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
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.
It 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
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Will Willingham
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Maureen Doallas says
What fun, Lyla!
How would you interpret Rumi?
Lyla Lindquist says
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. 🙂
L. L. Barkat says
oh, just fun. Fun, fun, fun.
I love this 🙂
L. L. Barkat says
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 🙂
Lyla Lindquist says
I think folks should send us pictures of their poet at work.
Why not video, too? 🙂
Donna says
This is like Flat Stanley for grown ups, only way better!!! 🙂 Happiness is a poet in your pocket! Thanks Lyla!
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.
Donna says
P.S. Lyla… did you draw this?
Lyla Lindquist says
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. 🙂
Donna says
You never cease to amaze me!!
Megan Willome says
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!
L.L. Barkat says
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 🙂
Lyla Lindquist says
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. 🙂
Suzann says
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.
Sandra Heska King says
Suicide? Oh that makes me sad.