"I’ve cast aside the grieving songs of my twilight"

The Academy of American Poets mourns the loss of Ethelyn Chase, who served as the Academy’s first President after founder Marie Bullock. Mrs. Chase devoted much of her life to poetry and literature, including founding the American Poets’ Corner at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York, New York.

In her memory, we share Anthony Hecht’s words which were printed in the Academy’s sixtieth anniversary booklet: “It is only the beginning of justice to claim that [Ethelyn] has labored with unflagging energy, cheerfulness, and dazzling success to advance the cause of our nation’s poetry, as well as the poetry of other nations, in ways for which all poets, as well as all readers of poetry, cannot fail to be grateful.”

“the sky will turn every color and still 
they will say everything is fine everything is fine”

—From Eunsong Kim’s poem “[asian]” 

Kim is the author of gospel of regicide (Noemi Press, 2017). The recipient of a Ford Foundation Fellowship, a grant from the Andy Warhol Arts Writers Program, and Yale University’s Poynter Fellowship, she is an associate professor in the department of English at Northeastern University. Read and listen to a Q&A with Kim about her Poem-a-Day curatorial approach. 

#PoetryNearYou Pick of the Week

Celebrated poet Elizabeth Alexander, Chancellor Emeritus of the Academy of American Poets, joins poet Kyle Dargan for an in-depth conversation about her life and work at Hill Center at the Old Naval Hospital (921 Pennsylvania Avenue SE, Washington, D.C. 20003) on Thursday, September 14, at 7 p.m. ET. Buy tickets here. (Sponsored)