Helen’s kitchen sink poetry, a snapshot of life
There’s no prescribed age for being a writer or a poet, candles on a cake or a date on a birth certificate don’t govern creativity.
So, in partnership with RMIT University, Monash Council will launch the 2025 Seniors Festival with Poetic Portraits, an intergenerational project combining a participant’s poetry with their portrait to share lived experiences, foster a sense of belonging and challenge harmful ageist stereotypes.
We’ll celebrate creativity, connection and the power of storytelling.
The aim of the intergenerational project is to showcase creative talent and create a sense of belonging among all Monash community members by inviting 20 creative writers -10 participants aged 60 and older; and 10 participants aged between 18 and 35 - to take part.
Helen Cobb, 94 and a long-time Glen Waverley resident having lived there for more than 60 years, is the embodiment of the project’s goals.
Having penned poems for most of her life she continues to produce a prolific body of work that captures her everyday experiences and the people and places that matter most in her life.
Helen said her poems aren’t based on big literary themes, they are a journal of the everyday.
“I’m no Shelley, I’m no Wordsworth,” she said. “I write poems, not poetry. I call it kitchen sink poetry.
“I’ve never thought about it (the process of writing), I just do it. Little snapshots of what’s happening around me.”
Helen said the COVID pandemic brought back memories of contracting tuberculosis when she was younger and that provided plenty of inspiration for her writing. But, just as easily, she’s turned her hand to topics like hearing aids, after her Probus branch had been discussing them one meeting, or even the day the cat got stuck in the washing machine.
Helen’s writing has also given her the chance to share her everyday experiences and daily happenings with family and friends. And she’s always enjoyed celebrating their birthdays, anniversaries, important milestones and special events with a well-crafted message – a poem from the heart.
She even said she’d write a poem about me after our meeting and, with her disarmingly cheeky smile, issued a challenge that she’d have that poem written well before I completed writing-up my website news item.
Helen’s first experience of poetry was courtesy of an elocution teacher when she was a young student in Adelaide - “The Highwayman” by Alfred Noyes; “Reynard the Fox” by John Masefield and Shelley’s “To a Skylark” still roll of her tongue immaculately, as if standing in front of class delivering the lines for academic grading.
“I’ve always liked words and things that go with words, like commas and apostrophes,” she said. “In this age, conversation and communication are getting lost.
“I mostly started writing poems when I was 50. Writing little poems and thoughts.
“All my poems I type up, but I keep an original copy. I have a whole stack of them in there (pointing to the sideboard). It’s like I’m writing a diary.”
POEMS PAINTED LIKE BRUSHSTROKES
Michelle Pan, mother of six-month-old son Alwin, had always been interested in poetry but never dared believe she’d be a poet. Until, by chance, she spied a poster promoting Poetic Portraits.
READ MICHELLE’S STORY
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THE PROJECT
www.monash.vic.gov.au/poetic-portraits