Local Poets Offering Personalized Valentine's Day Cards

Southwest Minneapolis artist Camille Gage has worked on some pretty big projects—a giant kimono commemorating her late mother hangs in the University of Minnesota's Weissman Museum—but this Valentine's Day, she decided to turn her attention to something smaller.

Working with poets and artists from the Joyface Collective and activists from On the Commons, Gage is offering the love-struck their own personalized romantic poetry.

Answer a set of around seven questions about the poem's recipient and your relationship with them by Feb. 8, make a modest donation, and Joyface's poets and artists will scurry off for four days and return on Feb. 12 with a poem dedicated to your beloved, written inside an original card, all delivered in a PDF. 

"When I contacted Joyface they were amazed. I quote: 'No one ever pays poets to do anything,' Gage told Patch in an email. "It's a 'two-fer'—you get a super unusual Valentine and you give to two great causes."

On the Commons is a "strategy center, developing approaches for how to share our commons equitably and inspiring activists to make a difference in their communities." To learn more about their work click here.

JoyFace Poetry and Arts Collective is a "group of artists building happiness and community through shared resources and poetry/art gatherings." They are using proceeds from this poetic endeavor to fund a new book store and gallery at the corner of Chicago Ave South and 38th Street. To learn more about their work, click here.