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LGBT Poetry

Today’s monthly poetry event is sponsored by Kelly at The Written World, so go over there and link up your poetry post for February!

After reading and reviewing Resilience edited by Eric Nguyen last week, I started thinking about all the poetry I’ve read and how universal it is.  I really pay little to no attention to what poets are LGBT and which poets are not.  Most of us know that Walt Whitman was gay, as was Oscar Wilde.  But what other classic and contemporary poets are/were LGBT? And could you tell by reading their poetry or were the verse more cryptic about it or more universal in scope?

While I am curious about how many published LGBT poets there are in contemporary society compared to those from the past, I’m more interested in whether we should bother categorizing our artists in this way.  Do we really need to know the sexual orientation of our poets in order to enjoy their art form?  Does it affect how we see their work and whether or not we enjoy it?  And does their poetry have to focus on the struggles of their oppressed minority or can it be broader in focus?

Just some food for thought.  I’d like to hear what everyone has to say.

For now, I’ll leave you with one of my favorite poems from Resilience edited by Eric Nguyen:

The Straight Boys Kiss by Rene Cardona

so they sit
and stare into the air
the secrets texted
make them nervous
more each second
so they lean in--
the smiles stop,
and stares shoot
like evening stars
to the lips of the one across.

For those in NYC:

On March 17 at 3-5PM, an Open Mic night will be held for contributors to the collection at WordUP Books.

For more information about the Resilience project, visit the blog.

I hope you’ll consider joining the 2012 Fearless Poetry Reading Challenge.

For those in the challenge who already have reviewed poetry volumes in February, please put your full links in the Mr. Linky below:

Reason to Drool Over Poetry

I’ve read a number of posts over the years from fellow bloggers about their love/lust of authors from the Book Lady’s Panty Throwing to bloggers like Hey Lady! Whatcha Readin?’s spotlights on the books she’s drooling over.  I know that we all drool over actors and various book series and more, but when it comes to poetry, many people shy away or turn their backs.

I’ve got a little incentive for you to consider reading poetry or looking at the poets who make the poems.  Have you heard of the Naked Muse 2012 Calendar? If you follow my Facebook/Twitter updates, you may have when I shared the Huffington Post article on this little gem.

(I want to formally thank Anna since she sent it to me at a time I was struggling on what to write about for my first poetry post)

I really love that these poets decided to bare all for a good cause — see poets aren’t always purposefully confusing and there to just drive you crazy with seemingly incongruous allusions and metaphors.  In fact, their meanings can be as plain as the skin that they bare to the camera.  I’d love to see some American poets get in on this little project.

I like the idea that 100% of the profits will be used to help those with Type 1 Diabetes through research at JDRF.

What contemporary or classic poets would you like to see in a naked calendar?  What is your poetry post about today?

I hope you’ll consider joining the 2012 Fearless Poetry Reading Challenge.

For those in the challenge who already have reviewed poetry volumes in January, please put your full links in the Mr. Linky below:

The Gauntlet Has Been Dropped: Monthly Poetry Event

Lu, Kelly, and Eva have talked about reading more poetry in 2012, and they want us all to join in.  Stuck for a list of enjoyable poetry books, check out the Indie Lit Awards 2011 list and Lu’s list.

This challenge is open to everyone — from those who love poetry already to those just starting out or returning to poetry — and you don’t even have to read poetry, but post about poetry.  You could post about your favorite poet, why you hate poetry, why you want to read poetry, different poetic forms, something you remember about poetry from school, and anything else you can think of as long as it is about poetry.

This is the schedule for posting ONCE per month:

Poetry: Read More/Blog More – A Monthly Event!

January 31st
February 28th
March 27th
April 23rd
May 29th
June 26th
July 31st
August 28th
September 25th
October 30th
November 27th
December 18th

Once you’ve posted, visit Lu and Kelly’s blogs to put your link in the Mr. Linky!  Once you have your sign up post ready, link up here.

I’ve picked up the gauntlet, will you?!