National Poetry Month at Brooklyn Public Library

April is National Poetry Month, and Brooklyn Public Library is the perfect place to celebrate! The Library is hosting acclaimed poets who will share their latest works. In addition, the Library has compiled a list of favorite poetry reads for 2013. We hope that you join us during National Poetry Month to inspire and revive your poetic nature as well as your reading lists for months to come.

Featured National Poetry Month Events at Brooklyn Public Library

Author Readings: Jessica Greenbaum, D. Nurkse and Beth Bosworth

Acclaimed Brooklyn authors read from their latest works: Poet D. Nurkse reads from his poetry volume, A Night in Brooklyn, a haunted love letter to the far corners of his hometown that brings the borough alive. Jessica Greenbaum’s new poetry volume is The Two Yvonnes. Short story writer Beth Bosworth reads from her new book, The Source of Life, winner of the Drue Heinz Prize.

APRIL 17TH

7:00 PM - 9:00 PM

Dweck Center, Central Library

10 Grand Army Plaza

Panel Discussion: Denise Levertov: Revolution and Revelation

Levertov, who died in 1997, is widely considered to be one of the major American poets of the second half of the Twentieth Century. A panel comprised of Paul E Lacey, Donna Krolik Hollenberg, and Mark Pawlak will discuss Levertov’s life, work, and friendship. Lacey, Professor Emeritus of English at Earlham College is Levertov’s literary executor and editor of Denise Levertov Selected Poems and the soon to be released collected poems. Hollenberg, Professor of English at University of Connecticut, is author of the newly released biography A Poet's Revolution: The Life of Denise Levertov. Pawlak, poet and co-editor of Hanging Loose magazine and press, was a student and protégé of Levertov’s during the almost two decades she lived in Boston.

APRIL 20th

4:00 PM - 6:00 PM

Dweck Center, Central Library

10 Grand Army Plaza

2013 Top Poetry Reads from Brooklyn Public Library

KIDS BOOKS

• Forgive Me, I Meant to Do It: False Apology Poems by Gail Carson Levine; illus. by Matthew Cordell

This collection of mischievous poems features characters such as Snow White and Rapunzel.

• I Lay My Stitches Down: Poems of American Slavery by Cynthia Grady, illus. by Michele Wood

Using the art of quilt-making, the author portrays the experiences of African American slaves in fourteen free-verse poems.

• Step Gently Out by Helen Frost, photographs by Rick Lieder

Appreciate nature’s smallest insects, including ants, fireflies and spiders, through thoughtful poetry and photographs.

YOUNG ADULT BOOKS

• Limericks & Other Poems by Jeffrey E. Burkart

Demonstrates the excitement of poetry by presenting humorous limericks and other poems on various subjects.

• Walking on Earth and Touching the Sky: Poetry and Prose by Lakota Youth at Red Cloud Indian School Edited by Timothy P. McLaughlin ; illus. by S. D. Nelson

Collects poetry written by Lakota on such topics as the history of oral tradition, the struggles of everyday life and their personal connections to the natural world.

• The Emily Sonnets: The Life of Emily Dickinson by Jane Yolen ; illus. by Gary Kelley

Recounts Emily Dickinson's schooling, seclusion and the slant rhymes for which she became famous.

ADULT BOOKS

• Selected poems / Vladimir Nabokov ; edited and with an introduction by Thomas Karshan ; new translations by Dmitri Nabokov.

A collection of poetic works by the acclaimed author features pieces spanning his entire literary career, from 1914's "Music" to 1974's "To Vera" as well as more recently translated works, including "The University Poem" and "To Russia."

• Dogfight : the 2012 presidential campaign in verse / Calvin Trillin.

Presents a humorous ode to the 2012 presidential election that likens the campaign to a three-ring circus and includes riffs on figures ranging from Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich to Rick Perry and Rick Santorum.

• American poetry : the nineteenth century.

In nineteenth-century America, poetry was part of everyday life, as familiar as a hymn, a love song, a patriotic exhortation. American Poetry: The Nineteenth Century reveals the vigor and diversity of a tradition embracing solitary visionaries and congenial storytellers, humorists and dissidents, songwriters and philosophers. These two volumes reassess America's poetic legacy with a comprehensive sweep that no previous anthology has attempted.

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