April 30, 2021
Dear Friends of Poetry Daily,
Thank you so much for subscribing to Poetry Daily. We’re very grateful for our readership and hope, in turn, that you will consider supporting us.
We trust you have enjoyed celebrating National Poetry Month with our second annual: 30 Presses/30 Poets (#ArmchairBookFair21). We hope that celebrating new books and offering free ads to their presses has bolstered enthusiasm and helped promote work of the poets who remain unable to travel to read. This year we have added links to videos of featured poets reading their poems; for example, you can see Yusef Komunyakaa reading "Ode to a Maggot" or Katie Peterson reading from Life in a Field.
Poetry Daily is now housed at George Mason University and, as such, we are fortunate to be able to support three graduate-MFA-fellows, who work on production, communication, and editing. However, we also depend heavily on the work of volunteers. During the last year, in particular, I have felt so grateful not only for the essential work and generosity of our volunteers, but by the energy and light they have offered our team. I want to share with you brief personal statements from each. Please know your support makes experiences like these possible. |
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 | | Pictured are Poetry Daily volunteers Lesley Smith, Alaina Johansson and Lloyd Wallace |
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Lesley Smith: I volunteered with Poetry Daily in the late spring of 2019 simply “to help out over the summer.” Almost two years later, I’m still here, working on permissions to reproduce poems, and our daily email newsletter. The openness of digital publishing has always excited me, and through Poetry Daily anyone with access to an email address or an internet browser can enjoy new poems, and ideas, otherwise barricaded inside expensive books and specialized libraries. That openness extends to the collaborative production of Poetry Daily, where what you contribute matters more than status or background. I’m fortunate to be at a stage in my life where I don’t have to worry about building a c.v. or entering the job market, but I learn daily from colleagues who, in the face of those pressures, devote such energy and passion to the reading, writing and sharing of poetry. And, of course, it is fun.
Alaina Johansson: I am a senior at GMU looking forward to pursing an MFA. I have been volunteering with Poetry Daily for about 10 months but over that short amount of time I have grown as an artist and as a professional. Poetry Daily has also given me the opportunity to be in touch with some of my idols! [I won’t soon forget speaking with Jorie Graham on the phone!] As a permissions intern, and an aid to Lesley Smith, I send emails to presses and poets asking for their permission to feature their work, and if [when!] they say yes, I get to follow up with compliments and requests for supplemental materials that enhance the feature. I could not be more thankful to have gained a more structured understanding of the publishing world. Poetry is critical to society, and I am thrilled to volunteer with Poetry Daily.
Lloyd Wallace: I've been helping out with Poetry Daily ever since it moved to George Mason, my main jobs being the handling of manuscript requests, helping with PD's reading load, and a bunch of miscellaneous office duties. My favorite (pre-pandemic) job was the mailroom, where I was able to get first pick of all the amazing work that's sent our way. Having graduated from George Mason's BFA Creative Writing program in 2019, I'll be back on campus in the fall as a Poetry Daily fellow in George Mason's MFA. The best book that we've featured, in my opinion, is Mary Ruefle's Dunce, for its scenic and precise imagination. I've lived in Virginia all my life.
******* After a challenging year, we hope you will think about a gift to help sustain this small nonprofit. A donation to Poetry Daily goes directly towards our operational expenses, including website maintenance and our forthcoming educational initiatives, as well as payment for panelists at our cherished virtual events.
We have plenty to look forward to and hope you will join us. Currently we are working on a new series on poetry and the environment; donating books through the Fairfax Poet Laureate program "Poetry Lives Here"; and, most importantly, continuing to offer the best in contemporary poetry to our readers.
Please celebrate National Poetry Month with us and make a gift to Poetry Daily; if you cannot make a donation, you can still support Poetry Daily by purchasing all of your books through our Bookshop storefront.
Thank you and be well, |
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Sally Keith
Editorial Director |
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