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A black-and-white portrait of James Baldwin, with an introspective expression, sitting in a chair. Visible behind him is a typewriter and a nightstand with a lamp.

Essay

Poet, Prophet, Prodigy

By Joshua Bennett

For James Baldwin on his 100th birthday.

Learning Prompt

The Infra-Ordinary: All That Goes Unnoticed

By Alecia Beymer July 16, 2024

Inspired by Georges Perec’s An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris, this prompt invites thinking about the various ways we might attend to the ordinary around us through creative...
Interview

An Ever-Bigger Table

By James D. Sullivan

A conversation with B. Metzger Sampson, executive director of the Chicago Poetry Center.
Essay

On “A Bigger Table: 50 Years of the Chicago Poetry Center”

By James D. Sullivan

An introduction to the Poetry Foundation’s latest exhibition.
Prose from Poetry Magazine

Editor’s Note, July/August 2024

By Adrian Matejka

Poem Guides

- Poem Guide
  
  Sylvia Plath’s “The Applicant”
  
  By Julie Irigaray
  
  A hymn to female independence in the form of a withering critique of marriage
  
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- Poem Guide
  
  The Hearers to Collection: T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land
  
  By Tyler Malone
  
  Who are all these people? Where is this waste land they inhabit? What is this chaos of impressions we are privy to? Wherefore such madness?
  
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- Poem Guide
  
  Margaret Walker’s “For My People”
  
  By CM Burroughs
  
  There is lightness within these downtrodden lives!
  
  Read More

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Harriet Blog

Bright, multi-colored letters reads "TRY POETRY" with a pale yellow background

Join Us for Poetry Month: Free Poetry, Events, and More!

By The Editors April 1, 2024

Join us in celebrating Poetry Month this April with free access to Poetry magazine, events, and so much more!
Free Poetry for Everyone
This Poetry Month, we’re thrilled to offer a FREE download of the April 2024 issue of Poetry for you...

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Meet our Grantee-Partner: Guild Literary Complex

June 25, 2024

The Guild Literary Complex (Guild Complex) was established in 1989 as a community bookstore, which soon became a nonprofit organization providing poetry programming to communities in Chicago that did not...
Meet Our Grantee-Partner: WriteGirl

June 10, 2024

While living in New York City, poet, songwriter, and freelance writer Keren Taylor helped lead poetry writing workshops for girls. She noticed the workshops’ transformative impact and wanted to continue...
Meet Our Grantee-Partner:
The Watering Hole

May 27, 2024

Candace G. Wiley and Monifa Lemons Jackson attended Cave Canem South Workshops in Columbia, South Carolina, in 2010 and 2011. Their experience as Cave Canem fellows inspired them to recreate...
Meet Our Grantee-Partner: 826CHI

May 13, 2024

826CHI opened its doors in Chicago in 2005 as part of the 826 National network, which was founded by author Dave Eggers and educator Nínive Calegari in 2002 and now...