The Poetic Classroom
Follow A Child's Voice
  • Home Page
    • What is the Poetic Classroom?
    • About Bill
  • Contact Bill
  • Programs & Pricing
    • School Programs
    • Publishing Students
    • Workshop for Teachers
    • Poetry at Pazzo di Vino
    • Home & Garden Parties
    • Leadership Workshops
  • Activities
    • Students >
      • Collection of Poems >
        • Straight-Backed Chair
        • Shine
        • Muss It Up
        • The Look I Like A Lot
        • Huff and Puff
        • Sunshine Bliss
        • Wild-Willed Whimsies
        • Skip To My Lou
        • Dash
      • Playing the Game of Poetry
      • Poetic Portraits >
        • Walt Whitman
        • Emily Dickinson
        • William Carlos Williams
        • Langston Hughes
        • Bob Dylan
        • William Blake
    • Teachers & Parents >
      • Collection of Poems >
        • Straight-Backed Chair
        • Shine
        • Muss It Up
        • The Look I Like A Lot
        • Huff and Puff
        • Sunshine Bliss
        • Wild-Willed Whimsies
        • Skip To My Lou
        • Dash
      • Poetry Lessons >
        • Playing the Game of Poetry
        • Writing with Music
        • Writing with Character
        • Narrative Poetry
        • Science Poems
        • Editing Your Poem
      • Poetic Portraits >
        • Walt Whitman
        • Emily Dickinson
        • William Carlos Williams
        • Langston Hughes
        • Bob Dylan
        • William Blake
      • Lessons From Great Writers >
        • Emily Dickinson Lesson
        • Edgar Allan Poe Lesson
  • Audio
    • Radio Poetry >
      • William Shakespeare
      • Edgar Allan Poe
      • Edna St. Vincent
      • Commercials
    • Kiss the Fish >
      • Dr. Suess
      • The Bogeyman Band
      • Poems for Sale
      • The Dawg Doctor
      • The Wizard
      • Uncle Shel
      • Blast Off Billy
  • Videos
    • Looking for Poetry
    • Poetic Shorts
    • Seuss to Shakespeare
  • Store
  • New Page
  • New Page
  • New Page
My Story

​I was a very average student. It was hard for me to sit still. My gym teacher understood: my mind, like my feet, wanted to wander.  

I graduated from college, and I became a banker.
​I knew something was wrong when I started picking flowers on my way to work. 

So like St. Francis of Assisi, I quit the world of commerce, studied theology, and became a youth minister. But I knew something was wrong when I started skipping the church services to play with the kids who themselves couldn't sit through the services!

When I launched a tutoring program to connect inner city and suburban kids, I saw that education was at the heart of my ministry, and I became a high school English teacher. 

There, in the classroom, I discovered the power of poetry. I studied Shakespeare, Whitman, and Dickinson with my students, and I started writing poems of my own.

But I knew something was wrong again: poetry wanted to come off the page! It wanted to come to life, so I started acting out poems with my students. 

And a funny thing happened. I got so good at making a spectacle of poetry (and myself) that people started calling me to perform poetry at schools, festivals, parties, weddings, and all kinds of ceremonies. 

And I have never stopped.  For twenty five years now
I have made a life of performing and teaching poetry. I've discovered that everyone, from the littlest children to the oldest adults, responds to some kind of poetry.

​We may not all be poets, but everyone has poetry.
Bill Buczinsky as a child.
Bill Buczinsky sitting among tall grass.
Bill Buczinsky at his graduation with his parents.