
Source: The Huffington Post
If you grew up in America, it might surprise you to learn that a poet has ever had that sort of impact. Poetry here is best known for the simple, sentimental verses found in Hallmark cards and the lyrics of pop music. The word "poet" probably calls to mind some weirdo in a beret.

Basking and glowing ever more
The swath of light with harmonious glare
This is what the light of sun should be
Instead the way it glows is similar to being burnt

was it all wasted?
the days you spent
sleeping on the sand
under hot sunlight
that burns and scorches your skin

Source: scq.ubc.ca
There once was a young man named Darwin
Who spent five years tossed to the far wind
He wrote a book for his peers
After only twenty short years
And now he's as pop as George Carlin.

When I was just quite small
I was given
A beautiful panda bear paintbox
Inside the most cheerful ovals
I ever did see
With it I decided
I would paint my world
Just as it should be
Bright, shiny, free
Green leaves and yellow suns

As I lay
Forced to watch
Unable to avert my eyes
She informs me
If I should look away
I will see her anyway
Hear her screams
Writhing
Crying
Strips of herself tear apart and fall
As if burned
I am sickened by it all

Today provided evidentiary proof
Catalyst status
It is what I shall learn to embrace
A new role
S'been brought into glaring relief
Focus
No longer abstract
S'real as rain

What was it
That we expected
Relief
Just a little
I suppose
In its stead
Forlorn reaching justification
Coming and going
I see this
Independent film
Inside your head
Each frame lovelier than the last

She stands there
Her feet firm
On unstable ground
Her weight distributed to the front of her feet
Wind blows hard
In bright darkness
At waters edge
Moon, water, wind
Roar
Knowing they are special
Chosen
The lady chose
This night
This moon
This place

Flitter and flutter from flower to flower
dancing the 'air-waltz' of butterflies.
Dipping and flitting from hour to hour,
nature's choreographer soaring in the skies.

Look at little Miss Saneeki Snail.
Wherever she goes she leaves a trail.
She thinks nobody sees her crawl.
She thinks she isn't seen at all.

Don't tick me off. Don't make me mad.
Don't get me angry, or make me sad.
I'm not afraid, and certainly not scared.
I'm not a pushover, so don't even go there.

As I sit in my chair
I feel my body tire
while the rest of my being
seen and unseen
is busy
closes in and around itself
self enveloped
a metamorphosis is taking place
right under my own nose
literally
I rejoice in this becoming
as I die here alone
I am not afraid
I thankfully and …

Let me be as proud of my failures as I am my triumphs,
I would not be the person I that I am without both,
For failure has built my strength and character,
Without failure I would have not known triumph.

Source: eggbeater.typepad.com
would you fight for love?
what's the worst thing that can happen if you let someone in? all the way?

Source: media-newswire.com
April is National Poetry Month, a time when communities across the United States popularize poetry. In New York, restaurants place poems inside diners' menus. All over, transit systems are "advertising" poems on buses and in subway trains.

This is a folk song
Take me down
to Norris Hall
And let me see
the crime
My eyes hold
the sounds of guns
The crooked smell
of time
Well half the mountains
Filled with pain
With coal and
diamond tongues
And when the sun sets
down the hills
The death smokes up
our lungs

Source: Poetry Foundation
In a recent article on the Poetry Foundation, The New Yorker lobs the latest volley in an ongoing intellectual debate.

Source: Bits of News
Until the time of Ibsen, and birth of modern drama, any play worth the name needed to be something more than people talking on stage much as they would in their own living rooms. It had to be in verse.

Source: realitystudio.org
Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 1986
William S. Burroughs
For John Dillinger
In hope he is still alive
Thanks for the wild turkey and the Passenger Pigeons, destined to be @!$%# out through wholesome American guts —
thanks for a Continent to despoil and poison —

Source: About.com
Jay-Z Adresses Roc-A-Fella Split on Kingdom Come

Source: The Washington Post
Civics in rhyme, one more time
By Gene Weingarten
Foley's Folly
Higgledy Piggledy
Congressman Foley's lewd
IMs to youngsters show
He's quite the louse.
No one's applauding, but
Oxymoronically
This sleazeball's conduct might