Poetry Daily

Above, the Geese

Gillian Sze

For an instant—all is convinced before moonlight kneels, as it does, to cast each day away.

from the book Quiet Night Think: Poems & Essays / ECW Press

“I think a lot about the English language, and I think it exists in a state of emergency”—Natalie Diaz
(LitHub)
#pdnews
https://lithub.com/natalie-diaz-on-the-mojave-language-and-where-english-fails-us/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Lit%20Hub%20Daily:%20May%2020%2C%202022&utm_term=lithub_master_list

Essay: "I wonder if new metaphors — metaphors we create for ourselves — might make for a sturdy pair of snow boots."
(Guernica)
#pdnews
https://www.guernicamag.com/on-metaphors-and-snow-boots/

Essay: "Rhyme turns language into ritual..."
(The New Yorker)
#pdnews
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/05/30/the-rules-of-rhyme-daniel-levin-becker-whats-good-notes-on-rap-and-language

Profile: "Mr. Nash, a sophomore at Brown, is a journalist, activist and poet who was named Washington’s Youth Poet Laureate in 2021."
(The New York Times)
#pdnews
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/style/a-poet-activist-at-brown-with-a-powerful-voice.html

Essay: "Where Mackey and Howe diverge from the received wisdom is in their refusal to see Gnostic ambivalence and political commitment as mutually opposed."
(LitHub)
#pdnews
https://lithub.com/on-the-gnostic-ironies-of-poets-nathaniel-mackey-and-fanny-howe/

Profile: "Hanesworth says her job right now – as a poet, community organizer and a teaching artist – is to validate people's feelings, even if they're angry, confused or grieving."
(NPR)
#pdnews
https://www.npr.org/2022/05/17/1099541558/buffalo-poet-laureate-calls-for-change

Essay: "A cohesive, linear ghazal, I dare say, is not a true ghazal."—Sarah Ghazal Ali
(The Poetry Foundation)
#pdnews
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet-books/2022/05/the-pen-the-throat-the-ear-on-ghazals

Report: "The magazine had been sold by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, to Paradise Media, a digital marketing company that hoped to make money on the site by increasing traffic and attracting online ads."
(The New York Times)
#pdnews
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/16/books/the-believer-mcsweeneys.html

Review: "Howe’s is a corpus entrenched in unknowingness."
(The Baffler)
#pdnews
https://thebaffler.com/latest/the-irreconcilable-fanny-howe-hood

Report: "A poem on Brahminism has stirred controversy in Maharashtra politics."
(Hindustan Times)
#pdnews
https://www.hindustantimes.com/cities/mumbai-news/how-a-poem-on-brahminism-sparked-political-furore-in-maharashtra-101652638543754.html

What Sparks Poetry

Ecopoetry Now

What Sparks Poetry is a serialized feature that explores experiences and ideas that spark the writing of new poems.

In Ecopoetry Now, poets from Canada, Mexico, and the US engage in an ecopoetic conversation across borders. In poems, poetics statements, and reading lists, their work describes important local differences, including of bioregion and native language, as well as a shared concern for the Earth. We hope to highlight poetry’s integral role in creating and sustaining a broadly ecological imagination that is most alive when biologically, culturally, and linguistically diverse.

This week's issue: Maricela Guerrero on a Common Heartbeat

Catch Up on Recent Poems

May 26, 2022

April at the Ruins

Lawrence Raab

If there's a late spring the plants suffer. They shouldn't have been so eager. Look at you, I say, you almost dead things, bent over; thrown out of the celebration.

May 25, 2022

Valorie

Eloisa Amezcua

she's an ocean she fills the room like water she is water she sways like water she rocks as she sings

May 24, 2022

About the Phones

Robert Wood Lynn

Closing my car door, you always say watch for deer and text when you get home. I want to, I do, but I will forget.

May 23, 2022

Canis lupus signatus

Maricela Guerrero (translated from the Spanish by Robin Myers)

Eight thousand seven hundred kilometers or 4700 nautical miles away, a forest has been blazing for days now.

A plane sent to smother the fire crashed and became one with the flames; that’s what the news said.

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B&W Photo of Dana Levin by B.A. Van Sise — Dana Levin

Phillip B. Williams