Poems Honoring Touch, Inaugural Poem Contest for Students, Brian Blanchfield Recommends Poems from the Archive

December 8, 2020

Poems Honoring Touch

As we move into an unfamiliar holiday season, we long for intimacy and to hold our loved ones. Stay safe, and instead, read these poems honoring human touch on Poets.org:

“Sink Your Fingers into the Darkness of my Fur” by Ellen Bass
“Cherry blossoms” by Toi Derricotte
“Daisy Cutter” by Camille T. Dungy
“How the Stars Understand Us” by Christopher Gilbert
“[When I come home they rush to me, the flies]” by Aracelis Girmay
“Nocturne” by Taylor Johnson
“The Gift” by Li-Young Lee

#PoetryNearYou Pick of the Week: TONIGHT I AM IN LOVE

#PoetryNearYou Pick of the Week: TONIGHT I AM IN LOVE, an Emily Dickinson Birthday Tribute Reading performed virtually by Academy of American Poets Chancellor Dorianne Laux from Dickinson’s bedroom in Amherst, Massachusetts. Co-sponsored by the Folger Shakespeare Library and The Emily Dickinson Museum. Thursday, December 10 at 7:30 p.m. EST, 4:30 p.m. PST. $5 with registration.

Watch poet Nithy Kasa read William Butler Yeats’ poem “The Lake Isle of Innisfree,” as part of the Adrian Brinkerhoff Poetry Foundation’s Read By series of poetry films.

Inaugural Poem Contest for Students

Submissions are still being accepted for the 2021 Inaugural Poem Contest for Students through December 30, 2020. Three students’ poems will be selected by this year’s judge, Presidential Inaugural Poet and Academy of American Poets Education Ambassador Richard Blanco. And, thanks to an anonymous donor who has doubled the prize money, the first place-winning student will receive $1,000; second place, $600; and third place, $300.

Awards for Books in Translation

The Academy of American Poets is accepting submissions for the Ambroggio Prize, given to a book-length poetry manuscript originally written in Spanish and with an English translation; the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award, recognizing a poetry collection translated from any language into English and published in the previous calendar year; and the Raiziss/de Palchi Fellowship, given for the translation into English of a significant work of modern Italian poetry. Submissions are open through February 15, 2021.

Opportunities for Poets

Farrar, Straus and Giroux in New York City is seeking a full-time Assistant Marketing Manager to work on advertising book campaigns.
Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, is seeking a full-time, tenure-track Assistant Professor in Creative Writing/Nonfiction to begin teaching July 25, 2021.
University of Alaska Anchorage in Anchorage, Alaska, is seeking a full-time Assistant Professor of Writing to teach a full load (24 to 27 credits) of undergraduate courses.
University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond, Oklahoma, is seeking a full-time, tenure-track Assistant Professor of English with a specialization in poetry.

Brian Blanchfield Recommends Poems from the Archive

“Carmen Giménez Smith’s ‘Like an Auto-Tune of Authentic Love’ may be the first great Zoom love poem; it is relaxed, unlabored, and in a mood to browse its subject, moving its figurative cursor over its subject, and because it’s so naturally paced and comfortable, it seems the speaker genuinely surprises herself that ‘love can happen at any part of one’s life / like the pixels deciding when to flicker into bursts.’”

—Brian Blanchfield, author of A Several World (Nightboat Books, 2014), and Poem-a-Day Guest Editor for the month of December.

Last Week’s Poem-a-Day

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

November 29: “Random Thoughts of Her” by John Rollin Ridge
November 30: “No More Fire Here: A Sestina” by b: william bearhart
December 1: “The Thought of the World” by Mark McMorris
December 2: “Would It Kill Me to Be a Nicer Guy?” by Raquel Gutiérrez
December 3: “Howl” by Eileen Myles
December 4: “Real Estate” by Richard Siken
December 5: “Love Songs (section III)” by Mina Loy

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Poems Honoring Touch, Inaugural Poem Contest for Students, Brian Blanchfield Recommends Poems from the Archive

Poems Honoring Touch

#PoetryNearYou Pick of the Week: TONIGHT I AM IN LOVE

Inaugural Poem Contest for Students

Awards for Books in Translation

Opportunities for Poets

Brian Blanchfield Recommends Poems from the Archive

Last Week’s Poem-a-Day

Older messages

"The Ruins of Nostalgia 59" by Donna Stonecipher

"Hickory Street, New Orleans" by Yona Harvey

"Villanelle" by Otto Leland Bohanan

"Love Songs (section III)" by Mina Loy

Poems and Lesson Plans for Winter and the Upcoming Holidays

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