Welcome to a special Utah monthly edition of Poetry Happens, brought to you by Rock Canyon Poets. With the current state of in-person events, we’re focusing this edition on how you can still celebrate National Poetry Month by attending online events, prompts and resources for writing your own poems, and supporting Utah poets!
Tune in on KRCL RadioActive the first Monday of every month at 6pm for announcements and feature poet reading! This month our feature poets are Trish Hopkinson, Nancy Takacs, and Joel Long. You can watch video recordings of Trish and Joel’s poems recorded in March on Facebook: “Earthquake // Corona” by Trish Hopkinson and “Map to Taylor Creek” by Joel Long.
UPCOMING ONLINE EVENTS
City Art Virtual Reading Series – City Art is a reading series in Salt Lake City that is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. With the Pandemic, we are moving online to create the City Art Virtual Reading Series to keep people safe and feed their hunger for language and the human story. Current readings on the City Art SLC Facebook page and the City Art Virtual Reading Series on Youtube include Katharine Coles, Wyn Cooper, Lance Olsen, Marty Williams, Trish Hopkinson, and David Baker, among others. Readings keep coming, so check back in both places to see these and the new readings!
30 Poems in 30 Days Competition – Announcing the SLCC Community Writing Center’s Annual 30 Poems in 30 Days Writing Competition! Write 30 poems based on daily prompts throughout the month of April. Winners will have a chapbook of their original poems produced by the CWC. Register by April 30th, either online or in person, for just $5 (fee can be waived on request). April 1, 2020 at 10:00 a.m., the first of the 30 writing prompts will be posted on the CWC’s Facebook (@CommunityWritingCenter) and Instagram (@slcc_cwc) accounts. Each morning, a new prompt will be posted. Participants must meaningfully incorporate each prompt into the corresponding poem. Contestants must submit their poems via Submittable or in person at the CWC by May 9, 2020 @ 3 p.m. Please see full rules and regulations.
CELEBRATE NATIONAL POETRY MONTH
Read/Listen/Watch Poems
NaPoWriMo.net 30 poems in 30 days – Participate in NaPoWriMo.net 30 poems in 30 days prompts and poet web site listings.
Writer’s Digest is running their April Poem-A-Day Challenge – Anyone can participate—there’s no registration and no fees. They will post a daily prompt; you write a poem based on the prompt; you post the poem in the comments on their blog. Easy and fun! You can also submit up to 5 poems to be shared on the Writers Digest site.
Social/Distance Online Writing Retreat with Amanda Moore – Join Amanda Moore for her online writing retreat with craft tips, readings to inspire, submission suggestions and more!
Writing in Stressful Times: The Covid-19 Pandemic via Adele Kenny – Adele Kenny has a wonderfully inspiring poetry blog The Music In It: Adele Kenny’s Poetry Blog chock full of over 300 writing prompts, including her most recent post entitled Prompt #349 – Writing in Stressful Times: The Covid-19 Pandemic. She gives helpful commentary, quotes, resources, and several writing exercises and/or prompts in each post.
The Rise of Quarantine Zines and How to Make Your Own – lots of history and information on how to create and share your own zine.
Writing Prompts for Stay-At-Home Writers – hosted by LiteraryArts.org, shares prompts from established writers and poets throughout the week.
The Poetry Prompt Project, lessons and prompts by Joey Gould – eight well crafted poetry writing lessons and prompts for the beginner to advanced poet.
CALLS FOR POEMS (Utah-based)
2020 Agha Shahid Ali Prize in Poetry – Manuscripts must be in English and should be between 48 and 100 typed pages. Fee: $25. Deadline: April 15.
Provo Poetry POEMBALL Machine – Send in up to 10 short poems to be included in the POEMBALL Machines in Provo and Salt Lake City.
Utah Life call for poems: May/June 2020 issue will be poems on the theme of “Dog days of summer.” Deadline May 1.
Western Humanities Review – open to submissions year round.
For more national submission calls, visit https://trishhopkinson.com.
MORE POETRY PROMPTS
Poetry Super Highway Prompt-A-Day – Submit your own prompt to be posted and read other poet’s prompts during April.
Fifty Two Poetry – includes 52 poetry prompts. “Write a poem a week. Start now. Keep going.”
Poets & Writers puts out regular prompts for poetry as well as fiction and nonfiction on their Writing Prompts page. You can also subscribe to their e-newsletter and receive them right in your inbox weekly.
Daily Word Prompts by Julie Paul – via her website, www.juliepaul.ca, where you can subscribe for daily emails, or on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/juliepaulthewriter
Ploughshares shared their favorite writing prompts of all-time in this article posted in December. Lots of great prompts in this list, including one I hope to take advantage of: “Write a dialog between your eyes and feet,” from Anastacia Tolbert.
500 Prompts for Narrative and Personal Writing from The Learning Network. “The categorized list below touches on everything from sports to travel, education, gender roles, video games, fashion, family, pop culture, social media and more, and, like all our Student Opinion questions, each links to a related Times article and includes a series of follow-up questions. What’s more, all these questions are still open for comment by any student 13 or older.”
If you have an event or announcement related to poetry in Utah, please contact us here and we will include it in our next edition.
Rock Canyon Poets 