Category: National Poetry Month

2025 Progressive Poem Day 20

Now more than ever, it is a blessing to be in community. I give thanks for this generous chorus of poets who have come together to create a poem for children, line by line. Special thanks to Margaret who wrangled us all together and to Irene, who invented this Poetry Month tradition.

April 1 Linda Mitchell at A Word Edgewise
April 2 Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect
April 3 Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge
April 4 Donna Smith at Mainely Write
April 5 Denise at https://mrsdkrebs.edublogs.org/
April 6 Buffy at http://www.buffysilverman.com/blog
April 7 Jone at https://www.jonerushmacculloch.com/
April 8 Janice Scully at Salt City Verse
April 9 Tabatha at https://tabathayeatts.blogspot.com/
April 10 Marcie at Marcie Flinchum Atkins
April 11 Rose at Imagine the Possibilities | Rose’s Blog
April 12 Fran Haley at Lit Bits and Pieces
April 13 Cathy Stenquist
April 14 Janet Fagel at Mainly Write
April 15 Carol Varsalona at Beyond LiteracyLink
April 16 Amy Ludwig VanDerwater at The Poem Farm
April 17 Kim Johnson at Common Threads
April 18 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche
April 19 Ramona at Pleasures from the Page
April 20 Mary Lee at A(nother) Year of Reading
April 21 Tanita at {fiction instead of lies}
April 22 Patricia Franz
April 23 Ruth at There’s No Such Thing as a Godforsaken Town
April 24 Linda Kulp Trout at http://lindakulptrout.blogspot.com
April 25 Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe
April 26 Michelle Kogan at: https://moreart4all.wordpress.com/
April 27 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance
April 28 Pamela Ross at Words in Flight
April 29 Diane Davis at Starting Again in Poetry
April 30 April Halprin Wayland at Teaching Authors

I lost track of a week’s worth of lines while I was “away from my desk,” and it’s a joy to see how this year’s poem has progressed! Impressive that we’ve maintained quatrains with a regular rhyme pattern. We’ve opened, raced, sung, and breathed. We’ve painted and communed, rejoiced and given thanks. In the current stanza, we bask, romp and startle. Such fun verbs! Here’s the poem I’ll pass to Cousin Tanita for the next line and the next stanza and the next action! I’m not adding punctuation to keep that pattern going, but I will modify the capitalization in the current stanza to match the rest. Now it’s up to Tanita to follow, bend, or break the “rules” we’ve all set!

Open an April window
let sunlight paint the air
stippling every dogwood
dappling daffodils with flair

Race to the garden
where woodpeckers drum
as hummingbirds thrum
in the blossoming Sweetgum

Sing as you set up the easels
dabble in the paints
echo the colors of lilac and phlox
commune without constraints

Breathe deeply the gifts of lilacs
rejoice in earth’s sweet offerings
feel renewed-give thanks at day’s end
remember long-ago springs

Bask in a royal spring meadow
romp like a golden-doodle pup!
startle the sleeping grasshoppers
delight in each flowering shrub

Poetry Friday: Measles

This NPM, I am writing acrostic poems using words from the Banned Words List at the Pen America Website. You can find my poems each day on Poetrepository, IG stories, and BlueSky.

April 1 Diversity
April 2 Climate Crisis
April 3 Transgender
April 4 Biases
April 5 Activism
April 6 Community
April 7 Pronouns
April 8 Gay
April 9 Hate
April 10 Elderly
April 11 Identity
April 12 Promote
April 13 Female
April 14 Belong
April 15 Minority
April 16 Activism

Jone has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at Jone Rush MacCulloch.

Poetry Friday: Identity

This NPM, I am writing acrostic poems using words from the Banned Words List at the Pen America Website. You can find my poems each day on Poetrepository, IG stories, and BlueSky.

April 1 Diversity
April 2 Climate Crisis
April 3 Transgender
April 4 Biases
April 5 Activism
April 6 Community
April 7 Pronouns
April 8 Gay
April 9 Hate
April 10 Elderly

Irene has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at Live Your Poem.

Slice of Life: National Poetry Month

Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.

Goodbye Slice of Life March Challenge…hello National Poetry Month Poem-a-Day Challenge!

This NPM, I will be writing acrostic poems using words from the Banned Words List at the Pen America Website.

It’s up to us to keep the truth in American history, and in science. It’s up to us to keep reading, thinking, and being as gloriously weird as possible. We must push back against the urge to obey in advance and we must defend our institutions. We must not let someone else dictate the language we choose to tell our stories, name our cultures and landmarks, and prevent us from telling all kinds of truths. I’ll do my small part by keeping some of the “banned” words in circulation by using them to write acrostic poems.

Daily poems will be found at Poetrepository, but I’ll round them up here at A(nother) Year of Reading on Fridays. Join me if you’d like!

Progressive Poem

Thank you to Margaret Simon for shepherding the Progressive Poem tradition started oh so long ago by Irene Latham.

Thank you to all the poets before me who brought Manu and his sister this far, and thank you, Janet, for getting them safely to their destination.

To the poets who will provide the final closure, good luck and happy writing!

April 23 Tanita Davis at (fiction, instead of lies)
April 24 Molly Hogan at Nix the Comfort Zone
April 25 Joanne Emery at Word Dancer
April 26 Karin Fisher-Golton at Still in Awe
April 27 Donna Smith at Mainly Write
April 28 Dave at Leap of Dave
April 29 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge
April 30 Michelle Kogan at More Art for All

And now, for the poem:

cradled in stars, our planet sleeps,
clinging to tender dreams of peace
sister moon watches from afar,
singing lunar lullabies of hope.

almost dawn, I walk with others,
keeping close, my little brother.
hand in hand, we carry courage
escaping closer to the border

My feet are lightning;
My heart is thunder.
Our pace draws us closer
to a new land of wonder.

I bristle against rough brush—
poppies ahead brighten the browns.
Morning light won’t stay away—
hearts jump at every sound.

I hum my own little song
like ripples in a stream
Humming Mami’s lullaby
reminds me I have her letter

My fingers linger on well-worn creases,
shielding an address, a name, a promise–
Sister Moon will find always us
surrounding us with beams of kindness

But last night as we rested in the dusty field,
worries crept in about matters back home.
I huddled close to my brother. Tears revealed
the no-choice need to escape. I feel grown.

Leaving all I’ve ever known
the tender, heavy, harsh of home.
On to maybes, on to dreams,
on to whispers we hope could be.

But I don’t want to whisper! I squeeze Manu’s hand.
“¡Más cerca ahora!” Our feet pound the sand.
We race, we pant, we lean on each other
I open my canteen and drink gratefully

Thirst is slaked, but I know we’ll need
more than water to achieve our dreams.
Nights pass slowly, but days call for speed
through the highs and the lows, we live with extremes

We enter a village the one from Mami’s letter,
We find the steeple; food, kindly people, and shelter.
“We made it, Manu! Mami would be so proud!”
I choke back a sob, then stand tall for the crowd.

Poetry Friday: Quarter to Six

Or perhaps the last laugh…

I’m having great fun with my 2024 NPM project. I’m writing daily (mostly privately), and…audiencing. After ten years of public projects, when I never managed to both write AND appreciate the writing of others, it feels good to spend time each day reading, appreciating, and being inspired by all you’ve been up to! (If I’ve missed yours, leave a link in the comments!)

This poem was inspired by the villanelle Tanita wrote this week. She compared the experience of writing a villanelle to the Poetry Sisters’ recent writing of another form with repeating lines — the pantoum. I wanted to test Tanita’s hypothesis that a villanelle is better for “…short lines, direct ideas. It’s good for inescapable truths. A pantoum sometimes leaves more wiggle room…”

I’m not sure I hit upon any inescapable truths, but I did have fun.

Jone has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup. Happy National Poetry Month!

Poetry Friday: In the Style of Neruda

Write a poem in the style of Neruda.

The urge to skip this month’s Poetry Sisters challenge was strong. I went to last Sunday’s zoom meeting with an idea for a way to come to this challenge through the back door. I was also hoping for a Cliffs Notes version of The Style of Neruda that could help me on my way, or, at the very least, provide content for my cheat. I got both.

Tricia shared this recent children’s book:

And others reminded me that Neruda is known for his odes. (Also sonnets, but only Tanita had the bandwidth to go that direction. Yay, Tanita!)

Here’s my cheat: a golden shovel with the striking line running through the middle of the poem, inspired by Neruda’s BOOK OF QUESTIONS and my garden.

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We are still inside National Poetry Month, so I was determined, also, to get a cherita out of this challenge. I leaned in the direction of Neruda’s odes for this one.

Here’s what the rest of the Poetry Sisters came up with this month:
Liz @ Liz Garton Scanlon
Tricia @ The Miss Rumphius Effect
Tanita @ {fiction, instead of lies}
Sara @ Read Write Believe
Laura @ Laura Purdie Salas

Ruth has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at There is no such thing as a God-forsaken town and the Progressive poem is at Still in Awe with Karin Fisher-Golton.

Happy Almost the End of National Poetry Month! All of my cheritas can be found at Poetrepository. So that I can catch up reading YOUR projects, I declare May to be Read What Everyone Else Did for NPM Month!

Poetry Friday: Open

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All of my cheritas for the month can be found here.

If you missed it, one of Jone’s students made a powerful work of art and social commentary with my poem from last year’s NPM project, “Dandelions.” Go watch her video. Have a tissue ready.

Jone has the Poetry Friday roundup today, featuring Classic Found Poems. I’m late to the party, but I found a cherita inside A WRINKLE IN TIME, p.191.

comparing our lives to a sonnet:

a strict form
but freedom within it

you’re given the form
but you have to write the sonnet yourself–
what you say is completely up to you

Jone also has the next line in the Progressive Poem tomorrow. Sounds like my life at the beginning of the month! Such fun times in April!

Poetry Friday: Dictionary Hopscotch

Back when I issued my challenge to the Inklings, I thought my Poetry Month project would be Dictionary Hopscotch — I would randomly choose 4 words from different spots in the dictionary and then use at least 3 of them in a poem.

So I challenged my fellow Inklings to use 3 of these 4 randomly chosen words in a poem: knuckle, denial, turn, cautious.

And then I changed my project to cheritas.

Therefore, this:

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Here’s how the rest of the crew met my challenge:

Linda @A Word Edgewise
Heidi @my juicy little universe
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Catherine @Reading to the Core
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche

Margaret has this week’s Poetry Friday Roundup at Reflections on the Teche.

Don’t forget to check up on the Progressive Poem! Links are in the sidebar.

Days 1-6 of my #NPM23 project can be found on FB, IG and at Poetrepository.

The hopscotch image is via Unsplash.