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2021 Poetry Blast!

  1. Humanities Career Connections Workshops
  2. High Stakes Culture Series
  3. High Stakes Art
  4. Jill S. Harris Memorial Lecture
  5. Marc and Constance Jacobson Lecture
  6. Norman Freehling Visiting Professorship
  7. Past Programs & Projects
    1. (Re)Emergence: Asian American Histories and Futures
    2. Humanities Without Walls Predoctoral Career Diversity Summer Workshop
    3. Humanities Without Walls
    4. 2023 Humanities Afrofutures
    5. 2022 HWW Career Diversity Workshop
    6. 2022 Poetry Blast!
    7. Octavia Butler Week
    8. 2021 Poetry Blast!
      1. Prompt a Poem!—A Daily April Poetry Challenge
      2. English Translations
      3. 2021 Poetry Blast Prompt a Poem Submissions
      4. Poems Submitted for April 1, 2021
      5. Poems Submitted for April 2, 2021
      6. Poems Submitted for April 5, 2021
      7. Poems Submitted for April 6, 2021
      8. Poems Submitted for April 7, 2021
      9. Poems Submitted for April 8, 2021
      10. Poems Submitted for April 12, 2021
      11. Poems Submitted for April 9, 2021
      12. Poems Submitted for April 13, 2021
      13. Poems Submitted for April 14, 2021
      14. Poems Submitted for April 15, 2021
      15. Poems Submitted for April 16, 2021
      16. Poems Submitted for April 19, 2021
      17. Poems Submitted for April 20, 2021
      18. Poems Submitted for April 21, 2021
      19. Poems Submitted for April 22, 2021
      20. Poems Submitted for April 23, 2021
      21. Poems Submitted for April 26, 2021
      22. Poems Submitted for April 27, 2021
      23. Poems Submitted for April 28, 2021
      24. Poems Submitted for April 29, 2021
      25. Poems Submitted for April 30, 2021
    9. The Humanities at Work
    10. 2018-19 Year of Humanities and Environments
    11. 2017-18 Year of Archives & Futures
    12. 2016-17 Year of Humanities & Public Policy
    13. 2015-16 Year of Conversions
    14. Early Modern Conversions Project
    15. MCubed Humanities Projects
    16. Author's Forum

April is National Poetry Month, the largest literary celebration in the world. This year we're joining the tens of millions of readers, students, teachers, librarians, booksellers, publishers, families, and, of course, poets, in marking poetry's important place in our lives. Our goal is for everyone in our community to read a poem, write a poem, or listen to a poem in April. Why? As editor and teacher Alice Osborn said, "Poetry is like the Windex on a grubby car window—it bares open the vulnerabilities of human beings so we can all relate to each other a little better."

Take a few minutes to listen to a poem. Every weekday at noon in April, our Youtube channel will feature a U-M faculty member reading one of their poems. Videos will also be archived for those who wish to listen later. If you'd like to receive a daily reminder in your inbox, sign up here

Creative expression through poetry for everyone! Every weekday in April, people from all walks of life can unite behind a common prompt by writing a poem. Sign up here to receive the daily prompts in your inbox, or look here where we will list them. Many thanks to Laura Kasischke for creating the prompts and collaborating on Prompt a Poem. If you're ready to submit a poem, you can submit your poem hereInspired by the 2020 Life/Lines project at the Center for the Humanities at Washington University. 

Stroll around campus and read a poem! We've teamed up with Michigan Quarterly Review to make poetry part of the campus landscape. Look for poems all over campus in windows, on the diag, on buses, and more. If you'd like to make a night of it, check out the Central Campus Poetry Blast Walking Tour, a poem-by-poem guide to the pop-up poems on central campus.

 

Poetry Blast would not have been possible without the generous support of many individuals and organizations, including Michigan Quarterly Review,  U-M Museum of Art, North Quad Programs, Pierpont Commons, Palmer Commons, College of LSA, Laura Kasischke, Grace Geiger, Nate Liebetreu, MHealthy, Michigan Humanities, Ann Arbor District Library, Student Organization Resource Center, Sydney Hawkins, Matthew Adams, Nikki Cischke, Umich Arts & Culture, and the U-M poets who recorded and shared their poems.