Go Ahead, Make Our Year: The FedEx Dare

As you well know (or maybe you are hearing this for the first time), we are the Poetry Dare people.

Maybe that started with our dare to ourselves, as recalled in this interview at Bluehost: we’ve dared to enter the poetry industry, in order to bring the world the best in poetry and poetic things (laughing all the way).

Fittingly, the dare to ourselves had its beginnings with a dare from one business man to another, one night on Twitter. Glynn Young dared Jim Wood: Write a poem for L.L.

Business man Jim Wood was not (yet) a poet, and that particular night he made an excuse which was turned into a poem by L.L.:

A poem?

While I’m on
the line with Dell?

and tweeting? That’s
way too much multi-

tasking (plus I’m
making a sandwich).

As you well know (or maybe you are realizing this for the first time), one dare often leads to another. That dare to Jim Wood on Twitter eventually led to more bantering, which became a party, which became a blog, which became so much more, which was recalled in that interview on Bluehost.

Now we are wondering. We had asked Bluehost about the possibility of servers on the moon, in case poetry came to need them. What if we could actually get their servers a ride to the moon (never mind the issue of finding electrical sockets once the servers touch down).

Okay, huddle now. Here’s the plan. As far as we know, FedEx has yet to make a delivery to the moon, but we figure if they are in the business of flying…it could happen.

And, in any case, we’d be happy enough to deliver poetry to NASA, via FedEx, should the moon expedition not pan out.

How can you get FedEx to go to the moon with poetry (or at least the coast of Florida)? We are asking you daring you to send them with your vote. All you have to do is vote every day in the FedEx small business grant contest, from now through February 23rd.

We promise to write you a thank you poem if you get FedEx to take poetry to the metaphorical moon, or to NASA, or even just to work. Better yet, maybe all of us could write FedEx #poetryatwork poems in a party on Twitter if they put poetry on board.

It’s always fun to come full circle. Moon dare back to Twitter dare. Who knows, Jim Wood, we might even give a little @ to you and Dell if FedEx makes our year.

***

What does it take to fund TS Poetry for a year? More than the grand prize FedEx grant. But if we won, it would feel like going to the moon.

More than this, we believe it would be one big step for poetry—and bringing poetry and literacy opportunities to education! (Check out this great partnership between FedEx and the Redskins. We can picture a similar high school delivery featuring How to Read a Poem.)

UPDATE, February 26, 2014:

Sadly, we did not win the grant. We note that we were beat out by a toad, a moose, a spider, and a pig in the FedEx small biz contest. Clearly, we need a wildlife component. 😉 Thank you to *everyone* who worked so tirelessly to try to help us win. We will remember your contributions dearly.