Our video resource today was suggested by longtime Na/GloPoWriMo participant Elizabeth Boquet, of Oaks to Acorns. She and a fellow group of poets in Lausanne, Switzerland, have been engaging with the concept of meta-poems – which are poems about poems! In this video, the poets Al Fireis, Lily Applebaum, Dave Poplar, and Camara Brown discuss Emily Dickinson’s “We learned the Whole of Love.” You can find additional background and video discussions of other meta-poems here.

And now for our daily (optional) prompt. As you may have guessed, today I’d like to challenge you to try your hand at a meta-poem of your own. If you’re having trouble coming up with a poem about poetry, and would like to take a look at a few examples, you might check out the Wallace Stevens and Harryette Mullens poems featured in the article about metapoetry linked above, or perhaps Archibald MacLeish’s “Ars Poetica” or Kendel Hippolyte’s “Advice to a Young Poet.”

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A meta-poem about poetry, poets and readers

Not everyone’s cup of tea

This assortment of words, called poetry

That says so much, with so little said

Requires a connoisseur to be enjoyed and read

 

A peek into a poet’s soul it gives; his perceptions;

Thoughts, beliefs and his emotions

Etched out in succinct verses-

At times it inspires, at times it nurses

 

Sometimes conceived in unforgiving wrath and sometimes in deep sorrow;

Sometimes in the hope of a better ‘morrow

At times in amazement or in ecstasy

Or an elementary wish, to spin a Utopian world of fallacy

 

Then into blank pages a poet must  dive

For poetry an elixir, that keeps a poet alive

P.S. I’m not sure if I did the meta-poem right. So if it isn’t, would be glad to have your guidance.

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