Monthly Archives: April 2025

Exploring a tactile approach to poetry

April was declared National Poetry Month in the United States in 1996 by the Academy of American Poets. Likewise in Canada, in 1998, the League of Canadian Poets established April as National Poetry Month to bring together “schools, publishers, booksellers, literary organizations, libraries, communities and poets from across the country to celebrate poetry and its vital place in Canada’s culture.”

Here in Ontario, things feel less than celebratory at the moment. Winter is overstaying its welcome, the goings-on of our neighbours to the south are having an impact on us and around the world, a federal election is surfacing domestic challenges and fault lines, and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is estimated to cover an area of about 1.6 million square kilometres. Yikes, to say the least.

Reading can feel like a wonderful escape right now. Poetry can, too. How lovely to dive into a Mary Oliver poem and feel at peace with the quiet majesty of geese, or trees, or grasshoppers. How tantalising to experience e.e. cummings’ thoughts on the body. How cerebral to spend a few hours (or a lifetime) investigating what William Carlos Williams meant by the red wheelbarrow in the rain.

Poetry is also political–a tool of resistance and protest. As the Editors of the Poetry Foundation have said, “Speaking truth to power remains a crucial role of the poet in the face of political and media rhetoric designed to obscure, manipulate, or worse.”

I have been exploring poetry myself recently, as both a reader and a writer. The world of poetry is vast and varied, and what I’ve read at school or in literary journals is a teensy fraction of all the poetic expression there is to enjoy.

And I want more.

As I continue my poetic education, I’ve decided to forget learning about the “important” poems. Forget about the canon, forget about the Norton anthologies. Instead, I’m reading poems published in The Walrus (like “Honey Crisp” by Molly Peacock). I’m reading poems tagged with #blueskypoets. I’m reading poems submitted to Poetry Week at CommuterLit where I’m a volunteer reader. I’m reading haikus, pantoums, sonnets, and so much more.

In my own poetic scribblings, I’ve been playing with words, imagery, and forms. I’ve written a poem about a spider crawling across my ceiling, a poem about a night out with my best friend, a poem about grapes. I’ve played around with book spine poems–and gotten the other Restless Writers trying it too (here’s Beckie’s, Andrea’s, and Sharon’s).

Something fun I did recently was cut words out of a magazine to create a collection of six-word poems, which I then consolidated into a single poem. I love how this activity is so accessible and exciting. It was tactile. Having my vocabulary limited to the words I had cut out forced me to find powerful and surprising creative combinations.

If you’re looking for a way to make poetry yourself, this exercise has a low barrier to entry. You can use any magazine–I chose the LCBO’s Food&Drink (natch). If you’re creating a book-spine poem, all you need is your own bookcase or a visit to the library. Play, celebrate! You don’t have to worry about being timeless, or cathartic, or insightful, or political. Those are all important aspects to poetry, and I will continue to strive to give my own poems that deeper dimension. But don’t let it stop you from the joyful act of playing with words to describe or illuminate your own experience of the world.

That’s how I’m celebrating this National Poetry Month. Will you join me?

Here’s the result of my experiment:

Armchair Adventurer
 
What flavour is beyond the world?
Meet the soul available for a game
A story about olives and wines
Pour your heart over the star flowers
 
Swap tomorrow to savour new time
Hop down the hour for escape
Drinking seconds by the loved road
Playing with plans for better madness
 
The blues feast at high showtime
Impressed by delights of happy sights
Scoop today – plan a great move
The active solution, a spirit choice
 
Travel to the layers of winter
Two views of the next west
Bench planning and start making sense
Explore the road under buzzing island
 
What has brought in your world?
We sip cocktails and taste culture
Our best pursuits are in adventures
Born yours with the unforgettable infinite

Maria Hypponen

Wishing you an inspiring National Poetry Month!

Maria