{"id":8130,"date":"2014-03-21T15:38:03","date_gmt":"2014-03-21T19:38:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/?p=8130"},"modified":"2014-03-21T15:38:03","modified_gmt":"2014-03-21T19:38:03","slug":"international-poetry-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html","title":{"rendered":"International Poetry Day!"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"poetry<\/a>
courtesy of Google<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Poetry — the breath of love, life, grief, terror, justice. And more…<\/p>\n

We woo with it, grieve with it, celebrate and commemorate and just plain live with it. All around the world today, poets and readers and appreciators are joining together in praise of the mystery of poetry.<\/p>\n

In other countries, poets have the fame and star power of movie stars here. Poets can — and have — destroyed totaliarian governments. They’ve also won the hearts of fair love, from Albania to Zimbabwe. It’s only right that the world should join together to honour the vastly colourful and infinitely varied body of poetry our various countries’ poets have written.<\/p>\n

\"poetry<\/a>
courtesy of Google<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Next month, fittingly (since it’s my birthday month!) is National Poetry Month in the U.S. So prepare for an onslaught of poetry. Today, though, I want to share a goofy poem by one of my favourites, Ogden Nash. I’ve never understood why Nash ‘gets no respect’ in academia. Lauded poets are far less skilled, in my humble opinion. And as far as laughter at his antics? Who doesn’t need a laugh? Almost any day of the year??<\/p>\n

Here’s “Spring Comes to Murray Hill,” courtesy of The Writer’s Almanac<\/a> this week:<\/p>\n

Spring Comes to Murray Hill<\/p>\n

I sit in an office at 244 Madison Avenue
\nAnd say to myself You have a responsible job, havenue?
\nWhy then do you fritter away your time on this doggerel?
\nIf you have a sore throat you can cure it by using a good goggerel,
\nIf you have a sore foot you can get it fixed by a chiropodist,
\nAnd you can get your original sin removed by St. John the Bopodist,
\nWhy then should this flocculent lassitude be incurable?
\nKansas City, Kansas, proves that even Kansas City needn’t always
\nbe Missourible.
\nUp up my soul! This inaction is abominable.
\nThe pilgrims settled Massachusetts in 1620 when they landed on a
\nstone hummock.
\nMaybe if they were here now they would settle my stomach.
\nOh, if I only had the wings of a bird
\nInstead of being confined on Madison Avenue I could soar in a
\njiffy to Second or Third.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Poetry — the breath of love, life, grief, terror, justice. And more… We woo with it, grieve with it, celebrate and commemorate and just plain live with it. All around the world today, poets and readers and appreciators are joining together in praise of the mystery of poetry. In other countries, poets have the fame…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":398,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[11,1181,1187,262,765,1190],"class_list":["post-8130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry","tag-beginners-heart","tag-britton-gildersleeve","tag-buddhism","tag-buddhist-blogs","tag-international-poetry-day","tag-poetry"],"yoast_head":"\nInternational Poetry Day! - Beginner's Heart<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Poetry -- the breath of love, life, grief, terror, justice. And more... We woo with it, grieve with it, celebrate and commemorate and just plain live with\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"International Poetry Day! - Beginner's Heart\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Poetry -- the breath of love, life, grief, terror, justice. And more... We woo with it, grieve with it, celebrate and commemorate and just plain live with\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beginner's Heart\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-03-21T19:38:03+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2014\/03\/poetry-goes-around.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Britton Gildersleeve\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"International Poetry Day! - Beginner's Heart","description":"Poetry -- the breath of love, life, grief, terror, justice. And more... We woo with it, grieve with it, celebrate and commemorate and just plain live with","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"International Poetry Day! - Beginner's Heart","og_description":"Poetry -- the breath of love, life, grief, terror, justice. And more... We woo with it, grieve with it, celebrate and commemorate and just plain live with","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html","og_site_name":"Beginner's Heart","article_published_time":"2014-03-21T19:38:03+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2014\/03\/poetry-goes-around.jpg"}],"author":"Britton Gildersleeve","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html","name":"International Poetry Day! - Beginner's Heart","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2014\/03\/poetry-goes-around.jpg","datePublished":"2014-03-21T19:38:03+00:00","dateModified":"2014-03-21T19:38:03+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#\/schema\/person\/b4348bfbe2223c0ec325db830aa95f52"},"description":"Poetry -- the breath of love, life, grief, terror, justice. And more... We woo with it, grieve with it, celebrate and commemorate and just plain live with","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2014\/03\/poetry-goes-around.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2014\/03\/poetry-goes-around.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/international-poetry-day.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"International Poetry Day!"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/","name":"Beginner's Heart","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Britton Gildersleeve","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#\/schema\/person\/b4348bfbe2223c0ec325db830aa95f52","name":"Britton Gildersleeve","description":"Britton Gildersleeve is a 'third culture kid.' Years spent living on the margins - in places with exotic names and food shortages - have left her with a visceral response to folks \u2018without,\u2019 as well as a desire to live her Buddhism in an engaged fashion. She\u2019s a writer and a teacher, the former director of a federal non-profit for teachers who write. She believes that if we talk to each other, we can learn to love each other (but she's still learning how). And she believes in tea. She is (still) working on her beginner's heart ~","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/author\/brittongildersleeve"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8130","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/398"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8130"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8130\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8136,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8130\/revisions\/8136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8130"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8130"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8130"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}