"During drought, the heat becomes a devil girl with oven-red lips"

July 18, 2023

Summer Poems

With the dog days of summer now upon us, embrace the swelter with these poems from Poets.org:

“Poem in July” by Samuel Amadon
“They’ll Spend the Summer” by Joshua Beckman
“Wonder” by Mei-mei Berssenbrugge
“Last Days” by Kwame Dawes
“july 28” by Akwaeke Emezi
“Failing and Flying” by Jack Gilbert
“Ghazal for a First Lover” by Mónica Gomery
“Summer in the Ordinary” by William Logan
“Tyranny of the Milky Way” by Claudia Castro Luna
“There” by Robert Mezey
“July” by Henrietta Cordelia Ray
“Florida Poem” by Emma Trelles

Revisit Sharon Olds’s reading of “Summer Solstice, New York City” from the Poetry Breaks series, filmed in the late 1980s and early 1990s by creator Leita Luchetti, who co-produced the series with the WGBH New Television Workshops.

“What is the point of travel
For a DeafBlind person
Other than the food the people the shops
And all that”

From John Lee Clark’s poem “Four Slateku”

Clark, this month’s Poem-a-Day Guest Editor, is the author of the essay collection Where I Stand: On the Signing Community and My DeafBlind Experience (Handtype Press, 2014) and the poetry collection How to Communicate (W. W. Norton, 2022). He is a Braille instructor and Protactile trainer living in Hopkins, Minnesota. Read and listen to a Q&A with Clark about his Poem-a-Day curatorial approach.

more at poets.org

Poetic Encounters, April, 2023. Photo: Enid Alvarez. Presented by the Guggenheim Poet-in-Residence in association with the Academy of American Poets. Made possible by Van Cleef & Arpels

#PoetryNearYou Pick of the Week: Poetic Encounters at The Solomon. R. Guggenheim Museum

Join us for an exploration of current exhibitions at the Guggenheim Museum with Poetic Encounters, a zine designed by 2023 Poet-in-Residence Ama Codjoe to inspire engagement, curiosity, and wonder. Physical copies can be picked up in the museum’s Aye Simon Reading Room on a first-come-first-served basis, or downloaded in advance of your visit. The museum is open daily from 11 a.m. ET to 6 p.m. ET (1071 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY). Learn more here. (Sponsored).

more at guggenheim.org

2024 First Book Award

Submissions for the 2024 Academy of American Poets First Book Award, judged by Victoria Chang, will be accepted online until September 1, 2023. The winner of the First Book Award will receive $5,000, publication by Graywolf Press, a six-week residency at the Civitella Ranieri Center in Umbria, Italy, and distribution of their winning book to thousands of Academy members.

more at poets.org

The University of Missouri is seeking a full-time senior editor for The Missouri Review.
The Chicago Poetry Center is seeking Chicago poets with K-12 education experience to work as teaching artists.
James Madison University in Harrisonburg, VA, is seeking an administrative assistant for the Furious Flower Poetry Center.

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

July 9: “Marie Bashkirtseff Said” by Annie Charlotte Dalton
July 10: “Snow Globe of Denver” by The Cyborg Jillian Weise
July 11: “Awkwafina Clarifies That She’s Appreciating, Not Appropriating
(in Black American Sentences)” by Simone Person
July 12: “Stability is a Feeling” by Nazifa Islam
July 13: “Oregon State Hospital” by Roberto Cabrera
July 14: “Sleep Hygiene” by Jill Khoury
July 15: “The Sluggard” by Isaac Watts

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"During drought, the heat becomes a devil girl with oven-red lips"

Older messages

"Parasitoid" by Frank Gallimore

"Ship/Plum" by Maija Haavisto

"Stability Is a Feeling" by Nazifa Islam

Poems for summer

"Oregon State Hospital" by Roberto Cabrera

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