One Page Poetry Circle Archive

Welcome to the One Page Poetry Circle at St. Agnes Branch Library!

Date: Tuesday, April 17
Time: 5:30 - 6:30 pm
Place: St. Agnes Branch Library, 444 Amsterdam Avenue (near 81st Street), 3rd Floor
Theme: Poetry and Enjambment (pdf)

Find a poem! Show up! Read a poem! Discuss a poem!

We're back for the spring season of the One Page Poetry Circle where people gather to examine the works of established poets. While there's no instructor and this is not a workshop for personal writing, once a month OPPC gives everyone a place to become teachers and learners to explore the form, content, language and meaning of poetry. Since the circle began, participants have selected and discussed 1057 poems and have read countless others in pursuit of poetry that speaks to them.

For April's program, Poetry and Timing, we'll take a close look at how a poem creates its own beat through meter or the lack of meter (free verse), punctuation, line breaks, and words. The poet uses these instruments to create a unique timing that gives a poem its cadence. Often the timing of a poem reflects its subject.

Through repetition, time comes to a standstill in Robert Browning's two-line poem, "Rhyme for a Child Viewing a Naked Venus in a Painting of 'The Judgement of Paris.'"

• He gazed and gazed and gazed and gazed,
• Amazed, amazed, amazed, amazed.

Meter and alliteration speed up these lines from Algernon Charles Swinburne's "Nephelidia":

• From the depth of the dreamy decline of the dawn through a notable nimbus of nebulous noonshine,
•       Palid and pink as the palm of the flag-flower that flickers with fear of the flies as
        they float—
• Are they looks of our lovers that lustrously lean from a marvel of mystic miraculous
  moonshine,
•       These that we feel in the blood of our blushes that thicken and threaten with
•       throbs through the throat?

We're looking forward to the poems you bring and read aloud on the subject of Timing. Whether a poem has an interesting meter or has a theme connected with time, feel free to bring a poem that has meaning for you. Can't locate a poem you want to bring? Browse the poetry section at the library or check out Poetry Foundation or poets.org.

Please blog with us at onepagepoetrycircle.wordpress.com.

Spring 2018 Schedule
April 17: Poetry and Timing
May 8: Poetry and Choices

Abigail Burnham Bloom and
AnnaLee Wilson

The One Page Poetry Circle is sponsored by the New York Public Library and is open to all. St. Agnes Branch Library is handicap accessible.