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View a myriad of poems embedded in beautiful graphics.

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Jayvyn Morthel | Youth Speaks Teen Poetry Slam Finals 2019

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Langston Hughes, Muriel Rukeyser and Toyo Suyemoto help make sense of challenging times.

I don't write poetry, and until recently, I didn't read it. Poetry is too beautiful, and I'm too self-conscious to try to create it. So when I was approached by a foundation to create an animated video series for National Poetry Month, I immediately thought t no.

For the past 12 months, I've overworked myself to avoid any pauses in the day where feelings might creep in. Because how can I make sense of this year? If I try, I'm pretty sure my mind might short-circuit, that smoke will spill out of my ears and the room will smell of burning plastic.

But then I spent some time with these works. They were chosen by the contemporary American poets who lent their voice to the videos, because the verses were helping them puzzle through their feelings about this past year (you can read what they had to say about the poems below). I also started to find the answers in these poems. A poem is a timeless place, an immaterial plot of land where we can gather across generations to breathe and feel, deeply and safely.

Thank goodness for poetry. I might be embarrassed, but at least now my heart has instructions for survival.

What's a line from a poem that has helped you navigate a difficult time, or encapsulates your outlook on life? Let us know in the comments.

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'Democracy' by Langston Hughes

Democracy will not come today, this year, nor ever through compromise and fear. I have as much right as the other fellow has to stand on my two feet, and own the land. I tire so of hearing people say let things take their course, tomorrow is another day. I do not need my freedom when I'm dead. I cannot live on tomorrows bread. Freedom is a strong seed, planted in a great need. I live here too. I want freedom just as you.

Langston Hughes used poetry to call out America's complications and bigotries when many other poets were writing nationalistic jingles. At the same time, his poems were soundtracks for Black American life, infused with jazz and blues and the clarity of protest. That's why Hughes's poems are timeless: They refused to make excuses for America's legacy of oppression, the same legacy we're still grappling with now. - Adrian Matejka

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'Poem (I lived in the first century of world wars)' by Muriel Rukeyser

I lived in the first century of world wars. Most mornings, I would be more or less insane. The newspapers would arrive with their careless stories. The news would pour out of various devices, interrupted by attempts to sell products to the unseen. I would call my friends on other devices. They would be more or less mad for similar reasons. Slowly, I would get to pen and paper, make my poems for others unseen and unborn. In the day, I would be reminded of those men and women, brave, setting up signals across vast distances, considering a nameless way of living, of almost unimagined values. As the lights darkened, as the lights of night brightened, we would try to imagine them, try to find each other, to construct peace, to make love, to reconcile waking with sleeping, ourselves with each other, ourselves with ourselves. We would try by any means to reach the limits of ourselves, to reach beyond ourselves, to let go the means, to wake. I lived in the first century of these wars.

What astounds me about Muriel Rukeyser's poem is how it captures both the sense of isolation and deep connection that mark our everyday lives during moments of turmoil. Rukeyser's words sound as if they could have been written in the last year, and in this way, the poem reaches across time and circumstance to remind us that we can endure what seems unendurable. The poem reminds us that even as times of disaster call upon us to reckon with "the limits of ourselves," these times also lead us to forge communal bonds "beyond ourselves." - Deborah Paredez

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'Barracks Home' by Toyo Suyemoto

This is our barracks, squatting on the ground, tar papered shacks partitioned into rooms by sheetrock walls, transmitting every sound of neighbor's gossip with a sweep of brooms. The open door welcomes the refugees, and now, at least, there is no need to roam afar. Here, space enlarges memories beyond the bounds of camp, and this new home. The floor is carpeted with dust, wind-borne dry alkali patterned with insect feet. What peace can such a place as this impart? We can but sense, bewildered and forlorn, that time, disrupted by the war from neat routines, must now adjust within the heart.

I was struck by how Toyo Suyemoto's poems felt so quiet, considering the pain and anger she felt at being incarcerated in Topaz, Utah, during World War II. But her poetry is also very pointed - a careful listener will note that "Barracks Home" is a sonnet. Suyemoto's formal choice is, I think, a dig at the fears that U.S. politicians had about Japanese and Japanese-Americans, that they weren't culturally assimilable.

The sonnet form shows that she has mastered the highest literary traditions that mark the West, but her subject matter reminds us of how she and other Japanese-Americans have now been cast out of this culture into a new, bewildering and utterly hostile environment whose "open door welcomes ... refugees," a place that itself mocks the idea of home, and the promise of America. - Paisley Rekdal

Sindha Agha (@SindhaAgha) is a filmmaker and writer in Los Angeles. She produced the Op-Docs " How to Be Alone" and " Birth Control Your Own Adventure." These videos are part of the "Twenty Ten Twenty-Five" project produced by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (@MellonFnd).

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Opinion | Poetry Helped My Heart Survive

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Langston Hughes, Muriel Rukeyser and Toyo Suyemoto help make sense of challenging times. I don't write poetry, and until recently, I didn't read it. Poetry is too beautiful, and I'm too self-conscious to try to create it. So when I was approached by a foundation to create an animated video series for National Poetry Month, I immediately thought t no.

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yarn braided together
brother we are fiber
sister we are strand
tensile tough twisted
around throat and
threat brother sister
we can gnaw the apple
from adam snatch his
voice from his neck
us as rope it will fit
perfectly in this
together-mouth I am
certain will not knot
FISH DINNER
my mother was frying fish
today and i hate when she
fry fish because the stink
get all in my cotton like
summer funky or cigar and

i say why you always gotta
stink up the house when i
gotta go somewhere and don't
wanna show up humming of
catfish and grouper and

sizzlin' old grease from
last week's fry and she say eat
boy shut up eat because love
sometimes gotta smell like
fish to feel like full belly
A REMINDER AND RECKONING (in need of a rest)
at some point i must admit
that i am not composed of stone
that i am not an iron spit
hot but unburned above the flame

at some point i will need to sit
and take heed of my flesh and bone
and maybe even cry a bit
and beat my head and scream my name

jason jason grind and grit
don't forget you're not alone
for everywhere is where you fit
and everyone feels just the same
ON COSBY (or OFF COSBY)
cliff huxtable snuck
late night snacks. nightmares. woke up
in a different world.
ON HUBRIS AND KANYE
what happens when you
start to see yourself

more as savior
than servant

what makes a king jam
the tines of his crown

into the chests of
the crown makers

and gesture as jester
jesus as they bleed
WHAT WE DONT WANNA TALK ABOUT WHEN WE TALK ABOUT JORDAN
i was lucky i felt
lucky to be around
to see a black man
fly through the air
tongue out to tease
the world camera
flashes bouncing off
bald shine ball in
hand outstretched
superhero red and
black and black man
had me feeling lucky
to be black turned
shoes into spaceships
and forcefields and
targets worth the
risk as a black boy
who believed they
could make me jump
higher than hate
i hate to say this
now i hate to say
this now i hate to
say i felt like a
fool to find he
thought less of the
boom bap and record
scratch that made
him took him from
athlete to astronaut
red there is red
around here and black
kids in your city see
it and many wear your
shoes while walking
through minefields they
have given their
arms to you and hope
to make it to your
jersey number
the first one and
you be the last one
to come around and
to me someone who use
to feel lucky about you
knows that's just
bull shit
THE PROBLEM WITH JUST OUR LUCK
we would joke about how
we'd all grow up and have daughters and daughters would be some kind of penance for the sins of sons

like we aint have mothers
like we aint know the difference
between human and couch
like daughters are ominous mind-changing curses wrapped in cute
da da juju

im buying a shotgun
no dating until thirty
chaperoning prom after i
threaten her date
our mirror our memory
a madness in masculinity

making it about us
when it's never been about us
and always about us
and now i wonder what if
we all had sons

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yarn braided together brother we are fiber sister we are strand tensile tough twisted around throat and threat brother sister we can gnaw the apple from adam snatch his voice from his neck us as rope it will fit perfectly in this together-mouth I am certain will not knot FISH

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Kwame Alexander Answers: What is poetry?

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Kwame Alexander Answers: What is poetry?

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Kids Learn Ingredients of a Poem with Kwame Alexander and TCM

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Poetry is the answer.

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Get Lit is a Los Angeles based arts education non-profit founded in 2006 by Diane Luby Lane to increase literacy, empower youth, and inspire communities through poetry. The inspiration for Get Lit began with a solo show that Diane toured with internationally celebrated poet and advocate Jimmy Santiago Baca in venues ranging from high schools and universities to prisons.

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The Ventura County Arts Council advances the arts in Ventura County by providing arts education and opportunities in schools and other creative settings, by advocating for local artists and arts organizations, and by creating partnerships among artists, arts supporters, businesses, foundations and county organizations. We embrace diversity and equity, striving to reach low income communities of color with programs that offer equal access to the arts.

For over 20 years, we have offered arts programming to residents and supported local artists and arts organizations. As designated by the Ventura County Board of Supervisors, we are the local partner of the California Arts Council, building upon its statewide, foundational mission to improve communities through arts and creative expression.

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Ventura County Arts Council | Providing arts education and opportunities to residents of Ventura County.

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The Ventura County Arts Council advances the arts in Ventura County by providing arts education and opportunities in schools and other creative settings, by advocating for local artists and arts organizations, and by creating partnerships among artists, arts supporters, businesses, foundations and county organizations.

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What passion in these words...

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Aiya | Youth Speaks Teen Poetry Slam Finals 2019

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You would spend 18 minutes doing waste-of-time stuff...I dare you to listen to this!

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If I should have a daughter ... | Sarah Kay

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Click here to learn about this style of performance poetry!

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Enter the Access ID and Passcode provided by your school to access Britannica School.

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Create poetry inspired by American Classic Poets

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Verse by Verse allows users to compose poems in collaboration with an AI.

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These resources put poetry in the palm of your hand.

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Check out Poem in Your Pocket!

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National Poetry Month

Launched by the Academy of American Poets in April 1996, National Poetry Month is a special occasion that celebrates poets' integral role in our culture and that poetry matters. Over the years, it has become the largest literary celebration in the world, with tens of millions of readers, students, K-12 teachers, librarians, booksellers, literary events curators, publishers, families, and-of course-poets, marking poetry's important place in our lives.

In April 2023, U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón selected twenty new poems by contemporary poets to be featured in the Academy of American Poets' Poem-a-Day series as part of a collaboration with the Library of Congress.

Thanks in part to our National Poetry Month partners and sponsors, each April the Academy is able to offer activities, initiatives, and resources so that anyone can join the celebration:

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National Poetry Month was inaugurated by the Academy of American Poets in April 1996. Over the years, it has become the largest literary celebration in the world with schools, publishers, libraries, booksellers, and poets celebrating poetry's vital place in our culture.

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Serving her second term

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Joy Harjo is an internationally renowned performer and writer of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. She served three terms as the 23rd Poet Laureate of the United States from 2019-2022 and is winner of Yale's 2023 Bollingen Prize for American Poetry.

The author of ten books of poetry, including the highly acclaimed, Weaving Sundown in a Scarlet Light: Fifty Poems for Fifty Years, several plays and children's books, and two memoirs, Crazy Brave and Poet Warrior, her many honors include the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award, the Ruth Lily Prize for Lifetime Achievement from the Poetry Foundation, the Academy of American Poets Wallace Stevens Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Harjo delivered the 2021 Windham-Campbell Lecture at Yale, part of the virtual Windham-Campbell Prize Festival that year. That lecture was the basis for Catching the Light, published in 2022 by Yale University Press in the Why I Write series.

As a musician and performer, Harjo has produced seven award-winning music albums including her newest, I Pray for My Enemies. She served as Executive Editor of the anthology When the Light of the World was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through - A Norton Anthology of Native Nations Poetry and the editor of Living Nations, Living Words: An Anthology of First Peoples Poetry, the companion anthology to her signature Poet Laureate project.

She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, Board of Directors Chair of the Native Arts & Cultures Foundation, and is the first Artist-in-Residence for Tulsa's Bob Dylan Center. She lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

In REMEMBER, acclaimed Indigenous creators Joy Harjo and Michaela Goade invite young readers to pause and reflect on family, nature, their heritage, and the world around them.

This timeless poem paired with magnificent paintings makes for a picture book that is a true celebration of life and our human role within it.

Praise for REMEMBER

"With Caldecott Medalist Goade as illustrator, recent U.S. Poet Laureate Harjo's acclaimed poem becomes a beauty to behold...A rich and reverential tribute to life, family, and poetry."

- Booklist, starred review

"Evoking the cyclical feeling of a slow breath in and out, it's a smartly constructed, reflective picture book based in connection and noticing."

- Publishers Weekly, starred review

"The teeming images thrillingly catch young viewers up as they swirl, circles emphasizing the cyclical nature of life. 'Remember,' closes the text, and children will."

- The Horn Book, starred review

"A contemplative, visually dazzling masterpiece that will resonate even more deeply each time it is read."

- Kirkus Reviews, starred review

With Caldecott Medalist Goade as illustrator, recent U.S. Poet Laureate Harjo's acclaimed poem becomes a beauty to behold.
-Booklist

Fifty Poems for Fifty Years

A magnificent selection of fifty poems to celebrate three-term US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo's fifty years as a poet.

In this gemlike volume, Harjo selects her best poems from across fifty years, beginning with her early discoveries of her own voice and ending with moving reflections on our contemporary moment. Weaving Sundown in a Scarlet Light traces every occasion of a lifetime; it offers poems on birth, death, love, and resistance; on motherhood and on losing a parent; on fresh beginnings amidst legacies of displacement. Generous notes on each poem offer insight into Harjo's inimitable poetics as she takes inspiration from sunrise and horse songs and jazz, reckons with home and loss, and listens to the natural messengers of the earth.

Praise for Weaving Sundown in a Scarlet Light

"Joy Harjo's work is both very old and very new. She tells stories in verse, sometimes highly compressed, sometimes long and winding, which ritually invoke and link her to roots and sources. She seeks continuity between what she calls her 'past and future ancestors,' and views each poem as a ceremonial object with the potential to make change. She has found a singing language for grief and meaningfully transforms the American story. Her work is a long-lasting contribution to our literature."

-Edward Hirsch

"Joy's poetry voice is indeed ancient. She has always been a visionary. A healer. A guide. . . . The poems in this collection are a song cycle, a woman warrior's journey in this era, reaching backward and forward and waking in the present moment. A chant for survival."

-Sandra Cisneros

"Harjo, though very much a poet of America, extracts from her own personal and cultural touchstones a more galactal understanding of the world, and her poems become richer for it. Here, she says, is a living, breathing earth to which we're all connected. Here is unbridled potential for the poetic-in everything, even in ourselves."

-Maya Phillips, The New Yorker

"These poems taken from half a century of Harjo's work show the powerful words and moving themes that have made her an unforgettable voice in the world of poetry."

- Book Riot

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Joy Harjo was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma and is a member of the Mvskoke Nation. She is a Poet, Musician, and Playwright. She has 14 books of poetry and five award-winning CDs.

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Yet much about this fascinating figure's life and work is misunderstood. Often caricatured in popular culture as a white-clad recluse who poured out morbid verse in the sanctuary of her bedroom, Emily Dickinson was a serious artist whose intellectual curiosity and emotional intensity are revealed in concise and compelling poems that capture a range of human experiences.

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Poems, readings, poetry news and the entire 110-year archive of POETRY magazine.

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Rumi...one of Miss Resnik's favorite poets!

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Rumi...one of Miss Resnik's favorite poets!

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Read a poem or two <3

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Home Page | Life of Rumi | Masnavi | Bibliography | Books on Rumi | Discourses | Divani Shams | Daily Poem | Sufism | Reflections | Contact Us | Rumi Links | Glossary | Rubaiyat | Poetry | Love Poems | Life & Death | Poems of Passion