Becoming a published poet is an impressive accomplishment, but to write a poem in 10 minutes that becomes published is an even more remarkable feat.
That’s just what junior BriAnna Garza, who is a published poet, was able to do.
Published Poetry
“There’s something about words and how a couple of scribbles on a page can mean so much,” Garza said. “It’s kind of an enchanting sort of thing.”
Before coming to Baker University this semester, Garza was a student at Northeastern Oklahoma A&M College.
In the fall semester of last year, Garza was sitting in front of a computer with her friend Zach Snider, killing time before her next class. While online, Garza stumbled upon a poetry contest advertisement by the World Poetry Movement, a poetry organization out of Los Angeles. The contest offered a $10,000 award for the winner of the contest. Garza decided she would take a shot and write a piece to enter.
“I wrote a really ambiguous love poem called ‘Not Yet Acquainted,’” Garza said.
In the few minutes she had left before class, Garza cranked out the poem and entered it into the contest. Snider was skeptical at the time and tried to temper Garza’s expectations.
“I told her, ‘You’re crazy. You’re not going to win that. You know how many people are going to enter that?” Snider said. “I read it when she was done and was like ‘Wow, that’s actually really good.’”
While she wasn’t informed of her finalist position in the contest until January of that semester, Garza’s work with the WPM wasn’t quite finished.
“They asked me for another one and the next one got published,” Garza said.
Garza’s published poem was entitled “Stranger No Longer.” The poem was published in the book “The International Who’s Who of Poetry,” a publication put out by the WPM. While she was excited about the prospect of entering her poetry in the contest, Garza didn’t plan on anything coming from the piece.
“It really it was just kind of this whimsical thing,” Garza said. “I just entered it into this contest and it got noticed.”
Before entering her piece in the contest, Garza was very private about her poetry. Not even Snider knew the extent of Garza’s talent.
“She plays guitar a little bit and we had wrote some songs together, so I knew that she had some writing ability. But before she wrote that poem, I really didn’t know she was that good,” Snider said.
Since transferring to Baker, Garza has only shown two people her work: senior Sam Beecher and sophomore Jackie Albin. Beecher first met Garza after he bought a ukulele and sent an email to the music department, asking if here was anyone who might be able to teach him how to play. The answer he received was that Garza could. It didn’t take long for the subject of writing to come up between the two.
“The first time that we met, we talked about music and writing and she had mentioned that she’d written poems a few times,” Beecher said. “I told her that I did a lot of writing and written poems myself.”
During one of their meetings, Beecher sang a song for Garza. He then asked her if he could see some of her poetry.
“It felt like an appropriate time to ask,” Beecher said.
Garza obliged. Beecher was impressed in her confidence not only to enter a poem in a contest, but also to share her work with him in a far more intimate setting.
“A lot of writing is very personal,” Beecher said. “A lot of times, people write for their own sake but are scared to share it with other people. I think it really showed a lot about her as a person to share that with me, especially being right there; the only audience member.”
Albin first met Garza during sorority recruitment this fall. The two became friends through a psychology class and started hanging out not long after that. The first time Albin became aware of Garza’s writing was within a week of becoming friends.
“We were just hanging out in her room. I told her I like to write and she said, ‘Yeah, me, too.’ She was like, ‘Here, I’ll show you my poetry,’” Albin said.
Again, Garza impressed with her ability as a writer.
“I thought it was really creative and well-worded,” Albin said. “I felt like there was a really genuine message behind it.”
Garza still writes, but it’s not an everyday event.
“It’s sporadic,” Garza said. “One day it will just switch on. I usually go outside when I can. Something about being outside lets me think clearer.”
Garza also finds peace in other poets’ works. Poems from writers like Robert Frost and Edgar Allen Poe have been inspirations and sources of tranquility for her.
“It’s a kind of meditation. Kind of soothes me. I get my inner workings onto paper and I can take a breath.” Garza said.
