National Poetry Month

Spring
by Edna St. Vincent Millay

To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of little leaves opening stickily.
I know what I know.
The sun is hot on my neck as I observe
The spikes of the crocus.
The smell of the earth is good.
It is apparent that there is no death.
But what does that signify?
Not only under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots.
Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.
It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.


April is NATIONAL POETRY MONTH

Since I love poetry and I always celebrate National Poetry Month by reading a new poem every day--I have decided to spotlight a few poetry resources I have discovered while surfing around the web.

One of my favorite sites is Poets.org--the website for the National Poetry Foundation--a great place to look up your favorite poet's poems, search for poems to read at that special occasion, or read interview's of poets or sign up to have a poem a day delivered to your inbox for the month of April. The National Poetry Foundation established April as the National Poetry Month in 1996.

Another great poetry resource is The Poetry Foundation---they have a blog, articles, news, and you can search thousands of poems in their archives---by subject, occasion or author.



"Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It's that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that's what the poet does."
—Allen Ginsberg, Ginsberg: A Biography, Barry Miles (1989).

For great animated visuals while poet Billy Collins read his poetry try Billy Collins Action Poetry or listen to Garrison Keillor's weekly podcast of The Writer's Almanac. Create your own poem at the Magnetic Poetry Board....looking for that perfect word to rhyme with blog? check out the Online Rhyming Dictionary.

I also highly recommend the Poets' Corner, "one of the largest and oldest text resources on the web. The goal of this project is to create a user-friendly library of works that promotes browsing and exploring through a site that spans thousands of works by hundreds of authors covering thousands of years." At Poetry Daily--you can read a new poem every day! (not just during April). Poets Against War "continues the tradition of socially engaged poetry by creating venues for poetry as a voice against war, tyranny and oppression."

Or join NaPoWriMo---National Poetry Writing Month! Write a poem every day (or at least try to) and post it to your blog if you dare...this dare is from the blog 32 Poems Poetry Magazine.


LIFE, believe, is not a dream,
So dark as sages say;
Oft a little morning rain
Foretells a pleasant day:
Sometimes there are clouds of gloom,
But these are transient all;
If the shower will make the roses bloom,
Oh, why lament its fall?
Rapidly, merrily,
Life's sunny hours flit by,
Gratefully, cheerily,
Enjoy them as they fly.

----From LIFE by Charlotte Bronte