Guest Post from L.L. Barkat: Random Acts of Poetry Day
“This one is my day,” said my 16-year-old daughter. She’s more into cosplay, steampunk, and photography than she is into poetry, which is fine by me, even if I do have it in mind to win the world’s heart with the power and beauty of verse.
As part of my role on the team at Tweetspeak Poetry, I spend a good deal of time considering how to reach this lofty goal—poetry to the world—or, as we’ve come to put it, Poetry for Life.
To that end, we sponsor four public days per year, from the serious to the mischievous: Poetry at Work Day, Poem on Your Pillow Day, Take Your Poet to Work Day, and Random Acts of Poetry Day.
As part of the fun, we offer free downloadable materials for libraries, teachers, hotels, workplaces, and anyone at all who might, like my daughter, suddenly see that poetry can appeal to a variety of people—some of whom will never love a sonnet or unlock the secrets of a ghazal.
T.S. Poetry Press, January 2014.
For Random Acts of Poetry Day, which is a day devoted to…random acts of poetry, it was my poetry-doubtful daughter whose street photography ended up on the free poster and the ebooklet of random act ideas. This wasn’t planned. The rest of the day’s materials were kindly provided by photographer Michelle Ortega.
In the end, it seems fitting. A last-minute photo shoot in Indiana, a sudden decision to use one of the images from that spontaneous trip, and this image being from the daughter who’s declared Random Acts of Poetry Day as her day. For a planned public day, this all feels appropriately random. And we know we’ve reached at least one heart with the possibilities of poetry.
Celebrate, Wednesday, October 7!
Download a free Random Acts of Poetry Day Poster
Download a free ebooklet of random act ideas
Borrow beautiful art to share the day on your website or social media
Share your photos from the day with us on Twitter or Instagram, using the hashtag #raopoetryday and we might feature you in the wrap-up post.
L.L. Barkat.
L.L. Barkat is the founder of T.S. Poetry Press, home of an Oprah-selected title; Managing Editor of Tweetspeak Poetry (which convinced Microsoft and Ellen DeGeneres to write poems); writer at Huffington Post Books blog; and the author of six books spanning the genres of memoir, poetry, and fiction. Her secret stash always contains chocolate or maple bacon potato chips. She accepts loose tea as bribes.
