Yesterday, Oct. 6, was National Poetry Day — in the United Kingdom. In celebration, Prince Charles, he of Lady Di fame, read Seamus Heaney’s poem “The Shipping Forecast” on BBC Radio 4.
(Hear it here.)
According to the British Broadcasting Corporation, the theme of this year’s NPD was “Messages,” and the public was encouraged to, “Say it with a poem.” Susannah Herbert, the National Poetry Day director, put it this way: “A poem can reach places that prose just can’t.”
(One can almost hear the cruder among us say something like: Poem & Prose walk into a pub. Prose is stopped at the door: “We don’t serve yer kind here.” Poem then says to the bartender, “I’ll have me a beer.”)
Several events marked the day-long celebration. Here’s my favorite: 380,000 poetic postcards were given away by the Scottish Poetry Library in Edinburgh. I mention this for two reasons: One, I’ve a bit of skittish-Scottish blood high-step dancin’ through my veins; two, always thought Scots squeezed-the-penny — so a give-away seems odd.
National Poetry Day is a Forward Arts Foundation initiative. According to the NPD website, “The Forward Arts Foundation is a charity that enables all to enjoy, discover and share poetry. We champion excellence in poetry and grow audiences through National Poetry Day, the Forward Prizes for Poetry and annual Forward books.”
An honorable pursuit.
Other themes for other years included: Song Lyrics (1999), Fresh Faces (2000), Britain (2003), Food (2004), and Games (2011). Of those, I like “Food” the best — combining, as it does, two of my favorite items: Food and Poetry.
Next year I hope to pen a proper poem for this grand day — this year, I fear, I’m a day late & a rhyme short.
WORD-PLAY ARCHIVE: Click Here
