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Poetry 180 - A Poem A Day

by Wendy on June 13th, 2006

Poetry180 is an outreach of the Library of Congress to high school students; the idea behind it is that they will read a new poem every day of school. Here’s an example:

“Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem’s room
and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author’s name on the shore.

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.”

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POSTED IN: Reference