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It’s Random Acts of Poetry Day!

By Will Willingham 6 Comments

Random Acts of Poetry teddy bear on cardboard box
I was talking the other day with a couple of twenty-somethings in my extended family who are the kind of people who, when the conversation hits a lull, will reignite it with a question like, “Tell me what else you’ve read lately.” While the rest of the room talked home improvement and sports and weather and any number of worthy subjects, we three talked about literature and not only how much we like it, but really, how much we need it. How fiction can cultivate empathy, and how poetry can help us cope with complexity.

There’s no denying these are times of great complexity. Every time in history is a time of great complexity. But there is no time like the present to bring such complexity into focus. Citizens in a Middle Eastern nation remain under siege. Hurricane Matthew is bearing down on Haiti as I type. Europe continues to grapple with a future of fragmentation. Here in the U.S. we scratch our collective heads over what the current election cycle has wrought.

This is not to mention the complexity that might be unfolding in your home, on your street, in your office or in the check-out line where the tabloids, if nothing else, will remind you with bold headlines and grainy photos what’s going on (or not) in the world around us.

So let me say this: the people standing next to you on this day in history need poetry. Offering a poem — slipped under a windshield wiper, sneaked into a lunch bag, left behind in chalk on a sidewalk, sent along with a bill payment, recited before a meeting, or tucked under a pillow — is a simple, random act which is in and of itself an act of kindness.

Commit a Random Act of Poetry

Share poetry with the world (your world) today, on Random Acts of Poetry Day — a day devoted to painting poetry in the public square (figuratively or literally). Download our little e-booklet of ideas or generate a random idea of your own. We’d love to see what you do, so post your random act on Twitter or Instagram using the hashtag #raopoetryday (follow us on Twitter at @tspoetry and Instagram at @tspoetry). Come back tomorrow and we’ll have a fun wrap-up featuring our favorite Random Acts of Poetry that we saw.

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Photo by Lily, Creative Commons license via Flickr.

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Will Willingham
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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.
Will Willingham
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Latest posts by Will Willingham (see all)
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Filed Under: Blog, poetry, random acts of poetry

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, Adjustments, is available now.

Comments

  1. Matthew Kreider says

    October 5, 2016 at 8:37 am

    Very glad I started the day by reading your piece.

    And this: “the people standing next to you on this day in history need poetry.”

    So true. So let us be kind. And kind of random. 🙂

    Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      October 5, 2016 at 8:41 am

      Kind and kind of random. That right there. 🙂

      Reply
  2. Michael Gowin says

    October 5, 2016 at 9:24 am

    Sharing the good word: http://michaelgowin.com/2016/10/05/psa-random-acts-poetry-day/

    Reply
    • Donna Falcone says

      October 5, 2016 at 9:55 am

      Terrific! I shared your post to my fb feed!

      Reply
  3. Donna Falcone says

    October 5, 2016 at 9:54 am

    Yep! I just committed a Random Act of Poetry, and it felt GREAT! https://twitter.com/BrighterSideBlg/status/783658442317787137

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. 31 Days of Moving Reflections - Day 5 #SouthFloridaBound - Sandra Heska King says:
    October 9, 2016 at 7:32 pm

    […] It’s Random Acts of Poetry Day and I scribble hasty words of home on the side of a book box. […]

    Reply

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