As a young boy, John Strugnell was inspired by the words of Sheree Fitch.

“I’m probably the only kid that took her book out the library,” he said, remembering the card with his name written on it over and over again.

Fitch is a children’s poet. She wrote books like Toes in My Nose and Sleeping Dragons All Around.

Strugnell still remembers select lines from her poems.

“I’ve been hooked on poetry since I was a kid,” he said while sipping a coffee at Coco’s Café last week.

Strugnell, who has been living in Jasper for about seven years, has been writing poetry for as long as he can remember. Words, rhyming couplets and stanzas come to him all the time. So much so that he has hundreds of scrap pieces of paper with his insights written on them. The scribbled notes can be as short as a few words that at that moment sounded good together. Those scribbles will sometimes be forgotten, but in other cases they’ll be discovered and turned into something more.

Since buying an iPhone, he said his insights have become a lot more organized because now they’re all typed out in Notepad.

He said he finds it much easier to write through technology than with a pen and paper, describing writing sessions in front of his computer screen as a lonely moment where he can just concentrate on his words.

Strugnell’s work is mostly made up of short couplets or stanzas that capture a moment or thought. 

He said ultimately he would like to see all of those moments and thoughts compiled in a book, but first, he’s going to put them on display for all of Jasper to see and read.

About 50 of his poems will be handwritten, framed and hung in a collage on the walls of Coco’s Café for Strugnell’s first poetry show, Jan. 30.

“It will almost be like a book, page by page, ripped out and put up on the walls,” he said.

The presentation of his work will have no real rhyme or reason, but people should be able to see a progression in his style, words and meter, as he’s choosing pieces from all different stages of his life. 

“I have a huge catalogue of material,” he said. “I think that’s part of the challenge, picking the right pieces.”

The show is titled Poetry for a Lost Generation.  

Strugnell said he’s not sure how long it will remain on the walls at the café, so he encourages people to come out to the opening on the evening of Jan. 30.