To be clear, if you have an idea for a post that includes poetry please suggest it; then, we can get you in line.
Lots of good stuff has been posted already. Many thanks to Lesley Roessing (find here and here), Padma Venkatraman (find here), and Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong (find here). And, in many other blog post, poetry and verse novels are referenced. Browse around a bit through past posts listed on the contributor's page
As most readers know, April is poetry month. Many colleagues have posted notices and work about poetry on social media. Some have engaged in community practices about writing poetry during the month. You might check out the Facebook pages of Sarah Donovan, Lesley Roessing, Sylvia Vardell, and Janet Wong. I admire their work. I might it try to tune up a couple of my poetic efforts during the month.
Jacqueline Woodson’s Brown Girl Dreaming, Virginia Euwer Wolff’s True Believer, Chris Crowe’s Death Coming up the Hill, Kwame Alexander’s The Crossover, Laurie Halse Anderson’s Shout, and Margarita Engle’s Enchanted Air.
Who Brought me to Poetry?
—Well, the answer to that simple question is William Shakespeare. When I learned to understand the language, it was transformative for me. I was always a reader of narrative. Shakespeare combination of poetry and narrative spoke to me. Marshall Craig and Arthur Henry King guided me through the craftsmanship of Shakespeare’s language. The language lived and my ability to explore rhyme, rhythm, and structure grew.
This experience provided me with confidence and the poetry of other started to come a live for me. I discovered John Donne, Gerard Manly Hopkins, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickenson, Langston Hughes, Elizabeth Bishop, Robert Frost, William Wordsworth, Derek Walcott, Hart Crane, Robinson Jeffers, T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, Wallace Stevens, H. D., Maya Angelou, Sylvia Plath, and Robert Lowell.
Not every student joined in the spirit endeavor, but many did. I found that reading poetry every week bred familiarity and pushed out fear. Poetry became manageable and the terminology was no longer an obscure jargon that they only heard once a year for 2 or 3 weeks. My AP students slowly developed confidence that served them well. As a result, post AP test discussion were about how they manage the poetry prompt and not about how awful the experience was. Hurrah, success.
I hope you find a poem to love, a poem to share, and a poem that helps you see the world a new.