By Julie Shapiro
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
BATTERY PARK CITY — Like most commuters rushing in and out of the World Financial Center ferry terminal this week, Tyler Schmetterer, 43, didn't notice the banners of poetry hanging from the entrance.
But when DNAinfo pointed them out to him, Schmetterer, a founder of a company that builds green homes, walked over to the nearest banner and started reading lines by Lucille Clifton:
may the tide
that is entering even now
the lip of our understanding
carry you out
beyond the face of fear
Schmetterer appeared deeply moved.
"Everyone needs a little bit of that right now — a little bit of courage," he said. "These are very uncertain times we live in. To get a little inspiration like that is a nice shot in the arm."
That's exactly the goal of the project by the Poets House, a Battery Park City-based library responsible for other poetry-themed projects Downtown. The nonprofit has installed black and white banners bearing poetry verses not only at the terminal, but on New York Waterway boats that regularly dock there.
"It's a kind of respite while you're in motion," said Lee Briccetti, executive director of the nonprofit Poets House. "It's a way to steady and focus your attention. [The verses] are little nuggets for people to think about as they go about their busy lives."
At the entrance to one of New York Waterway's boats, hundreds of commuters every day pass beneath a haiku by Chinese poet Yosa Buson:
In the summer rain
The path
Has disappeared.
Briccetti hopes people will get curious about the poems and perhaps look them up at Poets House's 50,000-volume poetry library, one block from the ferry terminal.
But first, they have to look up and notice the poetry — which is similar to the advice O'Hara gives in his poem "A True Account of Talking to the Sun at Fire Island," an excerpt of which is displayed in the terminal:
I know you love Manhattan, but
you ought to look up more often.
And
always embrace things, people earth
sky stars, as I do, freely and with
the appropriate sense of space.
Hardly anyone has spent more time in the shadow of the poetry banners than A.J. Bhabu, 33, who works in the terminal's small newsstand. Bhabu said poetry is important because it gives people something good to hold on to and share with others.
But when asked which poem was his favorite, the Astoria resident said he hadn't yet stopped to read them.
"I'm working long hours," he said. "And whenever I have a chance, I look for the newspaper."
