Poetry Day

What the day is

Poetry Day is observed on October 1. It is one of several poetry dates on the calendar, and the least formal of them: no organizing body, no theme, no required reading.

It sits alongside a number of relatives that are easy to confuse. World Poetry Day is held in March under UNESCO. The United Kingdom's National Poetry Day falls in early October, on a Thursday, with an annual theme. April is National Poetry Month in the United States. The proliferation is itself a reasonable argument that people want more occasions to read poems than they actually take.

Origin and background

The origin of this particular October 1 observance is not documented, and no founder or sponsoring organization is reliably known.

What the various poetry days share is a response to the same problem: poetry has an unusually large gap between the number of people who liked it at school and the number who read it now. Publishers, libraries and schools tend to use these dates to close that gap a little, through readings, displays and commissioned work.

Poetry's fortunes have shifted considerably in the last decade, largely through performance and short-form publishing. Spoken word, poetry shared on social platforms, and verse novels for younger readers have brought in audiences that traditional collections were not reaching, and have caused the usual arguments about whether popularity and quality are related.

How to take part

• Read one poem slowly, twice. Most poems are built to be reread and give up very little on a first pass.
• Read it aloud. Rhythm is not decoration in poetry; it carries meaning, and silent reading loses it.
• Do not start with the hardest thing. A poet who is enjoyable on first contact is a better entry point than one you feel you ought to admire.
• Try a local reading. Hearing poets perform their own work changes how the page sounds afterward.
• Write one badly. It is a quick way to understand why the good ones are difficult.

If you want a starting point, an anthology is a better buy than a single collection, because it lets you find the voice you respond to before committing to it.