Performed by Val Cole

Get to know the poet:

1) What is the theme of your poem?
Sticks and Stones explores memory, guilt, and the way childhood experiences
shape how we understand ourselves. It’s also about how coping is varied and
deeply individual — how different minds, different bodies, and different
people survive difficult moments in very different ways. At its heart, the
poem is about perception, responsibility, and quiet forms of compassion.

2) What motivated you to write this poem?
Much of my poetry grows from moments and people that linger long after
they’ve passed. This poem, in particular, comes from revisiting a childhood
memory and memorializing the people who mattered most to me when I was
young. Poetry, for me, is often an act of preservation.

3) How long have you been writing poetry?
I’ve always been a writer. I was fortunate to win awards for writing as
early as elementary school and continued through law school. I write poetry
because I have to — it’s less a choice and more a necessity.

4) If you could have dinner with one person (dead or alive), who would that be?
Alive.

5) What influenced you to submit to have your poetry performed by a professional actor?
Poetry changes when it moves from the page into someone else’s voice. Other
people give the work a shape, a rhythm, and an emotional texture it could
never have if it only came from me. I’m fascinated by that transformation.

6) Do you write other works? Scripts? Short stories? Etc.?
I’ve written personal essays and short stories, but in my heart of hearts,
I am a poet.

7) What is your passion in life?
Subtly shifting the people I encounter into being a little more
compassionate, a little kinder.