Apr 4, 2012

National Poetry Month - 5 Ways to Celebrate

A friend pointed out that April is National Poetry Month, and I figured I'd do a little feature this month where I share some of my favourite poetry. However to kick things off, I'm going to share my favourite five ways of the 30 Ways to Celebrate National Poetry Month  that The Academy of American Poets suggested on their website.


source  - Concrete poetry by bpNichol



1) Put a poem on the pavement: Break out a piece of chalk and share your favourite line from a poem, or make up a new one.

2)  Read a Book of Poetry: Here's the obvious one - read a book of poetry. It doesn't matter if you're re-reading an old favourite,  picking up a book that's brand new to you or simply leafing through an anthology and reading a poem here or there. 


3) Integrate Poetry with technology: Share your favourite poem on your blog or Tumblr, tweet a favourite line or use one as your Facebook status (poetry is the original song lyrics, right?) Make a desktop background using your favourite poem,  take a series of photos based on a poem or start a new board on Pinterest with some of your favourite poetry quotations. Update your email signature, sign up for a poem a day newsletter or email your favourite poem to a friend. 

4) Listen on your Commute: Have you ever heard an author or just a really good performer read a poem? In some cases, this can make a poem even better. There are a number of audio resources on the AAP website, and you can find others on other literary websites or even Youtube.

5) Start a Commonplace Book:  I hadn't heard this term for it, but the Academy of American Poets describes a commonplace book like this:  "Since the Renaissance, devoted readers have been copying their favourite poems and quotations into notebooks to form their own personal anthologies called commonplace books." Heck, I've been doing that since high school, and have notebooks full of pasted quotes, lines from song and poetry stanzas. If you've never made one before, think of it like a tiny scrapbook of your favourite poetry lines or whole poems that you can carry with you to share your favourites with others this month. 

So there you go! Five ways to start celebrating National Poetry month! Make sure to check out the rest of the 30 Ways to Celebrate National Poetry month for more fun ways to celebrate, and stay tuned to this space for the rest of the month for some of my favourite poems and my own ways of celebrating.

♥ Craftzilla 

3 comments:

  1. I had high ambitions of writing one poem a day for the month, but well, it's the 4th and I haven't written one... guess I'll save that for next month, an unofficial poetry month. :)

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    Replies
    1. You never know, even writing a poem a week is better than nothing!

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  2. Thanks! I enjoyed your poetry choice too, thanks for sharing! I hadn't read that sonnet in a while :)

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