Join the Club: Multiverse Poetry

Michael Baldwin, founder of the Multiverse Poetry Club in Marble Falls, shares his passion for the transformative power of poetry. Staff photo by Elizabeth De Los Santos
mul-ti-verse
noun
An infinite realm of being or potential being of which the universe is regarded as a part or instance.
For the newly formed Multiverse Poetry Club in Marble Falls, the word multiverse has nothing to do with Spider-Man and everything to do with opening up the imagination to multiple creative possibilities.
Poetry is a gateway to a more balanced and imaginative way of thinking, said club founder Michael Baldwin, who is on a mission to share his passion for the written word and its transformative power.
“Poetry is a way to become more human, more imaginative, more capable of enjoying life,” he said.
Baldwin is a published poet, lecturer, and retired library administrator with multiple degrees and an extensive background in literary arts. He founded the poetry club just four months after he and his wife, Helen, moved to Marble Falls from Benbrook near Fort Worth. The club has already attracted a core group of 10 poetry enthusiasts, who are attending the monthly meetings at the Marble Falls Public Library.
“Almost everybody read a poem, whether it was theirs or a famous poem,” Baldwin said of the inaugural gathering. “I was encouraged that there’s some excellent poets here in the community.”
He hopes to grow the program by tapping into the community’s creative potential.
“I just hope that more people will come and that they will enjoy reading and writing poetry and get a lot of happiness from that,” he said.
Leading the meetings involves more than sharing verses. Drawing from his studies in neuroscience, Baldwin believes poetry can help balance the brain’s left and right hemispheres, leading to more holistic and imaginative thinking.
“The right brain deals in images and subconscious imagination,” Baldwin said. “It’s developed first and, according to McGilchrist, is meant to be the master.”
McGinnis is psychiatrist and neuroscientist Iain McGilchrist, who wrote “The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World,” published by Yale University Press. Baldwin has held seminars based on McGinnis’ work at libraries in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex, the Austin International Poetry Festival, and the Poetry Society of Texas summer conference
Baldwin explained that, as civilization and language advanced, the left brain, which handles language and logic, became dominant, relegating the right brain to emissary.
“When you study poetry, you’re engaging the right brain more, tapping into that imaginative capacity and helping to restore balance between the two hemispheres,” he said.
Baldwin’s poetry journey began in high school when he developed a hate for the subject, a mindset he blames on a disengaged teacher. A college English teacher and the discovery of poet Gerard Manley Hopkins proved transformative, igniting a lifelong passion.
“When I got into college, I had a really good English teacher who taught poetry well,” Baldwin said. “And he happened to read something from Gerard Manley Hopkins, who’s a famous English poet from the 1800s, and I just loved it. I became immediately fascinated by Hopkins, and by poetry in general, and started writing and reading more poetry and just kept going from there.”
His love of poetry led him to become involved with various literary organizations over the years, including the Poetry Society of Texas, the Fort Worth Poetry Society, and the Montgomery County Literary Arts Association, which he co-founded.
Baldwin has published seven poetry collections, in addition to 10 works of fiction. Many of his works have won awards, including his poetry book “Scapes,” which won the 2001 Edward Eakin Memorial Poetry Award. It was published by Nortex Press on Jan. 1, 2012. “Lone Star Heart,” a book of Texas poetry published by Lamar University Literary Press in 2016, was nominated for Poetry Book of the Year by the Texas Institute of Letters.
His newest poetry book, “Nightmerica: Poetry of American Politics and Social Issues,” was released by an independent publisher on Sept. 17.
Baldwin is eager to share his expertise and enthusiasm with the Marble Falls writing community. Whether exploring the neuroscience behind creative thinking or simply reveling in the joy of the written word, the Multiverse Poetry Club aims to open up new realms of possibility for local poets.
“Poetry finds wonder hidden in everything and gives it wings,” he said.
Multiverse Poetry Club meetings are held on the last Tuesday of each month at 7 p.m. at the Marble Falls Library, 101 Main St.
Dawn Dancer
By Michael Baldwin
From the jutting ridgepole
at the apex of the roof,
like a tiny muezzin
in a minaret in Mecca,
comes a florid ululation
like a glory hallelujah,
from the mischief-eyed
quick dancer, the curved-
beaked canyon wren,
announcing the mounting
of the morning;
dawn’s light has come again!
I take my coffee
on the treetop deck
on a worn old wicker chair,
warm my hands around the cup,
drink, instead, the morning air.
Pale vapors from the sleeping lake,
its dream-spawned incubi,
perform a sinuous ballet,
dissolve into the sky.
The still dark hills breathe up
the sun like a bubble slowly blown,
and nothing other dares to breathe
until it slips those lips of stone.
The wren, then, jittering
on the roof, repeats
his arioso plea,
and something of my deepest self
is, for a moment,
radiant and free.