National Poetry Month

Inspired by Black History month, The Academy of American Poets  worked with a variety of interested parties including teachers, publishers, booksellers, librarians, and of course poets to figure out the many ways poetry could be celebrated.  They concluded April was a great month for the celebration, and on April 1, 1996, President Bill Clinton proclaimed April to be National Poetry Month. 

 

Following the Academy’s lead, Writers’ Morning Out has posted a poem-a-day during April since WMO’s inception in 2010.

“Deer Scat” by Judith Stanton

Scat in the rose beds,
scat in the drive,
under the pine trees,
dotting the lawn,

 

down in the ditches
where day lilies grow,
scattered on flagstones
that lead to the porch,

 

by the nandina the deer
strip of red berries,
over to beauty bushes
and swamp azalea
they prune for us.

 

Two hundred dollars
worth of tulips
beheaded before
they bloomed.

 

Whose property do
they think this is?
my exasperated
husband asks.

 

Ours, their cloven
hoof falls whisper,
since the dawn of time.

Previously published in Deer Diaries, 2017