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Take Your Poet to Work: Sara Teasdale

By Will Willingham 55 Comments

Ever wish you could take your favorite poet (like, say, Sara Teasdale) along with you to work? You know, set her next to your computer while you labor on that big report? Or prop her up in your pencil cup to give you a little extra push through to the end of the day?

You haven’t? Well, that’s okay. If you spend enough time with the Tweetspeak community, you may discover things you never knew you wanted, dreams you never realized you had.

Take Your Poet to Work Day is July 16, 2014

To help you play and celebrate with us, we’re releasing poets each week in a compact, convenient format that you can tuck in your pocket, tool belt, or lunchbox. We hear Neruda is coming. Emily Dickinson will put in an appearance. And some weeks we’ll release full collections — the Beat Poets, the Big Six, the Confessionalists.

Is there a poet you’d like to see? Give us your suggestions in the comments. We’ll see what we can do.

Take Your Poet to Work: Sara Teasdale

Take your poet to work - Sara Teasdale

Click here for a downloadable version of Take Your Poet to Work Day Sara Teasdale that you can print and color.

Perhaps if you brought one of her poems along, you could have Sara Teasdale read it to your coworkers over the noon hour.

Sara Teasdale - Take Your Poet to WorkIt Is Not a Word

It is not a word spoken,
Few words are said;
Nor even a look of the eyes
Nor a bend of the head,
But only a hush of the heart
That has too much to keep,
Only memories waking
That sleep so light a sleep.

–Sara Teasdale

Sara Teasdale was a lyrical poet born in 1884. She was known for simple verse focused on love, beauty, death, and loss. Oh, and lots and lots of kissing.

Though she was in love with fellow poet Vachel Lindsay, she married Ernst Filsinger. She and Lindsay remained longtime friends.

Her third poetry collection, Love Songs, won the Columbia Poetry Prize (which later became the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry) in 1918. Other prominent works include Flame and Shadow, and Strange victory, which was published after her death. Teasdale suffered poor health most of her life. She died by suicide in 1933.

Learn more about Take Your Poet to Work Day and our featured poets

Browse more Poets and Poems

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Will Willingham
Will Willingham
Director of Many Things; Senior Editor, Designer and Illustrator at Tweetspeak Poetry
I used to be a claims adjuster, helping people and insurance companies make sense of loss. Now, I train other folks with ladders and tape measures to go and do likewise. Sometimes, when I’m not scaling small buildings or crunching numbers with my bare hands, I read Keats upside down. My first novel is Adjustments.
Will Willingham
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Filed Under: Blog, Poems, Poetry at Work, poetry humor, Sara Teasdale, Take Your Poet to Work Day

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About Will Willingham

I used to be a claims adjuster, helping people and insurance companies make sense of loss. Now, I train other folks with ladders and tape measures to go and do likewise. Sometimes, when I’m not scaling small buildings or crunching numbers with my bare hands, I read Keats upside down. My first novel is Adjustments.

Comments

  1. L. L. Barkat says

    June 1, 2013 at 11:47 am

    oh, just fun. Fun, fun, fun.

    I love this 🙂

    Reply
  2. L. L. Barkat says

    June 1, 2013 at 12:11 pm

    And… I laughed out loud at the thought of a popsicle stick puppet show poetry reading.

    Still, I could almost see the most-fun among us actually doing it 🙂

    Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      June 1, 2013 at 1:37 pm

      I think folks should send us pictures of their poet at work.

      Why not video, too? 🙂

      Reply
  3. Maureen Doallas says

    June 1, 2013 at 11:47 am

    What fun!

    How would you interpret Rumi?

    Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      June 1, 2013 at 1:37 pm

      None of us can really be sure about Rumi, right? 😉 It’s funny you mention him. I just added him to my list earlier today.

      I’m working on Neruda right now. Think: bushy eyebrows. 🙂

      Reply
  4. Megan Willome says

    June 1, 2013 at 4:09 pm

    I like the poet at the end of a stethoscope. Cracks me up. I’m picturing Whitman, the nurse, offering a diagnosis along with a little Leaves of Grass.

    And what are you doing to do for Dickinson? A white dress? A closed door? A curtain fluttering in the breeze? I’ll wait and see!

    Reply
    • L.L. Barkat says

      June 1, 2013 at 6:27 pm

      i hear that some medical programs are actually now training doctors to do just this. Brings some humanity to the process.

      Gee, if they also had a poet on the tongue depressor, they could do an impromptu raise-your-spirits poetry reading 🙂

      Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      June 1, 2013 at 7:01 pm

      Oh, gosh. I never thought about it that way with the stethoscope. Funny. 🙂

      Dickinson is still in the imagination stage. 🙂

      Very funny, Laura, on the tongue depressor. 🙂

      Reply
  5. Donna says

    June 1, 2013 at 3:52 pm

    This is like Flat Stanley for grown ups, only way better!!! 🙂 Happiness is a poet in your pocket! Thanks!

    About Sara T… so tragic to die that way. 🙁 Sadness. I’ve been meaning to learn more about her and read her work, so thanks for starting with her. Sigh. So sad though.

    Reply
    • Donna says

      June 1, 2013 at 3:54 pm

      P.S. .. did you draw this?

      Reply
      • Will Willingham says

        June 1, 2013 at 7:00 pm

        Teasdale is a favorite. But yes, tragic life and death it seems.

        Good ol’ two-dimensional Stan made it into our brainstorming on this. We’ll have to see where some of these poets manage to go. 😉

        And, yes. I did. 🙂

        Reply
        • Donna says

          June 1, 2013 at 7:12 pm

          You never cease to amaze me!!

          Reply
  6. Suzann says

    June 3, 2013 at 12:01 am

    OK. Now I have to think about this — too many to pick from. Emily Elizabeth Dickinson, William Carlos Williams, Robert Frost, Adrienne Cecile Rich … hmm

    🙂 Or someone can take me.

    Reply
  7. Sandra Heska King says

    June 8, 2013 at 3:52 pm

    Suicide? Oh that makes me sad.

    Reply

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