Campus - Studium Generale - Epic Poetry Party

Michiel Bakker

Michiel Bakker has been elected Campus Poet 2019. On Thursday, January 24, 2019, the 22-year-old philosophy student won the annual campus poetry election of Tilburg University during the Poetry Party. Michiel Bakker is the thirteenth Campus Poet at Tilburg University. In the coming year, he will comment on campus life, studying, and his experiences as a student.

Poetry Party 2019: interview with Michiel Bakker (language: Dutch). 

Endnote and overture

I kissed you in a photo booth.
Your hands were tense as if you feared
a glow that smoldered in your soul.
The lens was stained with candle grease
that vaguely spelled our names
 
Your last name smelled of honey drops
mine could have been a Bee Gees song
where disco’s heat made hell undone.
From pulse to pulse we slowly danced
in feral fire and frozen trance
 
You framed our flame with timelessness
in cadences that made me blush
and grew a scorching burst of life.
Firmly you pushed to balance us
and set my body free of mind
 
‘A kingfisher,’ she said, ‘how nice.’
I watched and felt her slip away
as waking always wipes the dream.
The light of day arrested me
and closed the scene that night had been.
 
Michiel Bakker