National Poetry Month 2006

'Just Listen'

April 28, 2006 • 'Just Listen' is taken from the collection Eduardo & I, by Peter Johnson. Johnson teaches creative writing and children's literature at Providence College in Rhode Island, where he lives with his wife and two sons.

'Fears'

April 26, 2006 • Read a selection from Felipe Benitez Reyes' book, Probable Lives, which is now out in paperback. The character-poets here read as forgotten or unknown 20th century authors, all "rediscovered" and compiled by an anthologist who is also the creation of Felipe Benitez Reyes.

'Hazard Response'

April 24, 2006 • "No one should be writing poetry/In times like these, Dear Reader," writes Tom Clark in this selection from Light and Shade: New and Selected Poems.

'The Bearhug'

April 21, 2006 • A former lawyer, London-based writer Nick Laird wrote the novel Utterly Monkey. This selection is from his poetic debut, To a Fault.

'The Blue Terrance'

April 19, 2006 • Terrance Hayes teaches creative writing at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Penn. The following selection is taken from his latest collection, Wind in a Box.

'To the Tresspasser'

April 17, 2006 • For his collection Wonder Cabinets, from which the following poem was taken, David Barber derives inspiration from the curiosity cabinets of the late Renaissance.

'In Antigua'

April 14, 2006 • A travel ad in The New Yorker provides the inspiration for this poem selected from the debut collection of Kerri Webster. Webster teaches poetry writing at Boise State University and through the Log Cabin Literary Center's Writers in the Schools program.

'Now I Understand'

April 12, 2006 • Passion and strife come together in this selection from In the Middle Distance, a collection from New York-based poet Linda Gregg. Gregg's poetry has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The Kenyon Review, and The Atlantic Monthly.

'One of the Monkeys'

April 10, 2006 • Nicholas Johnson offers a view from the author's desk with imagery both amusing and sinister in this selection from the chapbook Degrees of Freedom.

'Stone Bird'

April 7, 2006 • Pattiann Rogers' Firekeeper, where this poem is collected, won the 2005 Lannan Literary Prize for Poetry. The Colorado-based poet lends portent and beauty to the notion of an inanimate bird in this poem.

'Farewell to Yang, Who's Leaving for Kuo-chou'

April 5, 2006 • Wang Wei is an eighth-century Chinese poet known for his tranquil, contemplative depiction of landscape scenes. The translation comes from David Hinton, a prominent translator of classical Chinese poetry.

'A Myth of Devotion'

April 3, 2006 • Read a selection from Averno, a collection by Louise Gluck that mines the ancient myth of Persephone for the light that it sheds on the experience of death and dying.