Bringing two poems into the digital age

Presenting two poems into the realm of cyberspace is my good deed for the day.

An original poem for these times

I have found great comfort over the past few years from reading poetry. The way I see it, there are hundreds of poets, and thousands of works that they’ve created—who knows how many there are, even?—and even if I can only make sense of a small fraction of them, I’m still better off than I

A beauty of a poem about America

One of my favorite books is titled “Our American Heritage” and it was edited by Charles L. Wallis, and published by Harper & Row in 1970. My recollection is that I purchased it at the Newberry Library‘s annual book sale at least 10 years ago, and perhaps even closer to 20 years by now. It’s

Thought for the day

People you once knew Didn’t get this day So think of them And move forward Dedicated to Jim Meredith Griffin High School Class of 1986 May 7, 1968-January 27, 2016 

The Gladness of Nature

Whenever a person starts naming poets, there aren’t too many who would put William Cullen Bryant on their list. He lived in the 19th Century, and he became a lawyer because poetry didn’t pay the bills. He was also a political supporter of another poet named Abraham Lincoln, and he introduced Lincoln at his speech

Getting creative with my morning tea

Over the past month or so, I’ve found myself writing poetry. Haiku, in particular. I like the discipline involved with expressing an idea within seventeen syllables. The classic five/seven/five structure of a haiku forces a would-be writer to make some choices. “Dad” must sometimes be used in place of “Daddy.” In a similar vein, “brilliant”

More tea and poetry

Sometimes a little scrap of paper is all you need to get creative. Instead of taking the Lipton tea bag out of its envelope, I leave it attached and see what comes to mind. We’re waiting for the snow to arrive as I type this out, 12 hours after I wrote this little throwaway haiku.

Words that are still relevant today

I’m sure that nobody reading this has ever heard of Maurice Thompson, and that’s OK because until earlier today, I had never heard of him, either. But he wrote something, more than a century ago, that seems as current as if it written yesterday. I came upon his work entirely by accident. The particulars of

Finding beauty in all things

I’m currently doing some research at work, learning about some of the great writers over the years. And the story of John Keats has to be one of the most humbling ones that I’ve yet come across. He once had to decide between being a surgeon or a poet, and being a poet was–and still

Keep a’ goin’

Today is Poem in Your Pocket Day, and it will be the second year I’m taking part in it. Last year’s poem, and the story behind it, is here. I came across the poem I’m using this year in a small volume of poetry that I acquired a number of years ago. I’ve never been

Presenting a young poet’s first work

My eight year-old daughter simply loves to read. And one of the things that comes with reading, it seems to me, is a proclivity to write. Naturally, this is something that I’d like to encourage in whatever way I can. When I came across this poem–buried in one of her folders at the annual end-of-the-school-year

An old poem made new again

April 26, 2012 was National Poem in Your Pocket day. I wasn’t aware of this until I saw something on Facebook about it. After all, that’s what grabs our attention anymore, isn’t it? I’m not always a follower of this kind of thing, but I wanted to participate in this. It was probably the poetry