FARMINGTON — A poem published last fall by Beloit Poetry Journal, “The Logic of Yoo,” comes to the stage Thursday as a reader’s theater production at Emery Community Arts Center at the University of Maine at Farmington.

“The poem was so powerful, Beloit editors John Rosenwald and Lee Sharkey wanted to bring it to a larger audience and I agree,” said Doug Rawlings, director of institutional research and grants administration at UMF. He plays a character in the production.

They turned the poem into a play.

The world premiere begins at 6:30 p.m. Sept. 27 with New Jersey poet Michael Broek, Rosenwald and Sharkey taking roles in the presentation. The event is free and open to the public.

The poem is based on John Yoo who worked in the Attorney General’s Office during the administration of George Bush, Rawlings said.  He wrote what is called the “torture memos” which support the use of torture measures without transgressing the Constitution.

In the poem turned play, a young student approaches a plagarist played by Rawlings. She hires him to write a paper to help her get into Harvard. She picks the topic and title,  The Logic of Yoo, a paper defending Yoo’s ideas of torture, Rawlings said.

During the writer’s research, he begins to have second thoughts and finds himself in a moral dilemma. Is torture right for any reason? Does one sell out their own beliefs for profit?

The nearly hourlong production remains true to the poem itself, Rawlings said. There’s very little change.

Six characters set on a fairly bare stage refashion the poem without leaving much out, he said.

Broek, the poem’s author, will narrate.

“This is amateur theater at its best,” Rawlings said. “It’s true to the poet’s language but is a dramatic presentation.”

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