Happy Poetry Friday, everyone. Today, I’m sharing an opportunity from my friends at 100 Thousand Poets for Change. Dear Poets and Poetry Lovers, Will you read a poem to a child on September 29 as part of the 100 Thousand Poets for Change Global initiative “Read A Poem To A Child?” This seems to be […]
Activism
Thursday, 2 August 2018
Saturday, 19 August 2017
My teen and I visited the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum last week. Just a few days after a deadly white supremacist march in our neighboring state of Virginia, it was healing to see hundreds of people in the museum’s galleries, learning about how the politics of hate can infect and impact a society. (Read […]
Thursday, 2 February 2017
Happy February, everyone. This week, we kicked off my annual poem project, which has moved over to Facebook. This year’s theme is #10FoundWords. We have a daily news story, speech, or current event selected by a project member. That person chooses 10 words from the news source, which makes up our word bank for the […]
Thursday, 26 January 2017
It’s the last Poetry Friday of January. That means I am gearing up for the annual February daily poem project. This year, I’m encouraging participants to engage with current events, news articles, political speeches, and interviews. Each day, we’ll be using 10 Found Words from a news-related source and building our poems around those words. […]
Wednesday, 25 January 2017
We’re coming up on the last Poetry Friday in January. You know what that means. It’s almost time for our annual daily writing workout! For the past four years, my blog has hosted a community poetry project. This started as a birthday project. In 2013, I wrote every day in response to vintage postcards. I mailed […]
Thursday, 19 January 2017
Well, here we are. It’s really happening. First, I’d like to thank all of you for your comments on the press conference found poems. Several Poetry Friday regulars have been engaging with transcripts of the president-elect’s words. By paring away (or emphasizing) the fluff, these poems help us expose problems with the way language is […]
Saturday, 14 January 2017
I’m still mining this week’s pre-inaugural press conference for found poetry. Today’s poem is pulled word for word, unabridged from an exchange between the president-elect and a reporter. In addition to the repetitiveness of Trump’s speech (repetition *is* a poetic technique, after all), the contrast between the two speakers, and the irony of Trump’s use […]
Laura Shovan is the author of the award-winning middle grade novel, The Last Fifth Grade of Emerson Elementary. Her second book, Takedown, is a Junior Library Guild and PJ Our Way selection. Look for A Place at the Table, co-written with Saadia Faruqi, in 2020. Laura is a poet-in-the-schools Maryland.
