A persona, from the Latin for mask, is a character taken
on by a poet to speak in a first-person poem. In our fifth
annual Inspired workshops, we wrote poems using the
imagined voice of another person, place, or thing--from
flowers, trees, and music to weapons, royalty, medicinal
treatments, bathroom fixtures, Oreos and a Yo-yo.
Persona poems give poets an additional voice, a way to
respond to personal topics from another perspective,
and to escape from writing what you know to writing
something that you are not. The variety of this collection
is as unique and individual as the poets themselves.
— Trish Hopkinson