Learn more about Teatro Paraguas' production 'Encantado'

Poetry is transformed and brought to life on stage during “Encantado: The Poetry of New Mexico.”

James Stake, show director, has worked on poetry shows before and has always thought the form belonged on stage.

“I always felt that poetry was performative. Poetry was meant to be embodied,” Stake said. “And so when we got on the stage, it’s like, wow, this is what I’ve always known to be true. And it was so special and so touching to me.”

“Encantado: The Poetry of New Mexico” opens at Teatro Paraguas on Friday, Aug. 8, and runs through Sunday, Aug. 24.

“It’s basically a fully staged, dramatized performance with an ensemble of nine actors ...,” Stake said, “performing poems by 22 primarily modern and contemporary New Mexico poets.”

The works come from poets in Northern New Mexico, from Santa Fe to Albuquerque and surrounding areas, Stake said.

“I ended up reading probably 1,000 poems by New Mexico poets. I went through five or six big anthologies,” Stake said. “I found books of poetry by different, well-known and not-so-well-known, New Mexico poets.”

The show also includes trovos, which is a “poetic battle between two poets,” said Jonathan Harrell, who is a performer in the show.

“It was a genre that I was always really interested in, but I also had kind of a family connection,” Harrell said, “because one of my great uncles on my mom’s side had a copy of one of these poems that he had written down from memory that was just in our family.”

Stake narrowed down selections by deciding if the poem resonated with him and would translate well to the stage.

“That’s really what I was trying to do, not just hodgepodge, throw poems together. But create a show that really fit together with a clear, kind of beginning, middle and end,” Stake said. “Like a play, but these are the original words of poets.”

Harrell wanted to represent works from New Mexico after several shows featuring poems from other countries.

“There’s so much great poetry from New Mexico, from so many different communities,” Harrell said. “Communities that have been here for centuries and as well as more recent communities. It’s just incredible.”

The ensemble is made of nine actors and actresses who, Harrell said, found ways to connect with the poetry.

“I think it really helps the individual actors feel really invested in the poems that they choose because they’ve chosen them or the poems have chosen them,” Harrell said.

Teatro Paraguas has been doing poetry shows for several years, Stake said, and he said he has always focused on what he wants to show the audience.

“Primarily, it’s for me about showing audiences what poetry is capable of, what it actually is, that it’s music, it’s an art form,” Stake said. “It’s not something that is in the ivory tower or belongs there … It belongs with the people. It belongs on the streets. It belongs in the culture.”

Teatro Paraguas' 'Encantado' showcases the poetry of New Mexico