Cheers to Our Own Poet Laureates, Sean Sexton and Pat Draper, as Arthur Sze Is Named U.S. Poet Laureate This Thursday.
- Vero Minute
- Oct 6
- 3 min read
By Dr. Bruce Fraser, Laura (Riding) Jackson Foundation Board Member
The Library of Congress has named Arthur Sze the nation’s 25th U.S. Poet Laureate, with his inaugural reading set for Thursday, October 9, in Washington, DC.
Sze will focus his time on translating poetry originally written in other languages – an effort that requires the elegance and attention that characterize his own artful use of language.
This idea – that poetry is a way of paying fierce attention – also has deep roots in our local community. The Laura (Riding) Jackson Foundation, with its historical “cracker-style” historical house on the campus of Indian River State College, has spent decades building a home for writers of all ages through summer camps, teen workshops, adult writing groups, and public readings that reflect the nuances and vitality of the human condition. The Foundation exists to honor and build on the legacy of the poet Laura (Riding) Jackson, who lived in Indian River County for 50 years.
With the support of the Foundation, our community has cultivated its own poet laureates. Rancher-painter-poet Sean Sexton, the County’s inaugural poet laureate (2016), is known for his talent for bringing Florida landscapes into poetic focus – rugged life and the memory of yesteryear caught in his steady, honest gaze. His books of poetry (Blood Writing, May Darkness Restore, Portals) remind us that local life is worthy of the grandeur and sentiment we find in the work of writers such as Sze.
And now there is Pat Draper (“P.M. Draper”), our new Indian River County Poet Laureate. Draper is a longtime Treasure Coast voice whose books (After Pyre, The Tao of Hibiscus) attend to the realities of hardship and the possibility of redemption. Her community roots include facilitating Foundation programs and authoring the County’s Centennial Poem, which turned our shared history into one collective breath.
Sze’s national platform is a reminder that poetry is essential, not a luxury. His work draws our attention to the fact that poetry is a way of making sense of an increasingly fragmented world, highlighting the shared values and aspirations of the human heart – grief, redemption, vitality, and love. The Laura (Riding) Jackson Foundation offers a chance to participate locally in the celebration of poetry and other forms of writing, and our poet laureates reflect the depth and richness of life here on the Treasure Coast.
Find out more about visiting Laura (Riding) Jackson’s home (tours available from November through April) and about LRJF’s writing programs at LRJF.org. Most of the writing programs for children ages 3-19 are free thanks to generous local donors and grantmakers. Adults can participate in ongoing writing groups for a small annual fee.
LRJF hosts prominent authors to provide writing workshops throughout the season and also to appear at the annual January speaker and April’s Poetry & Barbeque events.
The January 2026 event will feature Scott Turow, author of Presumed Innocent and Presumed Guilty.
Sean Sexton
from his upcoming book Works and Days
(previously published on Vox Populi)
"Worth"
I’ve wasted these days in the darkening hurry of the hours,
let myself—dryhanded, and ignorant—determine one aim in
deference to another. All I want to do is read and write poetry.
Somehow it spells in the distant mist that can cover this land,
sings by the chime—mesmering from that till of light to the east
whether at first sight or by bright blue afternoon such as this.
Yet art is concealed from us—
often in full apparency. The good days will come back around as
if they were never gone. Now the once-dry pond is full of flags
declaring a green Bastille Day—in full emblem—all raised out of
disappearance as amid the summer-long dissonance of machinery
in the air, comes a farthing breeze to conjure some aleatory hymn
one need only hear once to understand the world will indeed save
itself from us all.
Pat Draper
from her book After Pyre
"From My Caesura"
Pack the picture with the grandkids,
feel the breeze prickle your skin,
wiggle toes in the fine black mica sand.
Shiver a little as you slouch towards Bethlehem.
Stand tall on every rock: ascend Everest if you must.
Apollo, Zeus, even Jesus waiting.
Show the troika what you've got
as seconds count the minutes and hours fillet the weeks
in this year of your life, a crucible you cannot forget.
Build the retirement home you've always wanted
on American Express, that forever place
in the perfect location, location, location.
Count stars from the roof
pocketing the Milky Way in obsidian darkness.
Touch the bones of every dream.
