Poems for Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month and Mother's Day

May 3, 2022

Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month

May is Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month. Join us as we celebrate the wide range of voices this month and every day.

“[‘Twas the new moon!]” by Matsuo Basho
“i love you to the moon &” by Chen Chen
“Poem Full of Worry Ending with My Birth” by Tarfia Faizullah
“Kumulipo” by Queen Liliʻuokalani
“Resist” by Brandy Nālani McDougall
“The Iraqi Nights” by Dunya Mikhail
“Origin Story” by Jenny Xie

More Content for Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month

Read more contemporary and classic poems, browse book titles, essays, videos, and archival images, including this postcard from Arthur Sze, postmarked July, 2011, New Mexico.

Poems for Mother’s Day

“My Mama moved among the days” by Lucille Clifton
“Wonder Woman” by Angelo Geter
“My Mother’s Colander” by Dorianne Laux
“Self-Portrait as C-Section Scar” by Aimee Nezhukumatathil
“The courage that my mother had” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
“My Mother on an Evening in Late Summer” by Mark Strand

18+ Million Readers on Poets.org

As National Poetry Month came to a close last week, we reported that 18,015,092 individuals worldwide read poems on Poets.org in 2021, with a ten percent increase in overall traffic compared to the same time frame before the pandemic. Read fifteen poems from the top contemporary and classic poems.

“Poetry gives us all permission to be not quite right and still perfectly within our right.”

—Dasha Kelly Hamilton, 2021 Poet Laureate Fellow. Read this interview with Hamilton on her work in Wisonsin.

Apply Now: Poetry Coalition Fellowships

With thanks to the Mellon Foundation, the Poetry Coalition is pleased to announce the 2022–2023 Poetry Coalition Fellowships, which are paid fellowship positions hosted by founding member organizations Letras Latinas, Mass Poetry, Urban Word, Woodland Pattern, and Youth Speaks. Applications are being accepted until July 3, 2022. The positions will begin on September 5, 2022 and end on June 30, 2023. Interested individuals that are 21 or older are encouraged to apply, including those who are enrolled in or have recently graduated from an MFA program in creative writing.

#PoetryNearYou Pick of the Week

Check out our #PoetryNearYou Pick of the Week: Explorations Beyond Borders, a WeHo Reads event featuring Lisbeth Coiman, Myriam J. A. Chancy, Teresa Mei Chuc, and Sehba Sarwar. Tomorrow, May 4, at 6 p.m. PT / 9 p.m. ET. Register for this free, virtual reading here.

Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize

Established in 1975, this $25,000 award recognizes the most outstanding book of poetry published in the United States in the previous calendar year. The prize includes a ten-day residency at Glen Hollow in Naples, New York, and distribution of the winning book to hundreds of Academy of American Poets members.

Submissions for the 2022 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize will be accepted until May 15 (11:59 p.m. ET). The judges are Matthew Shenoda, Danez Smith, and Sawako Nakayasu.

The Queens Memory Project, a community archiving program of Queens Public Library and Queens College, CUNY, is seeking an outreach manager.
Strand Book Store in New York City is seeking a full-time used book buyer. To apply, email resume to careers@strandbookstore.
University of California, Irvine, is seeking an academic coordinator in the composition program.

Listen to Brandy Nālani McDougall discuss her curatorial approach and her own creative work. Read more about McDougall, the author of The Salt-Wind: Ka Makani Pa'Akai (Kuleana Oiwi Press, 2008), plus poems here.

Revisit last week’s Poem-a-Day selections with us on Poets.org:

April 24: “Throbbings” by Jamil B. Holway
April 25: “Vista” by Deema K. Shehabi
April 26: “Remember the Puns & Brashbrandy” by Matt Gonzalez
April 27: “For the Bird Singing before Dawn” by Kim Stafford
April 28: “The United States of Montessori” by Clemonce Heard
April 29: “Menopause ” by C. Prudence Arceneaux
April 30: “Apostrophe” by Lisa Katz Duncan

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Poems for Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month and Mother's Day

Older messages

"Remembering" by Dana Naone Hall

"Message to My Sistah" by Joe Balaz

"The Moonlight" by Yvor Winters

"Apostrophe" by Liza Katz Duncan

"Menopause" by C. Prudence Arceneaux

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