Postcards, art, and poetry: “the shy caterpillar project”

A new poetry project emerging at the University of Waterloo (UW) could form unexpected connections on Queen’s campus.

UW environmental sciences graduate student Sasha* launched the shy caterpillar project on Jan. 9, leaving five postcards featuring his own art and poetry at a student help desk on-campus. The anonymous project allows Sasha to share his artwork with fellow students and UW faculty, working through his social anxiety through practiced communication skills and low-stakes presentation. Now, Sasha has a vision for how the shy caterpillar project could spread to other universities, potentially helping students at Queen’s express themselves in a unique way.

Sasha’s poems are short, usually only a few lines. Their topics are usually positive and uplifting, which is “really important when sharing with a universal or non-specific audience, even though I totally understand and support poetry in general discussing complex ideas,” Sasha wrote in a statement to The Journal.

One of Sasha’s favourite metaphors is “the mountain of mindfulness.” He also enjoys using erasure poetry to replace negative emotions with positive ones. For example, “regret” may become “resilience.”

The initiative’s caterpillar symbol developed as part of Sasha’s hope to “come out of my shell a bit,” he wrote. He chooses to write on postcards with artwork he finds positive, like Studio Ghibli characters and work by Eric Carle, famous for his children’s picture book The Very Hungry Caterpillar (1969).

Generally, the project features two kinds of postcards: “Poetry cards,” featuring a longer poem and small drawing, and “Art cards,” drawings customized to a particular audience or on-campus office with limited writing.

“Regarding poetry, I just really enjoy both reading and writing poetry, especially more tactile poetry forms like erasure poems and concrete poetry,” Sasha wrote. Group poetry readings or slam poetry events can be challenging for their “extroverted” nature, so Sasha developed the shy caterpillar project as a “semi-introverted, semi-extroverted” way to share his work with the UW community.

“I think the sharing piece really helps with my personal social anxiety specifically, and I’ve found over time it’s become a lot easier to share the initiative with others,” he wrote.

Since launching the project in January, Sasha has delivered postcards to over 50 different locations on the UW campus, and shares his poems semi-regularly with the r/uwaterloo Reddit community.

“I found so much unexpected support in this community which I hope would be the same at Queen’s,” Sasha wrote. The shy caterpillar project was received positively the UW offices he visited, which Sasha didn’t expect but found encouragement from.

Traveling campus to distribute the postcards led Sasha to discover new campus resources, like UW’s Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Anti-Racism, and the Special Collections & Archives. “Some of my favourite and most meaningful connections have been with very unexpected places,” Sasha wrote.

Across other universities, Sasha believes there’s more room for small-scale community artwork like the shy caterpillar project. Where large events or clubs can feel like daunting places to express oneself, initiatives like Sasha’s make room for students working through social anxiety.

“I think also the general idea of anonymous community art sharing with different places on campus can be used even if the kind of art or medium varies,” Sasha wrote, noting he hopes to expand to the use of ceramics in the future.

In the future, Sasha hopes to connect with poetry and mental health-focused organizations at universities like Queen’s. In particular, he thinks library spaces are prime spots to have postcards located, where “visitors could participate and share them.” Perhaps it won’t be long until a shy caterpillar pokes their head out to say hello at Joseph F. Stauffer Library.

“My thought was maybe something like: ‘[Anything] says hi/hello/hey!’ So it could fit someone’s personal experience more closely, although they could totally use the shy caterpillar,” Sasha wrote. The next steps are simply to add a short poem or quote, and share.

The shy caterpillar project has universal potential for its accessibility and connection-focused approach. “Anyone can be an artist and make art,” Sasha wrote. As they continue their work at UW, Sasha hopes to inspire fellow artists at Queen’s and beyond.

*Names changed for privacy reasons