the stage. What does reading a poem aloud bring to the form? How does one “direct” a poetry reading? Reading a poem aloud returns poetry to its roots. There was an oral poetic tradition long before there was any written language. Poems are intrinsically manifestations of breath; they are created by bodies, breath exhaled as music.

I don’t know how one “directs” anything connected to poetry. There are conventions to any group event, but poetry is a little wild; you have to be prepared for surprises.

You teach university students at UC Santa Cruz, but also work with middle and high school students at Georgiana Bruce Kirby Preparatory School. What differences do you find in exploring poetry with the different age groups?There are the obvious differences in maturity, but on the whole I find high school students tend to be more open to new poetic voices and experiences than university students. They’re less encumbered by expectation, and they have less inhibitions about admitting that they don’t know something. Although it’s not universal, there is a tendency for college-age students to want to write more and read less. They often have a greater fascination for their own work than for the work of others.

How are the pieces that the Kirby students will read onstage being chosen? What ideas or themes have emerged?Except for a certain number of poems whose subject is the coastal area we live in, the poets will read poems poem with which they are most pleased.

In a January interview with the Santa Cruz Sentinel, you said that “Poetry is such a marginal art, that we’re really blessed that it, and all the arts, are honored and treasured like they are in this community.” In what ways has the Santa Cruz community nurtured you in your poetry? I came to UCSC as an undergraduate 40 years ago with the express intention of becoming a poet. I was fortunate to study and to become friends with many marvelous poets here: William Everson, Stephen Kessler and Morton Marcus in particular. This is a community that has always had a vibrant literary community composed of both writers and lovers of literature. I’ve never had to pretend I was anything other than a poet, nor I have had to defend my vocation. That’s a gift.

As the first Poet Laureate of Santa Cruz County, it is hoped you will inspire others to read and write poetry. What poets have inspired you, and why? Different poets have inspired me at different times in my life, although there are many poets I met in my youth who still move me: Stephen Crane, Walt Whitman, Rilke, Su Tung-p’o. Crane’s gnomic little gems have always fascinated me, and Rilke’s otherworldliness never gets old. Whitman, Su Tung-p’o (and Li Po, Wang Wei, Tu Fu and so many other Tang Dynasty Chinese poets) speak of the world with such directness and with such obvious care and love—they reveal the ordinary to be somehow heavenly. Kenneth Rexroth is a perennial favorite. His passion, and his fine touch with the line are ceaselessly inspiring, and there’s Gerard Manley Hopkins, Arthur Rimbaud, Karl Shapiro, Killarney Clary. This list could go on and on—Czeslaw Milosz, Philip Levine, W.C. Williams, Elizabeth Bishop. Picking your favorite poet is like choosing your favorite child; there’s no way you can do it.

Willing Suspension Armchair Theatre presents students from Georgiana Bruce Kirby Preparatory School reading poetry and literature, 7:30 p.m. March 1-3. Performance March 1 at Capitola Book Cafe, 1475 41st Avenue, Capitola. Performances March 2-3 at Actors’ Theatre, 1001 Center Street, Santa Cruz. Donations requested for all performances. (831) 425-7529.