Former LBCC faculty and staff members Jane White, Robin Havenick, Victoria Fridley, and graphic artist M’Liss Runyon, brought together submissions from former student poet laureates in A Unique Poetry Legacy, published in August 2021. The book includes three works by each of the nine featured laureates, as well as thoughtful narratives reflecting on their experiences as LBCC’s student poet laureates.

A Unique Poetry Legacy is available on CommunityArchive@LBCC.

After visiting Linn-Benton Community College in 2019, and meeting Student Poet Laureate Waldo French, I wanted everyone to know about the tradition there of empowering a student to seed poetry in all directions. He told me something I see reflected throughout this book: “I don’t write poems to become a better poet; I write poems to become a better person.” I repeated that idea at every subsequent event of my own as Oregon Poet Laureate, for he had told the true mission of poetry in the world: to kindle connection and raise the human spirit. A Unique Poetry Legacy will do that for you, and I hope this book will invite other schools to take up this brilliant custom.”

~ Kim Robert Stafford, American poet and essayist