Poetry blog

We keep you updated on the world of poetry with our news roundups.

Recent posts

Another 9/11 Tribute

 

In the bustle of the past week, this story escaped me. I saw it and read it early in the week, and tucked it away for later, then completely forgot about it till I was poking through the latest poetry news. Reported in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on September 6 is this little tidbit about a poet with a mission. Diane ...

Sonibyte Poem of the Day

 

I"m not often one to follow media hype to something slick and commercial. I"m always the last one on the block to read the current bestseller out of sheer stubbornness - and this press release that showed up in my mailbox really nicked at my resistance to commercializing art. Then again - it"s a poem a day project so I had to ...

Poems of Solace and Healing

 

It"s been five years since the morning that I stood in front of a television set watching in stunned horror as the news services replayed over and over and over the footage of a plane crashing through the second of the twin towers at the World Trade Center. I have yet to write about it. The enormity of it staggers me still, ...

Hungarian Poet Gyorgy Faludy Dies at 95

 

Gyorgy Faludy, the Hungarian poet who lived through years of censorship and exile from his native country, died Friday night at his home in Budapest. He was 95, and had spent decades of his life living outside Hungary, the country that he always thought of as "home". Faludy was born in 1910, and published his first works, translations of the French poet, Francois Villon, at 27. ...

This Week In Poetry

 

If you"re going to be anywhere in the neighborhood of Providence, Rhode Island this coming Tuesday night, you have GOT to be at Reflections Cafe on Wickendon Street. That"s the night that Patricia Smith will be featuring at the GotPoetry Live reading - and Patricia Smith reading her poetry is something not to be missed. I"ve written about Smith here before, and I promised ...

Not Just for Women Poets

 

Random web searches sometimes turn up some lovely finds - and this is one of them. Todays-Woman.net is an active portal for poets - and despite the name of the site, it"s not just for women poets. Named one of Writers" Digest"s Top 101 Sites of 2006, Todays-Woman.net welcomes both men and women - in fact, nearly half of their members are ...

Kids and Poetry Blogging

 

Want to do something really special this year? How about inspiring a young poet and encouraging them to keep on with their writing? For many adults, poetry was something we memorized in school, often taught by someone who had about as much interest in trophes and iambs and lyrical feet as we did. That sort of teaching made for a healthy dislike of anything bearing ...

Poet’s Bookshelf: Forms and Poetry

 

I am a lover of poetic forms. Language is music and magic and poetry. Fitting language and meaning together into a set form is like working a puzzle, creating a work of art from scattered thoughts. This is not to say that free verse has no place in poetry - it is very much in favor in most academic circles at the moment ...

Hopkins Poems Released in Musical Adaptations

 

Ever since I first read the lines: Glory be to God for dappled things For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow; For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim; when I was no more than 12 year old, I have been in love with the musical quality of Gerard Manley Hopkins poetry. His poems play with sound like an artist plays with color, rubbing ...

Update: Quickmuse

 

Among the other things dropping into my mailbox this week are updates from Quickmuse, which is rapidly developing into a mini-media sensation. It"s been written up in a few offline newspapers and journals, which has, I"m quite sure, made it easier for the QM folks to entice known poets to feature in their advertised poetry bouts. Since the last time I wrote about the ...