BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – “Speak poems or be silent” declared Illinois Wesleyan University Emeritus Professor of English James McGowan in his poem “Prefatory.”
More than 50 years of McGowan’s poetry was honored last week with an afternoon reading of his works titled “Poems in Five Decades: A Retrospective.” Sponsored by the English Department, the event enabled McGowan to choose some of his favorite poems to read. Later that evening, in a special tribute at the New Music Café, Professor of Music David Vayo debuted a suite he composed titled “Sandpails,” based on several of McGowan’s poems.
“Words have a certain music to them,” said McGowan. “Whatever the poem, whatever the imagery, it is the sounds that really reverberate in my mind. The two are intricately connected.”
McGowan, who retired from Illinois Wesleyan in 2000, has been writing poetry since the 1960s, and spent 20 years teaching it to IWU students. He has worked together with Vayo for years. The seeds of the suite Vayo composed stemmed from an invitation in 2003 to visit McGowan’s classroom. “I wanted to talk to the students about the connection between music and poems. David is very good at improvising,” said McGowan. “You can present him with a poem and he’ll just go for it.”