Preparing for April’s National Poetry Month Celebrations

April is just around the corner, and with that comes the annual celebration of poetry. To help booksellers prepare for National Poetry Month, the Academy of American Poets makes numerous resources available at poets.org. Among them is a free National Poetry Month Poster, which will be included in the March Red Box mailing to ABA member stores. The 2011 poster, designed by Stephen Doyle, features the line “Bright objects hypnotize the mind” from Elizabeth Bishop’s poem “A Word With You.” The poster can also be downloaded in PDF format from the Academy’s website.

Poet.org’s “Tips for Booksellers” features marketing ideas for National Poetry Month as well as for selling more poetry year round. Indie booksellers sharing their success stories on the site include The Booksmith in San Francisco; Prairie Lights in Iowa City, Iowa; Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi; and Tattered Cover Book Store in Denver.

In mid-March, booksellers should be on the lookout for BTW’s announcement of the Spring 2011 Indie Next Poetry Top Ten. The downloadable PDF will feature title recommendations from independent bookstores nationwide. (The deadline for nominations has just been extended to February 25, so send in your favorites now.)

Additionally, The Library of Congress Publishing Office has released The Poets Laureate Anthology (9780393061819, $39.95, Norton), just in time for National Poetry Month. For the first time, works from all 43 Poet Laureates have been collected in one volume that charts the course of American verse over the last 75 years.

And, on February 14, the National Book Foundation launched the NBA Poetry Blog with the publication of an essay by Ross Gay on William Carlos Williams, winner of the first National Book Award for Poetry in 1950. The blog will highlight a different award winner each weekday into May. It includes the original book covers, photographs of the authors, and related material and links.