Darrow School Senior Nets Second Place in Poetry Conest
 |
NEW LEBANON, N.Y.—Maya Woolridge, a senior at Darrow School and a resident of Newark, New Jersey, has been named a second-place winner in the Spencertown Academy Teen Story and Poetry Contest.
The poem, titled "Something Like Social Anxiety: A Spoken Word Poem,” addresses issues of introversion and isolation.
"The first part is based on an older poem that I wrote a long time ago," Maya said, "and then I just added the last part. I was trying to express how people who suffer from social anxiety see the world differently, but often people expect them to see the world in the same way that they do. But they are looking through a much different lens."
Maya was encouraged to submit the poem by her academic advisor, Dana Katz, a teacher in the World Languages Department at Darrow.
“I've been Maya’s advisor for the four years she’s been at Darrow," Katz said, "and I knew she was a very gifted writer and poet. I saw that she had snippets of her poetry posted on the walls all around her room and I wanted her to incorporate some of those pieces into one poem."
Founded in 1972, the Spencertown Academy Arts Center is a cultural center and community resource serving Columbia County, the Berkshires, and the Capital Region.
Tags: poetry,
