People have read poetry or listened to it or recited it because they liked it, because it gave them enjoyment.
But this is not the whole answer.
Poetry in all ages has been regarded as important, not simply as one of several alternative forms of amusement,
as one person might choose bowling, another chess, and another poetry.
Rather, it has been regarded as something central to existence, something having unique value to the fully realized life,
something that we are better off for having and without which we are spiritually impoverished.
-Laurence Perrine
I hope that you have found poetry—or perhaps poetry has found you.
Welcome to the human race!
After all, we are the only beings on this planet endowed with the capability to devise a written system of language,
and poetry represents the essence of that language and its power.
-Rita Dove
Poetry Responses
You’ll find here a bunch of poems to live with. Enjoy. Post a response, if you like, or respond to something else you're reading. Weekly or so, you have to write at least five sentences, in which you comment about specifics in the poem. How you comment is up to you: personal, associational thoughts are lovely, as are literary analyses. Explore your thoughts, wherever they lead you, and practice thinking and perceiving and feeling deeply. YOU MUST QUOTE. Feel free to link to or post relevant imagery, poetry, videos, news, memes, anything you think your classmates might find interesting in relation. And definitely respond to what other students have posted. Be playful. Use paragraphs and good, standard English.
Every so often, I'll ask you for a link to add to this list. I'll keep adding to it too. We'll want you to read us something cool.
Read the "for example" page for ideas of where poems might lead your thinking...
"maggie and millie and molly and may" by e e cummings
"Introduction to Poetry" by Billy Collins
"The Secret" by Denise Levertov
"Eating Poetry" by Mark Strand
"Much madness is divinest sense - " by Emily Dickinson
"In the Desert" by Stephen Crane
"I stood upon a high place" by Stephen Crane
"A man said..." by Stephen Crane
"Behind Grandma's House" by Gary Soto
"Earth" John Hall Wheelock
"The Golf Links" by Sarah N. Cleghorn
"Writing" by Jan Dean
"How to Write a Poem about the Sky" by Leslie Marmon Silko
"you fit into me" by Margaret Atwood
"this is a photograph of me" by Margaret Atwood
"Out, out - " by Robert Frost
"Not Waving but Drowning" by Stevie Smith
"what the mirror said" by Lucille Clifton
"note, passed to superman" by Lucille Clifton
"the lesson of the falling leaves" by Lucille Clifton
"When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer" by Walt Whitman
"The Book" by Miller Williams
"The World is too Much With Us" by William Wordsworth
"Kilroy" by Peter Viereck
"Curiosity" by Alastair Reed
"Jocasta" by Ruth Eisenberg
"Maple Syrup" by Donald Hall