Lexington poet Frank X Walker says ‘I see you, East End’ with giant poem
A 24-foot-tall love letter to Lexington’s East End was hung on the side of a new development in the historic downtown neighborhood Tuesday morning.
A banner printed with a poem by Frank X Walker, “Ode to the East End,” is the first of several pieces of art that were commissioned by Community Ventures Corp. for The MET, the nonprofit’s new mixed-use development at the corner of Midland Avenue and East Third Street.
“They wanted to make sure that this new building had a heart and a home in the East End,” said Walker, a University of Kentucky associate professor, founding member of the Affrilachian Poets and former Kentucky poet laureate.
Though he’s a native of Danville, Walker has has lived at four addresses in Lexington’s East End neighborhood over the past four decades, dating back to his days as a UK student. Most recently, Walker’s family became the first official residents of Community Ventures’ new Artists’ Village, which is not far from The MET.
His “Ode to the East End,” which describes the historically Black neighborhood as “a refuge for those this town would reject” and the very heart of the city, is intended to evoke the emotional relationship people have with the area, Walker said.
He has written a second poem, which has not been unveiled yet, that aims to capture the history of the place, going back to the earliest people, as well as the flora and fauna, that inhabited the area and Kentucky.
“I wanted to not leave out any part of the East End’s history,” Walker said.
That poem will be cast in bronze and displayed on the front of the building.
Other artists with significant ties to the neighborhood, including LaVon Williams, are also working on pieces of art celebrating the East End that will be displayed at The MET.
Community Ventures Corp. received a $75,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to support the project, said Mark Johnson, the Community Ventures employee who serves as the president of the organization’s artists incubator, Art Inc. Kentucky.
“With so much development taking place in the East End, we really wanted to make sure that we didn’t lose the history of the East End,” Johnson said. “This project is really designed to memorialize and commemorate those aspects of the East End’s history.”
He said the projects that are in the works now are just “the first round.”
“We’re going to continually add onto things,” Johnson said.
Walker said he’s excited to be a part of a public art project celebrating a place he clearly loves.
Just one word of caution: If you’re in a vehicle in the area, just don’t try to get your literary fix without pulling over. The poem is four stanzas long.
“Our only concern is that people driving down the street might try to read the whole thing and veer over,” Walker said.
