As World Poetry Day arrives (today!), and National Poetry Month waits just around the corner (April), I thought I’d offer a brief missive on literary matters both personal and universal:

Most people are poets to one degree or another, though some don’t like to admit it. When you walk outside and feel the temperature in the morning, your response to it is the beginning of poetry. The texture of the air on your skin, the combination of sunlight, birdsong, and environmental noise, and the state of the world around you (your seasonal lawn, the road nearby, the leaves that have fallen on your driveway)…these things are the earliest signals that your mind wishes to celebrate life by composing a poem. Most people immediately shut down this impulse with negative self-talk: “I’m not a poet,” or “That’s what somebody else would do,” or “That stuff’s too deep for me.” The truth is, we all want to record and respond to the world around us in artistic words; some folks just lean into that longing more than others.

There’s also that dreaded mental reservation called imposter syndrome. “I don’t know enough/haven’t done enough/can’t compete with experts” hinders so many earnest efforts. Nobody is the greatest at something the first time they try it, and there are plenty of metaphors and parables extolling the virtue of practice and patience. Being unwilling to try something because of initial frustration is ordinarily a child’s reaction, but in the adult world, too many creators quit before they’ve properly begun. Nowhere is this fact more evident than in poetry — the persistent thrive, even if they aren’t that great.

I won’t name names here, but walk into your mainstream bookstore and you’ll find the one shelf called a “poetry section” filled with poorly designed and badly written tomes by people whose greatest claim to fame is that they’ve penned trite cliches or radical malarkey for the last 25 years or more. And those “books” are placed alongside Dickinson, Shakespeare, and Frost. This literary injustice is a turnoff to those who may be considering writing well-crafted verses of their own, and it should be. But this sad fact should also be a motivator for producing better work for our current age. Make poetry great again!

So, how do we overcome a closed mindset regarding poem writing? The first step is to get inspired. Sometimes a little help can go a long way, and toward that end, I recently began a new mini-workshop by mail called “Metacreativity: The Process Behind the Poetry.” In this monthly letter, I offer one poem of mine, the backstory behind it, and the process it went through before becoming its final version. Sometimes seeing into someone else’s creative process inspires others to use their own, and this little communication allows readers to do exactly that. I also include a more traditional poetry prompt in every letter, and sometimes I add a QR code that links to an audio recording of the monthly poem. I also include news about my upcoming appearances, book signings, and other events when appropriate.

I’d love to add more subscribers to my growing roster for Metacreativity. Now more than ever, we need fresh voices putting more relevance into our world through poetry. And as celebrations of poetry begin in this first quarter of 2025, I hope you’ll join me in spreading good words. Whether it’s buying a fresh book of poetry or trying your hand at a sonnet, spring is a perfect time to appreciate beautiful language.