Poetry Friday: Book Problems

Rose is hosting Poetry Friday today at “Imagine the Possibilities.” Head on over there for the roundup. 

I Have a Book Problem

You may have guessed that when my 24 Bookstores in 2024 turned into 40 bookstores in 2024, that I might have a book problem.

I work in a library, but I make a trip to my public library at least once (often twice a week). My husband says, “but you work in a library.” And I do. I often read many, many picture books from the public library before I buy them. I also get many of my adult reading from the public library. My public library also tells you how much money you’ve saved during the year by checking out books instead of buying them. Each December my savings is in the $9K-$10K range.

But I have a book problem. I keep my holds list maxed out (50 for print). Then I have a list on my account for “books to put on hold” when it gets below 50.

I also have library cards to DC Public Library and Arlington Public Library (mostly for access to digital resources).

I’ve been brainstorming and researching several projects recently, and I’d been collecting books for it. But I also have been wanting to read other verse novels and research editors and read about gardening, etc.

My piles in my office were haphazard and growing. So cleared off my dining room table on Saturday (I was going to be home alone for the first time in months). And I made piles.

This is before. It’s a mix of personal books, public library books, and school library books.

This is after. That tallest pile is books that I want to read JUST BECAUSE! Other piles include research for upcoming projects, research for a panel I’m going to be on (I want to read the other panelists’ books), research about an editor and their imprint for a critique, research for 25 New-to-Me Poets, brainstorming for a new project.

It’s too much. I can’t read all of these before they are due (even though my public library no longer charges fines. So I’m doing triage with books. I’m making note of books I want to get on audio with my Libro.FM credits. I’m also doing a sweep through some of the research books so that I can determine whether they’ll work for my research or not.

I’m taking back some of the library books once I do a sweep through them. Then I’ll start to work on reading the remaining ones.

One Step Forward News

Check out the recommended verse novels for Poetry Month.

Last weekend I spotted One Step Forward in the wild at my local Barnes & Noble. 

On Saturday, March 29, I’m doing my book launch at the Lucy Burns Museum. If you are local, I would love to see you.

Stay tuned for those of you who aren’t local, I’m doing a hybrid event (with online option). Once the details are worked out, I will post here.

Haiku of the Week

witch hazel

we stretch our fingers

to reach spring


Photo Taken: March 15, 2025 Green Spring Gardens
Haiku Written: March 19, 2025

25 New-to-Me Poets in 2025

In her essay “Ten Things About Poetry,” Patricia Smith challenges the reader to “discover one new poet every week.” (in The Practicing Poet: Writing Beyond the Basics edited by Diane Lockward). I’m setting out to discover 25 New-to-Me poets in 2025. Join me as I read at least 5 poems by a new-to-me poet.

1. Francis Ponge
2. Cynthia Manick
3. Mattie Quesenberry Smith
4. Janine Joseph
5. Gyorgyi Voros
6. Elani Spencer

Harryette Mullen

I recently went to the Eastern Shore Writers “Bay to Ocean” Conference. For every hour of the conference they had a workshop for various strands–fiction, nonfiction, poetry, marketing, craft. I went to several poetry workshops. Kari Ann Ebert presented on “Fractures and Fragments.” She highly recommended Harryette Mullen’s collection Sleeping with the Dictionary, which was a National Book Award Finalist.

Luckily, my local library had a copy. I love the way she plays with words and structure in this collection.

Favorite poem: “European Folk Tale Variant”
Favorite phrase: “caulifloral coral” from “Fancy Cortex”

Sample poems at the Poetry Foundation
Sample poems at Poets.org

I have a bunch of new-to-me poets from this conference, so I look forward to diving deeply into their work more in the coming weeks.

RECREATE 

Last week the time change really did me in. So, I was really not making much progress on anything. Letting my body adjust meant not getting to everything on my to-do list, and that included last week’s Poetry Friday.

As I mentioned above, I went to a new-to-me writing conference. It’s mostly people writing adult books (though I did attend a great session on character with Laura Shovan and Bridget Hodder–both children’s writers). I attended several sessions on poetry and it was so helpful for me to go to a completely different conference. I only knew Laura. But I had lunch with two writers that were working on very interesting projects.

I’ve been tending to my little seedlings. It’s been a fun little morning ritual. Some of my seedlings (kale) have ventured their way outside too.

I went to one of my favorite parks to take some photos. I needed some outside time to do some photography, so I took some time on Saturday to do that.

Early in January, I purchased tickets to see John Green launch his new book EVERYTHING IS TUBERCULOSIS. The event was Wednesday night in DC. I’ll be honest, I wanted to go, but I was dreading the logistics. Traffic and parking are never easy. Based on the location of the event taking metro + walking would have taken me 2-3x longer. The event was worth the logistics. Atul Gawande interviewed John. If you’ve never read BEING MORTAL, I highly recommend it to everyone. They talked about the specifics of tuberculosis and possible future treatments (and how the funding has been pulled out), and it was so evident that the empathy that these two have for people. They care about global health. They care about the American people. John talked about how easy it is to give into despair and offered words of hope and kindness. There were federal workers in the audience. Some had been laid off from USAID (who had been doing good work on the TB front). NIH employees were there. It was a night that reminded me there are so many kind people in the world.

This last photo is from the end of the event. Everyone sang “We’re here because we’re here…” with a nod to Amy Krouse Rosenthal and in solidarity with others to show we are here together and we are not alone.