"poetry from daily life": a treasure trove of goodness

Greetings, Poetry People! I have been remiss. I have never taken the opportunity to highlight the fact that David L. Harrison, one of the greats of children's poetry, has been beavering tirelessly away on a project worthy of a Children's Poet Laureate (although he has never held that title). He is, however, the Missouri Poet Laureate, and has been organizing POETRY FROM DAILY LIFE, a series of columns published in the Springfield (MO) News-Leader and several other newspapers.

The opportunity to write short essays on what poetry is, what it means for us, and how others can access the little daily glories of poetry, has been taken up by a wide range of people writing and performing for a wide range of audiences.  There are columns by Ted Kooser, Jane Yolen and Joseph Bruchac, Marilyn Singer, Janet Wong and Greg Pincus, plus some by Poetry Friday regulars including Laura Purdie Salas, Irene Latham, Matt Forrest Esenwine, and me!  In fact, my second column will be published this Sunday, followed by a column by Kate Coombs on July 19.

My first piece, "You Are the Boss of Your Poem," appeared in September 2024, and my second is titled "Surprise for the writer, surprise for the reader."  In both I talk about writing poetry with elementary-aged kids and feature some of their work. [It's hard to get poetry formatting right in an online newspaper column, but I've tried to be less fussy than usual about that!]

To go along with these columns, David has pursued funding for "a free online library featuring recordings of the columns published. The first fifty-two recordings were completed and introduced as Poetry from Daily Life Free Video Library three months ago." Here’s the link to that channel.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5wGqp5vbw2K0N7cFcGwN5

And here's the video of my first column!

Explore the video channel, follow the column (if that's even possible), and sign up for updates from David's blog--I think we might say that he is the James Brown of children's poetry, the hardest-working man in the business!

Thanks to Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference for hosting us today--where she is, as usual, the walking, talking, poeting opposite of indifference, spurring us towards Peace, Poetry and Justice for All.