Barton Creek Mall Austin Texas

Poet sells her work at farmers market

At a farmers market, you'll find plump organic tomatoes picked the afternoon before. You find goat cheese, hibiscus tea and grass-fed beef, lamb, pork and chicken. What you don't expect to see is a poet for hire, hammering out a poem just for you, on the spot, while you shop.

But that's what you'll find at Barton Creek Farmers Market at Barton Creek Square on Saturdays. Meet the full-of-life wordsmith and lover-of-people Jena Kirkpatrick.

On a manual 1970 Olivetti Studio 45 typewriter that she bought for $5 at a thrift store in Kerrville, she writes poems for whatever people will pay her. Musician Harve Howell hired her in writing a poem about his 12-year-old son, John.

"Man, you did it again," the misty-eyed Howell tells the barefoot Kirkpatrick while reading "What's That Dad."

A line from the poem: "My son ink eyes dark whispering curls like mine."

"What Jena does is turn facts into feelings," says Howell. "The fact that I gave Jena about my son is that he has dark brown eyes. She writes he has 'ink eyes.' She's perceptive, like a big antenna. And to do that on the fly within an hour is special."

Kirkpatrick makes a living with poetry, whether she's in the parking lot of Barton Creek Square or in the classroom. She conducts poetry workshops in several Austin and Del Valle elementary schools through Austin nonprofit organization Badgerdog Literary Publishing. She also tours with Trio of Poets (Kirkpatrick and two poet friends), conducting poetry workshops and performing. In January, she says, they opened for Leon Russell in Fort Smith, Ark. In July, she's working with students at a music camp in Kerrville through the Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Texas.

But around Austin, the 41-year-old former Plano resident and onetime owner of the AllGood Cafe in Dallas is known as the poet who writes beautifully assembled poetry within minutes (www.jenapoetforhire.com).

"My poetry is accessible. It's written for you, and you walk away with it," she says. Typewritten. "I stole the idea when I saw a TV news story of a guy in California doing poems in a grocery store," she says.

The process is simple. People talk about the subject of a poem. It's usually about a loved one, even a pet. She scribbles notes and will ask questions to get a visual image. "People like to talk, and they usually get very emotional," she says, as Howell did.

"Harve told me a story about losing his son at the airport. I took that thought and turned it into a positive vision. In the poem, I took John's hands and turned them into wings so that he can take flight on his own," Kirkpatrick says.

Barton Creek Square Mall Austin Texas - Southern Malls & Retail

Barton Creek Square is the main indoor mall of the Austin metro area. The mall is located to the southwest of downtown Austin off of the Mopac expressway and the south capital of Texas highway. This mall has benefited from the demise of nearby Northcross and Highland Malls in the last decade as it has emerged as a retail powerhouse. (Check out my article May 22, 2011 for the most recent update on Highland Mall). Most of the retail competition is to the north and northwest of the mall, so this center is poised for success for years to come.

Shopping Malls in Austin, Texas, The Domain (Austin, Texas), Highland Mall, Dobie Center, Lakeline Mall, the Arboretum, Barton Creek Square

University Of Texas At Austin, Austin, Texas

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