It’s Take Your Poet to Work Day!

It’s possible, depending on who frequents your neighborhood coffee shop, that there was a recent influx of colorful poets on sticks ordering cappuccinos and iced coffees. (And, I imagine, a few cups of tea as well.)

In anticipation of this year’s Take Your Poet to Work Day celebration,  we recognized that poets like to take a coffee break as well as anyone else. So we invited you to take your poets to your favorite coffee shop and help us build the first Take Your Poet to Work Day GIF collection. Led by the reclusive Emily Dickinson,  my poets were a little shy about making a scene at the coffee shop so we played a little make-believe instead:

(click the image for a larger view)

So listen. Coffee break is over, and it’s time to get back to work. But before you go, make sure you pick a poet or two to take with you to work. Here are 3 great ways to celebrate:

1. Download our Take Your Poet to Work Coloring Book

Our fun coloring book is full of 20 poets you can cut  out and color. The downloadable book has been updated with the 2015 poets, along with the poets’ backs (fun!) plus props and accessories (more fun!).  Print a copy for yourself and an extra to leave on the table in the break room for your coworkers.

2. Choose a poet from one of our Take Your Poet to Work Day printables

Choose your poet, color and cut him or her out, and attach to a popsicle stick. No matter where you’re going to work, bring your poet along. Maybe you’ll even have your poet read a coffee poem to a coworker who stops by to chat, like this one from Marjorie Maddox:

Anniversary Coffee

On this side of plate glass,
the Pennsylvania sky threatens

no one, calms us with what we aren’t,
such perfect summer squall the calm

we love in morning
coffee and split croissant.

Those behind the counter
know us and know

when to save what we want,
can order for us, smile at how we smile

at each other’s drenched winsomeness. You are
not what I ordered but what I order now

across the café table, across the morning
spread with such delectable savor.

—Marjorie Maddox

(And if you’re not working today, take your poet to the beach, or the grocery store, or yes, of course, to your favorite coffee shop.)

3. Share your Take Your Poet to Work Day photos and stories with us

Tweet us a photo of your poet at work to @tspoetry and use the hashtag #PoetToWork. We’ll share our favorites with the Tweetspeak Poetry community.

* * *

Thanks to all who submitted Take Your Poet to Work Day GIFs from your favorite coffee shop. Our winner of the $100 prize is Suzanne, who says this about her GIF, based on a 12-line poem called “How to Throw an Insult with Shakespearean Style”:

This poem was inspired by the Shakespeare Insult Kit. I created new insults inspired by the words of William Shakespeare. All very tame and silly. The animated poem shows insults volleying between Shakespeare and other poets. In the end William realises he is outnumbered and decides it is wise to turn his back.

Featured photo by abhisawa, Creative Commons license via Flickr. (Modified to include illustrations.) Post and Emily Dickinson coffee GIF by LW Lindquist.

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How to Read a Poem uses images like the mouse, the hive, the switch (from the Billy Collins poem)—to guide readers into new ways of understanding poems. Anthology included.

“I require all our incoming poetry students—in the MFA I direct—to buy and read this book.”

—Jeanetta Calhoun Mish

Buy How to Read a Poem Now!

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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, Adjustments, is available now.

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Latest posts by Will Willingham (see all)

• Summer Break & Take Your Poet to Work Day - July 17, 2021
• Adjustments: A Belated Bicentenary Party for John Keats - March 4, 2021
• The Reindeer Chronicles Book Club: You’re Cutting a Tree in Almería and Getting a Storm in Dusseldorf - February 17, 2021