IBPC: Poetry and Poets in Rags

"He was a very bright kid," the coach said. "He could have applied himself more. He was into poetry. He was a creative writer."

from Sports Illustrated: Dennehy's family, friends now look for full story

Mention "The Courtship of Miles Standish," "Evangeline" and "Paul Revere's Ride" to baby boomers or older folks and you'll likely see a gleam of recognition in their eyes, and maybe even hear them break into a quotation or two from those poems. But ask today's schoolchildren about those works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and chances are their response would be: "Huh?"

from Portland Press Herald: Through the eyes of Longfellow

That left Pound free to follow his own dogmatic theories, meticulously setting the poem not as a strophic song (the way the troubadours themselves had, as Pound knew perfectly well) but as a fanatically worked-out, through-composed replica of his own spoken performance, notated with impossibly finicky meter sequences (7/16, 25/32, 9/8, 1/4) that his composer friend George Antheil helped him capture on paper. This gave his score a forbidding modern-music look that long kept it from being performed â€” a modernist triumph. It was only after Pound was persuaded to simplify the notation that anyone attempted it.

from The New York Times: Ezra Pound, Musical Crackpot

As a boy from Lowell's Pawtucketville neighborhood, the acclaimed author grew up playing sandlot baseball and even devised his own baseball card game.

He later starred on Lowell High School's track and football teams before earning honors as a baseball player for an exclusive New York prep school. Kerouac also spent a brief stint on Columbia University's football team before beginning the rambling period that served as the basis for On the Road, one of the seminal works of the beat generation.

from Lowell Sun: Beat author, Lowell legend and bobblehead doll?

Ismail Khoi, poet and essayist, was one of the first university lecturers suspended when the government of Iran instituted a cleansing and rebuilding of Iranian universities after the 1979 revolution. When his colleague Saeed Soltanpoor was executed, Mr. Khoi realized that his own life was at risk.

from Payvand's Iran News: Iranian Writer Honored with Prestigious Award: Ismail Khoi Receives Hellman/Hammett Grant

Dave Purdie, an Edinburgh poet who started the appeal, said: â€œItâ€™s very disappointing that we havenâ€™t yet managed to have the statue erected, but the problem is that so few people are interested in poetry, not least Scots poetry.

â€œIt is important for people to know that Robert Fergusson was a marvellous poet and that his contribution to literature in Scots is absolutely irreplaceable. Without Fergusson there would be no Burns. He really is one of Scotlandâ€™s forgotten heroes.â€?

from Sunday Herald: Forgotten: the poet who most inspired Burns

Torn's Sylvia is a no-nonsense fast talker with an agile mind that often skips ahead of her words, or sometimes wanders away from them completely. She's far less self-indulgently tortured than you'd expect of a famously depressed poet, even if her smiles are mostly of the mirthless, sardonic variety.

from NY Newsday: The Doomed Poet Underlining All Her Words

The BBC's Hassan Barisse in Somali says that in Kismaio, Mr Hadraawi, the most popular living Somali poet, told the rally not to despair as the "solution to the problems of Somalia will be found one day".

Accompanied by his fellow poets, writers and musicians, Mr Hadraawi said that the march is part of his new initiative to persuade the Somalis to forgive each other and live in together peace in their homeland.

from BBC News: Somali poet marches for peace

"When Edward conquered Wales, he asked 500 bards to sing his praises," explained Wyn Davies, a member of the choir.

"But when they got up to speak, they only spoke of the death and bloodshed he had brought upon Wales, so he had them burnt at the stake."

from BBC News: Choir remembers poets' deaths

Weaver, who is originally from England, moved to Bethany Beach from the Washington, D.C. area after she was diagnosed with Parkinsonâ€™s Disease nearly three years ago. Since then Weaverâ€™s life has transformed and she finds herself filling her time with pictures and words instead of patients and healthcare technology.

from Cape Gazette: Christina Weaver finds her passion in photography, poetry

You may not think this is Pulitzer material, but it goes to the head of my particular class. The poem is about Vitaly Leybman, a South Side High School senior killed by a drunken driver in a horrific accident in 1998. If poetry is "memorable speech," I remembered this verse long after I read it some months ago. I responded in a way I've never done to reader poetry: "Send me more."

from The News-Sentinel: Local poet sorts out life with rhymes, structures

The poet Josephine Jacobsen, who died last week in Maryland at age 94, was a cultural exception. Although she never attended college, she earned the respect of her fellow writers and was named poetry consultant to the Library of Congress (the honorary job now called United States poet laureate) in 1971.

from The New York Times: Josephine Jacobsen's Legacy: The Physical Thrill of Poetry

Now Fowler is resigned to losing his caddie after the British Open as the elder brother of Kiwi golfer Greg Turner returns home to indulge his other diverse passion.

Fowler described Brian Turner as New Zealand's poet laureate and added: "He's going home because he has to read some poetry at a recital."

from Herald Sun: Fowler revival poetry in motion

Each word within a verse is thought of as a poetic gene. There are a possible 30,000 words, and as people vote, some genomes will prove more popular than others as they form semi-meaningful phrases.

from New Scientist: Poetry website goes from bad to verse

So, I ask, what makes a poem good? "I'll give you a quick rule of thumb," he answers firmly, "and that is: would you want to read that poem again? Do you remember a line or a striking phrase or image from it? I think it would be true of just about every work of art. Would you really want to encounter it again? Would you spend the time?"

from Ft.com: Lunch with the FT: Joe Parisi