The Poem-A-Day Project

The Poem-A-Day Project started on a whim in September of 2011.

(BRIANNA and KATIE are two college students, walking back to their residence hall on September 1, 2011.  It's a beautiful day, and they're crossing a parking lot.)

KATIE:  Hey, you know that challenge where you write a poem every day for a month?

BRIANNA:  Yeah, that's crazy.  I don't know if I could do something like that, I'd probably give up the first week.

KATIE:  Yeah...

(pause)

BRIANNA:  Wait a minute...it's September 1st!  Wanna give it a try?

KATIE:  Yeah, okay!

On that day, it began.  Every day I put a poem in Katie's mailbox, and she became September's "Poem Keeper."

It didn't stop after September.

Each month I had a different Poem Keeper who I gave the month's poems to in order to keep myself from reading the poems and judging them in their rough and initially unpolished forms.  Poem Keepers could read the poems, but they couldn't talk to me about them until the end of the month when they returned the entire month's worth of poems and I read them from the perspective of never having read them before.

I thought I might stop after six months.  And then I thought maybe I would stop after I graduated from university.  Then I figured I might as well finish up the calendar year of 2012, but it didn't stop there either.

At this point, I've been writing one poem every day for almost two years, documenting my life and writing some really weird or fun things in a poetic form, and I have no idea if there's ever going to be a point at which I say that I'm done with this project.

What's in store for the Poem-A-Day Project now?  I'm looking for a way to bring my poems to the world.  At Printer's Row Lit Fest, I'll be at the table for Here's the Story with a gumball machine that'll dispense poems in little capsules.  And I'm working on putting together a manuscript of my favorite poems from the project.

Thanks for reading!  I'm always looking for tips, guidance, advice, or shouts of encouragement, so feel free to leave a comment, I will read them all!

"That night when you kissed me, I left a poem in your mouth, and you can hear some of the lines every time you breathe out."

- Andrea Gibson