This fall I spoke with listeners at the Twin Cities Book Festival about the place of poetry in their lives.

This week we're sharing their stories. I am Melina Mungal and I live in St Paul Minnesota. I'm a children's author, so I write primarily for children. I write

picture books. I also write biographies and I write short stories for young people.

They also write some young adults and I have written some adult short stories as well.

So I just I love writing.

Poetry for me is a solace when I'm going through tough times or when I'm stuck.

I turn to poetry to help me re-enter and redirect my thoughts to help me sometimes get in tune more with my own

feelings and thoughts to help me appreciate language as well. I love using poetry with my

students and also just as practice because there's nothing like a poem to help you get into the depth of

words and the range of words that are available out there so it's both a tool but also a comfort for me.

This is Micah Kielbon,

this is Micah Kielbon, producer of the slowdown.

When working with poetry is your job, like it is mine,

sometimes it becomes more tedium and less solace.

I find myself needing a break or wanting to break something. If I'm

smart or urged on by a friend I'll go for a walk.

And lately when I do, the sky has seemed so big and beautiful that the clouds have made me cry.

I can see the rolling hills of the cemetery in the distance and the mountains beyond that.

And even if the sun has set, the smell of the evening and the motion of my legs on the pavement

can set me free.

Once I start walking out in the fresh air, everything feels alive again,

even thoughts and memories that were stagnant in my mind just hours before. And then, when I come back to the poems on my desk, it's like they open themselves for me, and the words of the poets are alive too.

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